The most fun you can have with your clothes on.
Off piste or backcountry skiing is one of the most exhilarating sensations around.
The stunning mountain scenery, the solitude and silence away from the tourist resorts, the infinite variety of snow and the ski techniques to deal with them combine into a heady mixture that’s hard to beat. If you can ski parallel on a red piste, then the way is open to discover this new world.
Chamonix is a world centre for off piste, with a wide variety of runs to suit everyone from the beginner to the seasoned freerider. The world famous VallĂ©e Blanche is many people’s first off piste experience, descending 2000m from the summit of the Aiguille du Midi back to Chamonix. Many other runs of this quality exist throughout Chamonix. Still more terrain is available just over the Swiss border at Verbier, and heli-skiing in Italy is just 30 minutes away through the Mont Blanc tunnel.
You can ski off-piste in Chamonix from Christmas through to the end of April, and itineraries are flexible to suit your ambition and abilities.