Sabine, Tobias and I attempted to defy the freaky snow-less winter in the north part of the Swiss alps and headed south of the crest, where they are having something like once-in-a-hundred-years quantity of snow. They don't usually get a ton of snow down there so this isn't saying too much, but it's plenty for good touring with minimal chances of wrecking your skis!
We got going at an amazingly early time of 10 am from the Zürich main station and made it up to the beautiful new Cristallina hut by 4 pm. High freezing levels meant that the snow below 2000m was pleasant wet concrete, but up higher it gradually turned into fluffy powder. The Cristallina hut is very new because the old one was destroyed in an avalanche -- luckily they decided on a new location when they built this one so no need to be afraid for your life if you stay there. The hut caretaker cooked up an awesome 4 course meal of minestrone, risotto, pizza, salad and panettone (well the last one was probably store-bought)... quite the feast!
Next morning the clouds gradually gave way to the sun and we did some peak-hopping -- first we climbed Cristallina (2912), then headed across the way to Cima di Lago (2833m) and finally on our way toward our exit route via Val Piana, we stopped on top of Poncione di Val Piana (2660m). The skiing off the peaks was great, although the descent through Val Piana was already almost fully tracked out in the narrow spots, which came as a bit of a surprise. Once we hit the fog layer the snow turned to the awesomest kind of mushy and breakable crust which made the last 400m of our descent a good survival-turn character-building exercise... but we made it down unscathed and even had time to grab bratwurst and beer before catching the bus back to Airolo.
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| approaching Capanna Cristallina at sunset |
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| Cap. Cristallina |
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| Looking back down toward Val Torta with Il Madone dominating the view |
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| starting out in the morning |
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| steep slopes below the summit of Cristallina |
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| looking north-west toward the giants of Berner Oberland (Finsteraarhorn in middle-left with the peak inside a cloud) |
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| Close up of Berner Oberland 4000ers |
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| ridge leading up to Cristallina |
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| Cima di Lago -- our next objective |
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| Sabine and Tobias hiking up to the summit |
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| naming peaks on the summit of Cristallina |
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| Rare shot of me -- my hair was doing great things that morning (thanks for the photo Sabine!) |
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| spectacular shadow play on the sea of fog |
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| descending from below the Cristallina summit |
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| skiers on the upper slopes of Cristallina |
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| skiers on the ridge below the summit of Cristallina |
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| Tobias descending the steep upper NW face of Cristallina |
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| Sabine skiing with Tobias below |
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| single track on Cima di Lago |
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| Approaching Cima di Lago -- Cristallina in the background |
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| pretty sure this is the first photo ever of Voile V8 in the southern Swiss Alps! (on summit of Cima di Lago with Berner Oberland in the background) |
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| for the first time ever I tried to specifically set up for an action shot -- this first one of Sabine worked out pretty nicely! |
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| somehow I misfired when Tobias charged straight at me... |
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| oops... need to be better prepared next time :) |
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| Descending from Cima di Lago |
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| Sabine skiing down from Passo della Cima di Lago |
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| Skiing down Val Piana just before entering the fog |
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| dramatic fog effect |
