All that has been said above applies equally to three men on a rope: three on a rope is, however, a more difficult combination; the position of the middle man liable to both fore and aft jerks is far from enviable. The best man should be placed in the middle. It is, however, surprising how easily a party of three practised roped runners can execute straight running and even combined turns on a rope.
Ropes that are employed in winter should be new. Old summer ropes should not be used up in winter. Ropes break much more easily in winter than in summer, and the strain is much greater in the event of a fall into a crevasse owing to the greater speed on ski than on foot.
The High Alps in Spring
There is a fascination about the High Alps in winter that is unique. Never are the great peaks so icily aloof, the silences of the glaciers so inviolate. No moon compares with the full moon of January shining on some great glacier causeway; no views are clearer than the summit panorama of February. None the less, winter is not the proper season for ski tours in the High Alps. It is true that the rock ridges are usually free from snow in the winter and corniced in spring, so that for expeditions which combine ski-ing with more or less difficult rock climbing, winter is preferable to spring. At the same time, it is possible to exaggerate this point. An ardent champion of winter mountaineering once cited to me the Lyskamm as a mountain that could not be climbed in May owing to cornices. Unfortunately for his case, the Lyskamm had been climbed in May. I have known the cornice on the Wetterhorn almost invisible in May, whereas in many winters it is quite formidable.
Still we may concede that rock ridges are certainly far easier in February than in May, and cornices in general much larger in spring than in winter.
And of course the snowline is lower in winter than in spring; but, as we shall try to prove, this is not of very great importance.
The winter is the season for ski tours of modest length. It is the season for what may be called sub-alpine ski-ing. (We need some handy expression in English for the most useful German word Mittelgebirge.) Spring, on the other hand, is eminently suitable for ski tours in the High Alps.
The best month for glacier ski-ing is May. June is also excellent. Indeed, from about the middle of May to the middle of June is, on the average, as good a month as any in the year for glacier ski-ing.
February is usually the best of the winter months, and May is the best month for spring ski-ing. May is, among other things, usually fine. April is almost always stormy; but the weather usually mends at the end of April, and a long spell of perfect weather is as common in May as in February.
Let us then compare ski-ing among the glaciers in May and in February from the point of view of (1) Safety; (2) Quality of ski-ing; (3) Effort; (4) Scenery.