Balmhorn: From Sunnbüel

Balmhorn W-face is pure joy in these conditions! No ice, just 500m+ of steep descend, made for big turns. Summit with great view in all directions. No one else in winter mode (just many hikers further down). For the W-face ascend/descend: Apparently, the ice shield melted so much during the last years that the rock barrier at 3250m grew a lot. The route indicated on swisstopo and some older GPS tracks now includes several meters of mixed climbing (except maybe if there are tons of snow). The rock barrier can still be passed on snow but further towards the Zackengrat (S) as we did.

Snow from ca. 2050. The ascend until the rock barrier and after the boot-pack to the summit was easy without ski crampons on a well holding melt-freeze crust and some fresh wind-drifted snow higher up. Boot-pack was also easy.

We had amazing snow during the descend of the W-face at ca. 12h15 (some cold, fresh snow and good edge hold on the icy parts). Also the softer snow further down offered still much fun.

in general warm (0° at 4000m) but the whole ascend until the Zackengrat was in a shadowy, cold valley slight wind in the valley and at the summit zero clouds