On friday night, as the lifties were thinking of shutting up shop, 8 tdc coaches were frantically packing supplies into back packs, ready for the inaugural tdc night tour. The snow had been falling all afternoon and visibility wasn’t great but what did that matter on a night tour, surely that’s the idea! It proved to be a pretty strenuous journey to the Refuge des Fours, a two hour skin that culminated in a steep bumpy gully high above the Cugnai Valley, but once we had the stove fired up and pumping out heat we were all glad to have put in the effort. A delicious 3 course meal washed down with lashings of red wine was then topped off with a few glasses of whiskey. The laughter continued into the small hours as the snow and wind continued to drive against the hut outside. Although heads were a little fuzzy in the morning we had enjoyed a brilliant night, very different from your average Friday evening. The ski home was almost as much of a slog as on
the way up! Poor visibility and heavy wind blown snow made for a long arduous trudge out of the valley. Any hopes of cutting our efforts short by taking the Manchet Express chairlift were dashed as we rounded the corner to see it closed! Lets get the weather right next time team…looking forward to it already.
