After the blizzard, only 15cm at most here, but over a metre in 36 hours at 2000m.

 Then the south wind blew and it's all gone at Quelebu already.

What a difference a day makes (24 little hours).

On Christmas day and boxing day the sun broke through and the temperatures climbed to a lovely 28 degrees in the sun, then over a cold front and gale force winds, rain, hail then snow!

The snowy weather has continued for the past few weeks and its been unseasonably cloudy which translates into "cold" so far this winter. The sheep don't seem to mind - they have a cosy shelter and plenty of hay. The chickens don't like it much and in the last couple of weeks we've lost two birds. Bandicoot was taken by a hunters dog and Thistle had been ill for the last few months but despite are best care she died last night. A possible cause is marek's disease (a viral illness caused by the herpes virus which lives in the soil). It's highly contagious amongst birds but only develops into an illness in some (it might have been the cause of Shelley's blind eye). Fortunately it doesn't pass into the hen's eggs and nor can it be transferred to humans. When spring approaches we'll let one of  the broody hens sit on clutch of eggs to re-build the numbers.

Some sun forecast for next week then a dump of snow for the few days before xmas.

Another sneaky mini ski-tour from the house

Sunshine and a quick ski up and down Joubac

View from the bedroom window this morning

Still dumping down with snow

Snow!

Mulch

The symbiotic garden is all mulched up and just in time - snow is forecast for the next 4 days!

Tuc de la Seube

Another trip into the snow before more arrives in the mountains this weekend and later in the week at Quélébu. Susie, Sandrine and I headed up from the Col de la Core towards the Etang d'Eychelle, on firm snow then with snow shoes as far as the T-junction with the path arriving from the Cabane d'Eliot. Then we headed steeply up towards the Tuc de la Seube. A headwall of snow on the North ridge required crampons to breach, we kept on for the summit and the descent to the Cabane d'Eliot. A long descent with much post-holing in soft snow saw us back at the car in 6 hours. A surprisingly tiring trip with about 800m of ascent.

At Quélébu we've a had a few days of digging and rotovating to create the raised beds for the symbiotic garden, which we hope to plant next spring.

Winter walk up towards the Port d'Aula

Since the minibus accident about 10 years ago when someone tried to take a minibus up to the Col de Pause in snowy conditions and reversed it off the road killing several people - controls on access in winter have become a bit tighter. Last year a friend of ours got a parking fine for going to the Col de Pause when the road was officially closed, even though there was no snow at all! We (Susie Sheri and I) decided to play it safe and parked at the barrier which added an extra couple of km and 300m of ascent - After the last hairpin the road becomes snowy but it was passable with a 4x4 (someone was parked there in fact). 

At the cabane d'Areau we lunched (having started late) and put on our crampons. At the Refuge Forest (ONF) we looked out over the frozen lake before returning on snowshoes. Snow conditions were variable crust, powder, hard frozen snow and wind blown snow all in the space of a few metres. Beautiful weather and lovely views as always.

The high pressure is bringing beautiful clear skies, warm daytime temps (18 this week) and cold night temperatures (-2). The sunsets are glorious!

Snowshoe

A quick stop around Guzet with a decent in our snowshoes. Much more snow than I thought and in fact a couple of inches of light fluff on top of a firm base.....I wish I'd taken my skis!

Snow!

Snow Wednesday night and most of Thursday followed a slight thaw and rain, but a clear spell over night and this morning revealed all. 75cm of snow at 2100m.

This morning we wandered up Joubac for some photography and fresh air.