Espace Killy off-piste

The off-piste in Espace Killy is quite simply superlative. In Val d’Isère it can be divided into five areas, or ‘massifs’: Bellevard, Solaise, Fornet, Pissaillas, and La Daille. In Tignes, you’ll find the main areas are above Val Claret, on the Grande Motte, at Lavachet, and at Brévières.

Although heli-skiing is banned in France, it is permitted to fly skiers and boarders back from remote areas once they have reached the bottom of the heli-skiing runs (particularly if there is no other way out) or, in some cases from neighbouring valleys. You can, for example, trudge up to the Col de L’Oille Noire (3,284m) above Le Fornet, and ski a couloir called Ouille des Reys and continue all the way down to the Maurienne Valley, where you can get a helicopter to return you to the slopes of Val d’Isère.

Depending on conditions some descents may be dangerous. Take a guide or instructor – even in good conditions it’s worth it, even if it’s only to find the best runs.

In Val d’Isère the off-piste skiing can be divided into five areas, or ‘massifs’: Bellevard, Solaise, Fornet, Pissaillas, and La Daille. more...

The off-piste skiing in Tignes tends to be of quite a different character to that in neighbouring Val d’Isère – much of it a little higher and in general above the tree-line, which gives it something of a lunar landscape.
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Avalanche guide

Some passages in this section are extracted from Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain by Bruce Tremper, Director of the Utah Avalanche Center.
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Top Ski Val d'Isere

In 1976, after a brilliant racing career, Patrick Zimmer started the first breakaway French Ski School, Top Ski , specialising in taking clients to the best ungroomed runs in Espace Killy. Today Zimmer knows these richly varied and exhilarating off-piste areas like no-one else.

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