By Felicia Sturgeon
A little while back, my partner Matt and I booked a spontaneous trip to do some speed riding in France. I've been wanting to go to France during winter for a long time now, and the stars finally aligned to make it happen.
We had some good days at the beginning of the trip to get some "warm-up laps", so we decided to head to Chamonix next, and try to get some bigger flights. Up until then, we were having a rough-go with the weather on this trip, but on our last day, it looked as though the weather was finally going to cooperate to fly from the top of the Aiguille du Midi. The Aiguille is a rock spire towering over Chamonix next to it's more famous neighbor, Mount Blanc, and is the origin for several famous ski runs where you can ski on a glacier the entire way down it's flanks. And, at 3,842 meters (12,605ft) the Aiguille du Midi is also the highest mountain peak served by an aerial lift system in the French Alps.
It can be pretty dangerous and it's important you go with a guide, or someone that's been there previously, for your first time. We were lucky that our buddy Dante was around to show us the way. Dante has been living in Chamonix during the winter months, and is one of the most talented air sports athletes of our time.
Dante told us he wanted us to ski the entire run before we flew it, so we could learn the way and get familiar with the terrain. Very smart..... Turns out, it's really easy to ski yourself into a crevasse if you don't know where you're going.
We got to the top of the famous gondola and WOW.... what a site! It's something you can't really explain and must see for yourself, but the mountains here are stunning. It felt completely "out of this world". Dante showed us where we were going from the top, and you could see people walking down the arête of the Aiguille du Midi, which definitely makes you feel small and exposed!
We got to where we'd start and put our skis on. Turns out, it snowed a ton the night before. We really lucked out with the conditions and got to ski knee-deep, fresh powder!
Fresh pow.... the sun was shining, and there was zero wind. I just couldn't believe what I was seeing the whole time! Skiing and navigating around on the glacier was so awesome. We stopped a lot, both to take it all in.... and for Dante to point everything out to us.
We finally made it to the bottom of the glacier and it was probably the coolest ski run I've ever done!
Now.... it was time to head back up, this time to FLY! Conditions were still awesome with no wind, so we set up our wings for take off...
I've always dreamed of flying over and next to a glacier, and here I was, getting to do just that. It was just as awesome as I had imagined it!
After we landed from the epic flight down, we decided to walk into the cave they built within the glacier each winter. Yes.... they build a cave you can walk through inside the glacier. It's so cool!
They have little displays throughout with facts about the glaciers, and you get to see and touch the beautiful blue ice up close. It's really worth checking out if you're ever in Chamonix.
As if we didn't already have the best KAVU day, Dante said if we hurried, we could go up one more time and fly the front side of the mountain all the way back to Chamonix. This is approximately a 9,200ft flight!
Not many people go up at the end of the day because it takes too long to ski back down. So this time, we pretty much had the whole mountain to ourselves. Dante did an excellent job of explaining everything, and making sure we knew where to go. Feeling good about it, we launched.... and again, it was something out of this world. Flying past the Aiguille with some perfectly placed clouds, I followed Dante swooping through as we descended to another glacier. I felt so lucky to fly over and inspect another beautiful display of nature.
Then, cruising back into the valley, I got to see Chamonix from the air.
This was the most epic day I've ever had on skis in the mountains.
Huge shout out to Dante for the epic day!
Cheers to more KAVU days ahead!