SME In The Alps - Part 2 - Glarus, CH

| by Alex Gear, G3 Gear Ambassador

After a great Haute Route trip, our second trip started on May 2nd in Glarus, Switzerland, the valley where Ruedi grew up.

Day one we made it up to the summit of the Gemsfairenstock just in time for the weather to turn, so we skied to the Clariden Hut.

Swiss version of a fire escape ladder at the Clariden Hut Day two we woke up to heavy snow and fog at the Clariden Hut, but shortly afterward the weather started to break, so with our strong group we pushed up to the summit of Clariden for some beautiful spring powder.

Skiing the Claridenfirn A short climb from Ober Sand took us around to the Fridolin Hut, located in a deep valley surrounded by huge limestone walls over a thousand meters high.

Fridolin Hut

After a 3:30am breakfast, we were the first out of the hut to climb our main objective for the trip, the Toedi; a 1600m climb from the Fridolin Hut, followed by a 3000m descent to the valley bottom. Ruedi decided not to take the normal route up the couloir due to avalanche concerns. Instead we worked our way up through the second icefall with some intricate track setting. This proved to be a good decision when we watched a natural avalanche pour over the cliffs near the couloir.

Threading the needle through the second icefall Once above the second icefall the route to the summit was fairly straight forward with ski crampons.

Ruedi with his mentor Frigg on the summit of the Toedi (3614m) A thin layer of fresh powder on the smooth crust provided great skiing on the way down as it transitioned into creamy corn skiing, with zero breakable crust. Did I mention the blue skies? The Toedi has to be one of the best ski tours I’ve ever done.