We had another early start and left the hut between 5:00 and 6:00 a.m., heading up a snow slope towards La Luette. The temperature was surprisingly warm, and the snow was already soft, leading us to believe we had made the right choice not to try going across to the Pigne d'Arolla which would have been a lot longer and very hard work in the soft snow. As we reached the glacier we could see the sun rising over Arolla. There were other groups behind us as we crossed the glacier. The final part of the route was a narrow snow ridge which took us up to the summit. We descended with John at the back of the group so that he could arrest a fall, and we headed up the neighboring 3444m peak. This was safe for us to glissade down, allowing us to knock almost an hour off our descent time. A video of John, Helen and Andy glissading can be seen here (note this is a 13MB file and may take some time to download)
We returned to the Cabane du Dix for lunch, and picked up the gear we had left behind in the morning before heading off down a well defined track towards Arolla. The descent was quite interesting with our route taking us over the Pas de Chevres, where John offered a rope to anyone who wanted it whilst ascending some steep ladders. At the top of these we met some other Jagged Globe groups who were on the Introduction to Alpinism course based in Arolla. We headed down and stopped off at a restaurant just above Arolla where Duncan and I enjoyed a traditional cheese fondue before checking in at the hotel for more cards and chess.
