Les Grands Montets sits above Argentière, farther up the Chamonix Valley from the main town.
It has always had a different pull from the other ski areas in the valley.
Brévent-Flégère gives you extraordinary views across to Mont Blanc. Balme is broader and more open. Les Houches can feel more forgiving and more contained.
Les Grands Montets is about something else.
Altitude. North-facing snow. Steeper terrain. Glaciers. Long descents. And a sense that once you leave the marked pistes, the mountain gets very big, very quickly.
For generations of stronger skiers, this has been one of the defining mountains of Chamonix.
Argentière first
You feel the shift before you even reach the lifts.
Argentière is smaller and quieter than Chamonix town. It feels more obviously tied to the mountain above it.
There are fewer distractions.
People tend to be here because they are going somewhere.
On a powder morning, that becomes especially obvious. Skis come off roof racks. Guides gather groups. People stand looking up at the mountain, trying to understand what the weather has done overnight.
Les Grands Montets rises directly above the village.
That proximity gives Argentière much of its character.
Why Les Grands Montets matters
The ski area currently runs from around 1,235 metres to 2,800 metres, with large vertical drops and terrain sitting immediately alongside the glaciers. Chamonix itself describes the area as a freeride mecca, helped by its reliable snowfall and predominantly north-facing slopes.
That north-facing orientation matters.
Snow is better protected from direct sun than on many other aspects in the valley. After fresh snowfall, conditions can remain colder and more wintery for longer.
That is part of the reason people look towards Argentière when the snow arrives.
The other reason is terrain.
Even from the current lift system, Les Grands Montets gives access to broad bowls, steep pitches, natural features and long off-piste descents that make the piste map feel like only the beginning of the story.
The mountain today
The Grands Montets you ski today is not quite the Grands Montets of old.
A fire in 2018 destroyed the Lognan and Grands Montets cable-car infrastructure and removed direct lift access to the summit area. Since then, the mountain has operated principally through Plan Joran, Bochard, Herse and the lower lift network.
For winter 2026/27, that begins to change.
A new 10-seat gondola between Argentière and Lognan is due to open for the Christmas 2026 holidays. The second phase, planned for winter 2027/28, will introduce a new 24-seat 3S lift between Lognan and the summit area above 3,000 metres.
The summit station is planned at around 3,300 metres.
And that matters because the historic summit lift was one of the great experiences of skiing Chamonix.
The old summit cable car
Historically, the defining journey on Les Grands Montets was the cable car from Lognan to the Aiguille des Grands Montets summit station, around 3,275 metres above sea level.
This was the lift that changed the scale of the day.
You left the normal ski area behind and emerged into a world of glacier, rock and altitude.
On the right morning, cloud could sit in the valley below while the upper mountain broke into sunshine.
The views opened towards the Aiguille Verte, the Drus and the wider Mont Blanc massif.
And from the summit, the mountain suddenly offered a completely different set of possibilities.
The rebuild is designed to restore that direct access, with the new 3S system reaching roughly 3,300 metres. The stations themselves are being designed by Renzo Piano Building Workshop, with forms inspired by pyrite crystals.
So Les Grands Montets is currently in an unusual moment.
Its history is still visible.
Its future is being built in front of you.
Bochard and Herse
Until the summit access fully returns, much of the day revolves around Bochard and Herse.
Bochard takes you to roughly 2,765 metres and opens access to a broad sweep of terrain above Lognan. Herse serves steeper ground nearby.
This is where Les Grands Montets begins to make sense.
Stay on the pistes and there is plenty of challenging skiing.
Move beyond them, with the right knowledge and conditions, and the mountain opens dramatically.
Between Bochard and Herse sits terrain that has become part of the vocabulary of Grands Montets skiing.
La Pendant
From Bochard, one of the classic off-piste options is La Pendant, sometimes referred to as the Lavancher bowl.
It is a broad descent away from the main ski area, with around 1,000 metres of vertical before using the Retour Pendant lift to get back towards Lognan.
In the right conditions, you can continue farther through the forest towards the village of Lavancher, taking the total descent towards roughly 1,600 metres.
This is exactly the kind of route that makes Les Grands Montets feel larger than the formal ski area.
You are not simply skiing beneath a lift.
You are using the lift system to access a much broader mountain.
Triangle de la Herse and Combe des Rachasses
Between Herse and Bochard, the Triangle de la Herse offers another classic area of freeride terrain.
An old moraine has created a sustained natural bowl with a consistent pitch, running down towards Lognan.
From the upper Herse area, the Combe des Rachasses offers another route through more sheltered terrain.
These are not the headline names that someone books a Chamonix holiday for.
But they are exactly the names that begin to matter once you actually ski Les Grands Montets.
They are part of the mountain's internal geography.
The historic summit terrain
Above all of that sits the terrain traditionally accessed from the old summit cable car.
This is where Les Grands Montets earns much of its mythology.
La Face
La Face descends west from the summit onto the glacier.
The upper section is steep and crevassed before the glacier broadens farther down. From there, lines can reconnect towards the Bochard sector or towards the Combe des Rachasses.
This is not casual side-piste skiing.
It is glacial terrain.
Which means crevasses, avalanche exposure and route choice all matter.
Glacier des Rognons
On the north-east side lies the Glacier des Rognons.
This opens a series of long, steep off-piste lines between the Combe du Cordier and the much steeper Grand Mur.
The skiing can be exceptional.
It can also be technically demanding, with crevasse risk, avalanche exposure and in places danger from serac fall.
This is where the phrase “ski with a guide” stops being travel-advice boilerplate and becomes common sense.
Pas de Chèvre
And then there is the Pas de Chèvre.
This is one of the great names in Chamonix off-piste skiing.
Traditionally, the route begins from the summit side of Les Grands Montets and drops west towards the Mer de Glace.
In good snow years, the total descent can eventually continue towards Chamonix, giving roughly 2,300 metres of vertical.
But “Pas de Chèvre” is really shorthand for a family of lines.
From right to left when looking downhill, the classic options include the Pas de Chèvre itself, the Central Couloir, Rectiligne, and the Couloir du Dru, also known as the Couloir des Autrichiens.
The Pas de Chèvre and Central routes are around 30 degrees in places but contain narrow and rocky sections where a fall can become very serious.
Rectiligne and the Couloir du Dru are steeper, narrower and considerably more consequential.
These are not simply “secret runs” to add to a list.
They are high-mountain itineraries.
Snow conditions matter.
Avalanche conditions matter.
Route-finding matters.
Crevasses matter.
The ability to turn around matters.
A good guide does not merely show you where to ski.
They decide whether skiing it makes sense at all.
The Poubelles
There is another name that occasionally comes up when talking about accessing the Pas de Chèvre side from Bochard: the Couloir des Poubelles.
It is steep, narrow and can require a rope simply to enter safely.
That tells you almost everything you need to know.
This is not an itinerary to go searching for because you saw the name online.
It belongs in the wider story because it shows just how quickly Les Grands Montets moves from lift-served skiing into genuine mountaineering terrain.
Col du Passon
And then there is Col du Passon.
This is better thought of as a ski-tour than lift-served freeride, but it belongs in the broader Grands Montets world.
Traditionally accessed from the Grands Montets and Argentière Glacier side, the route involves crossing the heavily crevassed Argentière Glacier, climbing on skins towards the 3,028-metre col, and then descending via the Le Tour Glacier towards Le Tour village.
The itinerary involves around 750 metres of ascent and more than 2,000 metres of descent.
Again, it is remote glacial terrain.
The route itself recommends travelling with a guide and carrying proper avalanche and glacier equipment.
This is the other side of Les Grands Montets.
The lifts do not simply provide skiing.
They provide a gateway into the wider mountains.
Why a guide changes the mountain
There is a temptation in Chamonix to think that because something starts from a ski lift, it must therefore be part of the ski area.
That is a dangerous assumption.
Les Grands Montets makes the boundary particularly obvious.
Step beyond controlled terrain and you may immediately be dealing with avalanche hazard, crevasses, cliffs, seracs and complex route-finding.
The Chamonix tourism authorities explicitly recommend professional mountain guidance for ski touring and high-mountain off-piste terrain.
But there is another reason to ski with a guide.
They make the mountain better.
They know which aspect kept the snow cold.
Where the wind loaded overnight.
Which routes have been tracked.
Where visibility will hold.
Which line makes sense for the group.
And, just as importantly, where not to go.
On Les Grands Montets, that knowledge is one of the great luxuries.
A mountain in transition
Right now, Les Grands Montets is between eras.
The old summit cable car is gone.
The new gondola is arriving.
The summit 3S is coming next.
And for the first time since 2018, lift-served access above 3,000 metres is on its way back.
That makes the coming winters fascinating.
Because when the upper lift returns, so too does easier access to much of the high-mountain terrain that made Les Grands Montets famous.
The mountain will look different.
But the reason people come here will be much the same.
Why Les Grands Montets matters
There are easier ski areas in Chamonix.
There are sunnier ones.
There are places where a mixed group will have a simpler day.
But on the right morning, Les Grands Montets offers something harder to reproduce.
You look at the weather.
You look at the snow.
You decide what the mountain will allow.
And then you go and find out.
It rewards knowledge, ability and judgement.
The pistes are only part of it.
The real story sits in the terrain around them.
That is why people have been coming to Argentière for decades.
And why, when the summit lift finally begins turning again, a lot of skiers will be very happy to see it.
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