The "Rebuffat-Terray" AKA "Carrington-Rouse"

Some of the best days are completely unexpected....... It was about 11.30 and we were just about to order more beers, when Jon walked through the door of Elevation. He promptly told me that through the power of facebook he'd heard the "Carrington-Rouse" had been done. I'd never seen the route in condition before so it wasn't a hard call to make.
      A quick packing session, short sleep and early start later we caught a delayed first lift up the midi. The usually rapid approach took far longer than usual as all the morraine was covered in 30 cm of annoying powder. In fact the approach took so long we only started up the route at 11.30 am.

Passing some stuck ab ropes low on the route. No sure what the story is with these but don't envy their past owners....

 To gain the initial ramps we climbed directly under the towering serac which threatens the first rope length. Although not ideal, at the moment the safe start is very dry and due to the time of year much longer than it would be in the winter months.
        This is followed by a beautiful twisting gully up to about 85 degrees, then about 7 pitches (we moved together a bit also), of the most pleasing ice smears on the best of Chamonix granite.

Seconding one of the easier lower pitches.

Perhaps the crux?

Altogether a great route, very much an "Aguilles" style outing i.e. not big or serious but good fun. 5 hours up 3 down. Get on it!