Butterfly Couloir

Halfway up the steepest section of the couloir, lost in the rhythm of bootpacking and breathing, I suddenly notice something shimmering through the tracked snow. A flash of color catches my eye. I carefully brush the snow aside with my gloves and can hardly believe what I’m seeing. Oh, hey! How exactly did such a beautiful butterfly end up here? After all, it’s February, we’re at around 7,900 feet, standing in the middle of a roughly 45-degree couloir in the Lech Valley. Yet, despite its involuntary snow shower, the little guy seems remarkably lively – and clearly much happier on my glove than in the white stuff. Still slightly baffled, I lift him up and smile at our tiny, unexpected companion. But let’s start at the beginning…

The windshield wipers are working overtime as we drive to our meeting point at Hahntennjoch. Unfortunately, it’s not because another northern storm has delivered heaps of fresh snow, but because of warm temperatures and rain that should have stopped long ago. At the meeting point, we climb out of the cars and laugh at each other – somewhere between “Great to see you again!” and “Why exactly are we going on a ski tour today?!” At least the wet stuff from above has stopped by the time we reach the parking lot, so we put the skins on our skis. Let’s see what the weather has in store and whether our plan will actually work out.

For the first few hundred vertical feet, we weave between patches of snow until the damp snowpack finally becomes continuous. The fog remains stubborn, and there’s barely a glimpse of the mountains around us. Navigation isn’t exactly straightforward either. Still, we keep going and hope for better snow. Somewhere in the fog, we take a small, unintended detour before finding our way back on track. Visibility is still pretty poor when we reach the hut, so we stop for a quick snack and discuss our options. Then we get lucky: less than 200 vertical feet later, the clouds suddenly part and the entire basin appears for the first time – along with the couloir Martin had picked the day before. After all that gray, the view feels like a small reward. Doesn’t look too bad! The snow is getting drier at this elevation too, so we decide to give it a shot.

Old avalanche debris makes breaking trail hard work. We’re hoping conditions inside the couloir will be better, otherwise neither the climb nor the descent will be much fun. At the entrance, there’s relief: the snow feels good. Skis go on the packs and we start bootpacking. The higher we climb, the more the rock walls close in and the steeper the couloir becomes.

Martin goes first through the bottleneck while I keep some distance. And this is where it happens: suddenly, colors shimmer through the snow and moments later, the little butterfly is sitting on my glove. “Take him with you!” Martin calls from above. So I do. One-handed and as carefully as possible, I continue up the roughly 45-degree couloir. After a photo or two with my little “passenger,” though, he seems to have had enough and decides to fly off on his own again.

At the top, we take in the mystical atmosphere. Steep limestone walls and towers frame the couloir while banks of fog still drift across the valley floor. Not another person anywhere in this normally busy basin. Well, heading out in that miserable weather was worth it after all. And the best part is still to come.

Skis on, bindings locked – and down we go. There’s a slight crust on the snow, but it still skis surprisingly well. We soak up the huge scenery and the steep turns this line allows us to make. Between the rock walls, there isn’t much room for error, which makes controlled, precise turns all the more important. At its narrowest point, the couloir is barely six feet wide. We sideslip the first few meters until there’s enough space to make a turn. Then the couloir opens up and we link the final turns down to the base.

My thighs are burning. But one look back up the couloir makes me forget the pain in an instant. You definitely don’t get to ski a line this beautiful every day. And sometimes it’s the unplanned moments that stick with you the longest. An extraordinary encounter in an extraordinary couloir that turned what had initially seemed like a rather unpromising day of ski touring into a pretty special story. And with that, we knew what name this descent would henceforth bear for us: Butterfly Couloir.