Home · Traverses

March – May · Chamonix · Verbier · Zermatt · Max 5

Cross the Alps
on skis.

A traverse is not a day out repeated six times. You start in one valley and finish in another, carrying what you need, sleeping where the route takes you. These three are the ones worth doing — and I live in all three valleys they pass through.

Ask about dates See the routes
Mar–May
Season
4–6
Days on the route
Max 5
People per guide
Private
Your rope only

Why these three

I live where
they pass

The Haute Route runs from Chamonix through Verbier to Zermatt. Those are the three valleys I guide in, and Chamonix has been home for twelve years. That is not a marketing line — it decides things on the route. It means I know which hut warden answers the phone in a storm, where the Col du Chardonnet is holding and where it is stripped, and which variant to take on day four when the snow is not what the forecast promised. A traverse is a week of decisions, and local knowledge is what you are actually hiring.

Chamonix → Verbier → Zermatt · 6 days on the route

The Haute Route,
end to end

Mont Blanc to the Matterhorn, on skis, the whole way

The most famous ski traverse in the world, and still the best. Six days linking the two greatest mountains in the Alps, crossing from France into Switzerland over glaciers and cols, sleeping in huts, and arriving in Zermatt with the north face of the Matterhorn in front of you. You finish somewhere genuinely different from where you started — which is the whole point of a traverse, and something no day tour can give you.

Day 1
Chamonix → Trient hut
Lift to the Grands Montets, then the Col du Chardonnet and the Fenêtre de Saleina — the day that takes you out of France.
Day 2
Trient hut → Verbier → Cabane du Mont Fort
Down to Champex, a road transfer to Verbier and the lift up. The one day with wheels in it — I would rather you know that now than find out on the mountain.
Day 3
Mont Fort → Cabane de Prafleuri
Into the Swiss Valais proper, with the Grand Combin filling the sky to the south.
Day 4
Prafleuri → Cabane des Dix
Over the Col de Riedmatten or the Pas de Chèvres. Strong parties sometimes skip Prafleuri to save a day; I do that only when conditions on the approach are right, never to keep to a brochure.
Day 5
Dix → Cabane des Vignettes
Over the Pigne d'Arolla, 3,790 m — the summit of the traverse, and the view that people remember.
Day 6
Vignettes → Zermatt
The long one. Col de l'Évêque, Col du Mont Brûlé, Col de Valpelline — and then the Matterhorn appears and you ski down to it.
On requestguide fee

The fee is for the whole traverse and depends on how many of you are on the rope — up to five. Tell me the size of your group and the dates you are looking at, and you get the figure for the week, not a day rate to multiply.

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Verbier → Zermatt · 4 days on the route

The Swiss half,
condensed

The Haute Route when you don't have a full week

The same finish, the same huts, the same arrival under the Matterhorn — starting from Verbier instead of Chamonix. You skip the French opening days and the road transfer, and you still get the heart of the traverse: Prafleuri, the Dix, the Pigne d'Arolla and the Col de Valpelline. For most people with four or five days of holiday rather than eight, this is the honest answer, not a lesser one.

Day 1
Verbier → Cabane du Mont Fort
Lifts out of Verbier and a short climb to the hut. We check equipment and transceivers before anything else.
Day 2
Mont Fort → Cabane de Prafleuri
The long traverse into the Valais, under the Grand Combin.
Day 3
Prafleuri → Dix → Cabane des Vignettes
The biggest day of the four, over the Pigne d'Arolla.
Day 4
Vignettes → Zermatt
The three cols and the descent to Zermatt with the Matterhorn ahead.
On requestguide fee

The fee is for the whole traverse and depends on how many of you are on the rope — up to five. Tell me the size of your group and the dates you are looking at, and you get the figure for the week, not a day rate to multiply.

Ask about this traverse

Zermatt · Monte Rosa massif · Italy & Switzerland

The Monte Rosa
4,000 m peaks

Summits on skis, and the highest hut in Europe

Not a crossing between valleys but a traverse of a massif, linking 4,000 m summits on skis and sleeping high. This is the winter version of the ground I guide all summer on the Spaghetti Tour — the same huts, the same glaciers, approached on skins instead of on foot. It includes a night at the Capanna Margherita at 4,554 m, the highest building in Europe, which is an experience with no equivalent anywhere in the Alps.

Day 1
Klein Matterhorn → Breithorn → Italy
The lift does the first 2,000 m. We skin to the Breithorn, ski between its summits and drop down the glacier into the Italian huts.
Day 2
Castor 4,228 m
Roped and on crampons for the summit ridge, skis on the pack, then down the Felikjoch.
Day 3
Lys glacier → Gnifetti hut
Across the heart of the massif to the base of the highest summits.
Day 4
Signalkuppe 4,554 m → Margherita → Zermatt
The high point of the traverse and the Capanna Margherita, then the long descent of the Grenz glacier back into Switzerland.
On requestguide fee

The fee is for the whole traverse and depends on how many of you are on the rope — up to five. Tell me the size of your group and the dates you are looking at, and you get the figure for the week, not a day rate to multiply.

Ask about this traverse

What you get

Included
& not included

The same for all three traverses. You are paying for the guide and for the work that goes in long before the first day — the route, the hut nights and the judgement about which variant on which morning. What the mountain itself charges stays separate and visible.

Included

  • UIAGM certified mountain guide for the whole traverse, privately — your rope only
  • Planning of the route and of the hut nights, including the reservations
  • Group equipment: rope, and the technical kit the rope team shares
  • Advice before the trip on fitness, kit and what to expect, and the daily call on which variant to take

Not included

  • The huts themselves — your nights and half board and, as is standard in the Alps, the guide’s
  • Your personal equipment: skis, skins, boots, transceiver, shovel, probe, harness, clothing
  • Lifts, mountain trains and the road transfers on the route
  • Food, drinks and anything consumed on the way
  • Accident and mountain rescue insurance, which is compulsory on a traverse
  • Travel to the start and accommodation in the valley
  • Anything not specified above
I book the huts, but they are billed to you at what they charge. It is the honest way round: hut prices change, half board is not the same in every refuge, and you should see that cost for what it is rather than buried inside a package price.

How I run them

What to know
before you book

Five people, and no more
I take a maximum of five on a traverse. It is not a safety ceiling — it is the number above which the week stops being good. With five, the rope moves at one pace, the hut evenings are a conversation rather than a crowd, and I can still give each of you attention on the descents, which is where it matters most after four days of climbing. Larger groups exist and are cheaper per head. They are also slower, and slower is what turns a col into a problem.
The season is March to May
Spring, not midwinter. By March the glaciers are filled in and the snowpack has settled enough to commit to a week of high cols, and the days are long enough for the big stages. Earlier than that the cover is thinner and the daylight shorter; later, the snow goes before the huts do.
The huts set the calendar
Places in the Haute Route huts are booked months ahead and each night is reserved for a fixed date, so the schedule is fixed once we commit to it. That is why these traverses run on set dates rather than being moved around a forecast, and why booking early matters more here than on any day tour. Come with a day spare at either end of your trip if you can — travel is far easier to move than a hut.
The route is a plan, not a promise
Cols get stripped, slopes load, huts close. On every one of these traverses there are variants, and choosing between them day by day is the job. What I promise is the crossing and my judgment, in that order. I will tell you on day three if the line we talked about in January is no longer the right one.
The level: comfortable off-piste, in any snow, with a pack
That one sentence is the whole requirement, and it is a higher bar than it sounds. These are not day tours strung together. You climb five or six days in a row, often above 3,000 m, and then ski down whatever the snow happens to be — crust, breakable, spring slush — tired, with the pack still on your back. The skinning is rarely what stops people. Skiing all conditions safely, day after day, is. Tell me honestly what you have skied and I will tell you which of these three fits you, or whether a shorter tour this year is the better call.
Is there a tradition I should know about?
Yes, and it is a good one. Here the day traditionally ends with the client buying the guide a drink or a meal once you are back down. It is not part of the price and nobody will ever ask you for it — but it is how most good days end, and it is usually when the day finally gets talked through properly.

March – May

Cross the Alps
with me

Tell me which traverse, roughly when, how many of you, and what you have skied. I'll come back with dates, the full program and an exact price.

WhatsApp · +41 76 270 13 49 @carlitos_molina_guide molinamountain@gmail.com
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