Description

This is a truly amazing day- fabulous scenery, wild isolation, exposed terrain and fantastic skiing.

The ascent begins right behind the hut.

Take the gentle slopes to the NE, rising up under le Mammouth.

After a short steeper section, crossing the moraine, you pass imperceptibly onto the glacier at about 3200m.

Continue easily up here, under your summit, the Blanc de Moming, then under the ridge you will be subsequently climbing along.

At about 3730m you gain the ridge above you, to the L, putting skis on your packs.

This is the E Ridge of the Blanc de Moming, known locally as the Arete du Blanc.

If you are first here, with no track, it will feel extremely exposed and committing, as it will in windy conditions, as your pack with skis on may feel like a sail.

However on a fine sunny day in the spring with little wind and a track in, it is a delight.

You stick to the ridge crest itself, as far as possible, and, apart from the exposure, it is not particularly difficult.

Initially you descend to the W, then a small climb over a minor top on the ridge, followed by a final descent to a saddle.

Here it becomes less exposed as it climbs up to your summit, the Blanc de Moming at 3657m.

The descent is often a delight, on N facing powder.

Descend down and R onto a flat glacial plateau, then traverse L under Besso.

If conditions are good- check with the guardian of the Mountet Hut- you can descend to about 3000m, before traversing off down and R, taking complicated terrain between crevasses.

(In poorer conditions you can continue your descent much lower, down to about 2200m, before reascending to the hut).

On the traverse go no lower than 2800m, as there are ice cliffs below you.

Undulating terrain leads you off the glacier at an obvious lateral moraine, before traversing without difficulty to the Arpitettaz Hut at 2780m.