Only in Chamonix would this be seen as a disappointment. Although about a dozen ski areas line the valley, the best runs are in Chamonix's endless backcountry, and little can compare with the epic grandeur of the Vallée Blanche. When it's good, skiers can ride a cable car to the 12,605-foot summit of the Aiguille du Midi and porpoise through powder for as long as 12 miles and nearly 9,000 vertical feet, skiing through an icy jawbone ringed by Mont Blanc, the Aiguille Verte, the Grandes Jorasses, and scores of other famous peaks. There's a rock hut halfway down that sells sausages and beer. The route is so popular that mogul fields will form, but it's best to go with a guide.

"People think they can ski it like it's a run at a resort," Silitch says. "My father-in-law did that. He's just ripping all over the place and skis over a crevasse. It opened up under him—it was huge—but, lucky for him, he didn't fall in."

We meet the Parisians the next day at the tram terminal below the Aiguille du Midi. Six feet of snow has fallen in the past two weeks, and the lift station is a zoo. Pessi and Silitch carry backpacks stuffed with harnesses, ropes, and avalanche transceivers. One of the Parisians has cigarettes and a cell phone tucked into his front mesh pocket.

"For most of these guys, it's their first time in the high mountains away from a ski resort," Pessi tells me as the tram climbs steadily upward.

Pessi, now 39, came to Chamonix from southern France in the late nineties to study at the National School of Ski and Alpinism, which sits in the center of town. Every mountain guide in France has studied there, including Silitch, who did a short course with Anselme Baud. Pessi was there for three years, studying geology, wildflowers, and French mountain law, and he passed a comprehensive test called the tronc commun. Then came practical training, in which students guide real clients, who get discounts for being cobayes, or "guinea pigs." In 1999, Pessi passed his final exam and became an internationally certified guide. So far he, like Silitch, is just a reinforcement.

At the top, we rope up and step out onto an exposed ridge. The Parisians slip on the steep snow, but the rope keeps them safe. We work our way down to a saddle, where we can untie and put on skis.

"You take the lead," Silitch says to Pessi in French. "I'll bring up the rear." It's warming up fast today, and the Parisians flail badly in the mashed-potato crud. It doesn't seem to bother them.

"La neige!" yelps one, happy with the quantity of snow.

"Mais vas-y!" shouts another, hurrying a buddy so he can drop in.

Silitch never makes a scene, but I can tell something bothers him by his cracked lips, which are thin and drawn.

"I would have picked an easier route down," he says later. "Sometimes guides have their own agenda. You have to make calls based on the group, and this group is having problems."

Everyone needs a break by the time we reach the Requin Hut, a stone building perched where two glaciers crash into a third, the Mer de Glace. Inside sits a forty-something local wearing the Company's distinct green jacket and devouring a croûte savoyarde, a cheesy potato casserole. He has perfect boy-band hair and a confidence that teeters on cocksure. We sit at his table, which seems to bug him.

"I remember when you were the new guy up on Mont Blanc," Silitch says playfully in French.

"I don't climb that anymore," the guide fires back.

"You climbed it a lot," Silitch says, almost apologetically.

"Seventeen times that first summer."

"Wow, that is a lot," I say, trying to exude a friendly vibe. He ignores me.

"How many times did you have to climb Mont Blanc before you got into the Company?" Silitch asks, trying to salvage the encounter.

"That has nothing to do with it," the guide snaps, steam curling off the food on his fork. "You have to be from Chamonix."