Here I am again! This first weekend of May I decided to say goodbye to Aran valley, at least when it comes to snowboarding...For Saturday I wanted some long and beatiful summit so Montardo fit the bill, whereas on Sunday I would take the lifts of Baqueira which were still open this year.
Montardo is within the limits of Aigüestortes National Park and together with Mauberme is the most well-known and emblematic peak in this valley. Its usually done in two days using La Restanca refuge. In my case, I just had one day and is also plausible to do it in one day. It was just what I was looking for...
So I left the car around 1450m. Due to some avalanches over the road, I couldnt drive closer to the summer parking so I had to do it on foot.
There were some people with the same idea as me. To get the refuge, we had to track up through the forest which wasnt such a pleasure because of firm and irregular snow from avalanches in some parts.
Fortunately, after some hard time the terrain became better to progress with the splitboard.
The ice lake is starting to melt. The refuge is right in the other side of the "bridge". I was still at 2000m...
Good place to skin up!
And here is when I first realised the descent was going to be quite bad...A huge traverse to get that far coll...And what´s more some meters had to be lost!
Finally I got the coll (2450m), and this time I thought the opposite! What a descent! But first I had to skin up all that huge slope...Then I realised that wasnt the summit, just a "door" to the summit which is not in the picture...
When I thought I had arrived, Montardo told me: not yet! I still had to turn around for fourth time for the last 150m...That slope was quite steep, good I found it with safe snow. The shame was another traverse, this one shorter than the other one, to get the pass that gives access to the wide and big slope...
And summit! To put into perspective, my car is right down there....
Other mountains of the National Park...We were, by the way, close to the base of the clouds..
We did on foot the last meters to the summit over the ridge, which were somewhat exposed...high mountain environment!
Few meters down the summit, in the "shoulder" I left my equipment, I put my splitboard on. Ahead I had a short but straight slope (seen in previous photo), but as you can see, followed by a traverse to get acess to the good slope...
Got it! Time to snowboard the good slope!
Until the proper coll at 2450m again...Here ti came the big traverse...I better skip any comments of what was it for me...:)
I took it easy and thinking in the next step: this tube. Good part with gorgeous scenary!
I ate something in the refuge and got back over the same path I went up!
Finally, the dirty road...
The beautiful Montardo from Arties...I was delighted of being right up there! It seems so far from the village, well it is!
To summarize in numbers: +1500m and 7h of activity. Taking into consideration the dirty road on foot, the big traverse, the hard "passages" with the splitboard in some part of the woods...it was ok. I would not recommend it as a great descent as my guide says. Its not about the splitboard, but the descent was clearly divided in 3 sections with up-and-down parts...Despite it, it has 2 great slopes and a beatiful tube!
