Description

If you are planning on skiing this, you probably don't need to refer to FATMAP for help.

However, the route goes as follows: ski into the North Face as for the Mallory or Eugster.

Instead of continuing to traverse, ski down the fall line and then head skier's right.

This brings you to a permanent streak of black ice up against the Frendo Rognon.

Make one short abeil on a v-thread to cross it or if conditions and skill allows, go for the straightline (if you think this could never be possible, Antoine Montant straightlined it).

Ski down the iconic Frendo Arête.

From the top of the rock spur there are three options.

1.) Continue down the hanging glacier, traversing back onto the rock spur before the serac cliffs out.

Once on the rock spur, climb and/or abseil leftwards until established on the lower snow covered rock slabs.

In good conditions you can ski down the remainder without any further abseils.

2.) Make four 30-60 meter abseils down the steep gullies which dissect the central section of the rock spur.

As of 2013, there were in-situ anchors there.

3.) Climb back up to the Midi. From the 1970s through to the late 1990s, it was possible to descend skier's left side of the rock spur after skiing the arête.

This was more logical and eliminated a lot of abseiling.

However, global warming has drastically thinned out the permanent snow and ice cover on the North Face of the Midi, an area which has been particularly vulnerable to summer heat waves.