After a quick, half-hour approach, Max and I were racking up below Scotch. Just as I had hoped, Max did a marvelous job leading through the crux slot, and after five rope-stretcher pitches, we reached the small ridge where the route ends and began rapping back to our packs. A sea of clouds had slowly risen over Italy, and by the time we were back at our skis, the glacier was socked in. The original plan had called for us to have a fun late-afternoon ski down the Valley Blanche, catch the last train ride from Montenvers to Chamonix, and be drinking beer and eating french fries (In France, they actually try to call them pomme frites, but they’re still French fries in my book) by seven. But the plan was about to change.  

We blindly charged into the whiteout, and for a brief while I was convinced we were making excellent progress, until I noticed that my skis were actually pointed slightly uphill and I was barely moving at all. That’s the problem with whiteouts — you become so disoriented its hard to tell whether you are going up or down, or even moving at all. I hadn’t been down the Valley Blanche for five years, and Max had never done the descent. I stopped and called a conference. With that same nonchalant shrug, Max agreed to ski back up to the Aiguille du Midi top station.  We both knew the lift had long since closed, and there wouldn’t be any French fries waiting for us.