Ebenalp

The first true tour of the season, after a bunch of descents on most of the regional pistes, and one trial tour that was mainly on the pistes of Sellamatt and Chaeserrugg. I was at a point where all red runs were done comfortably, even if not very quickly - though I must say that the freeride section at Chaeserrugg left me most time on my back in deep snow than skiing down the slopes.

So it was with some trepidation that I attempted Ebenalp today. The weather was cold, but it was comfortably still at the valley, so I could shed most layers and still sweated profusely. After half an hour of slow progress, I got into a proper pace, helped by the existing tracks of a few tourers before me. It started becoming foggy at around 1200m, but the way was then clear, as red piste markings were posted on the side of the road. 

The pistes were mostly left ungroomed this season, apart from one of the descents from Ebenalp - in fact, I arrived at the bottom of the groomed slopes just as one machine started grooming the snow at 9:30. I was at Ebenalp by 10:00, where it was really windy and cold---something easily fixable by spending 10 minutes with some hot cocoa.

I pondered briefly going down the ungroomed black slope, but instead chose to start with the groomed descent for warming up, followed by the really comfortable descent on ungroomed pistes. This let me practice my powder turns a little bit - there was only 10-20cm of powder on top of the harder surface though. I then turned into the descent through the forest road (which is normally another red piste). This was a bit narrower, with deeper powder, and chopped up by cars and skiers, so it was a bit tough for me. I had to snoughplough my way through most of it. And even so, I managed to plunge in the snow and flail ineffectually like a fish a couple of times.

The last part of the descent was on gentle, deep powder terrain, and even though I was not going that fast, it was rather enjoyable.

Best of all, I made it back just in time to catch the S train.