Skiing Breithorn

Not to compete with Idris' TR, but here is a little trek to Breithorn, a 4,150m mountain above Zermatt, and probably the easiest 4000m peak you can get to thanks to the Klein Matterhorn cable car.    Did the treck with another EpicSki user danila and his ski instructor friend.  We had a local Zermatt guide Christoph with us, so we were able to get some off-piste skiing on the glacier and go down almost all the way.  Some pictures are my, other are from danila's camera. 

The day before, just skiing in Zermatt, Breithorn- the next day's objective -- is the prominent mountain in the distance:

The saddle between Breithorn and Klein Matterhorn is unexpectedly vast:

We are skinning up the saddle, right along the Swiss-Italian border way above some clouds, amazing high mountain scenery:

Breithorn-bahn- you certainly won't find any solitude on this climb:

A change to ski crampons, and after an hour more of climbing, we are on the summit of Breithorn.  It is foggy and there is not much to see.

Suddenly a window opens up and you see the glacier about 3,000 feet below you:

TIme to ski... the fog prevented the snow from softening, so skiing from the summit was a bit crunchy, but after we got closer to the saddle, the snow changed to corn and it was spring snow all the way to TrockenerStegg station.  

The skiing is somewhat similar to CA skiing, but the landscape is vast and the snow is mostly smooth and pristine.

After a couple of laps on the steeper glacier parts off Klein Matterhorn we are skiing down to Zermatt (or at least down to the snow line above Zermatt).   This is already getting slushy.

The last 15-20 minutes was hiking to the Fury cable car station (and food and beers).  

Overall a great day, thanks to danila and others for the company and for making that happen.  

Quote:

Originally Posted by Meathelmet 

groovy! did you ski the ovest,central or oriental? and you skied down between breit 6 klein matterehorn or did you ski down to zemat via scwarztor?

I am not sure where we skied down, it was foggy, so skied a bit skiers right off the climbing (hiking) route, then cut a sharp left to avoid a crevasse (it was not open but I was told it was there).  Down to Zermatt was on the Theodul glacier, the glacier between KM and Breithorn looked pretty gnarly in a couple of places (long drops) and it was getting foggy, so that possibility didn't even come up.  I guess the route further down was via Scwarztor, but I am not sure.  I followed other people.   

TC:  Hey, noting compares to Squaw, right?  .  But seriously, those trips are not about skiing the gnarly terrain, this is more like a long hike in high mountains... on skis... mostly downhill...    Nothing we skied that day could be called difficult, but that was not the point.