Down Mont Blanc, by snowboard

updated 4:54 p.m. ET Feb. 27, 2007

CHAMONIX, France - "Follow my path exactly," my guide instructed sternly as we set off on the Vallee Blanche glacier descent, warning me of the crevasses hidden among the blankets of snow and boulders of ice that give the famed ski run its breathtaking beauty.

The stunning Vallee Blanche glacier run on legendary Mont Blanc - one of Europe's longest ski runs at 13 miles - also is among its most dangerous. Legions of skiers and hikers have died here since alpinists began traversing the White Valley some 200 years ago.

I had chosen the easy way up the mountain: by cable car to the stiletto-sharp peak of the Aiguille du Midi, or "needle of the south," 12,605 feet high. And now, after hearing about this run for years, here I was, about to embark on a descent, by snowboard, that is a kind of pilgrimage for powder hounds like me.

After letting me ooh and ahh over the panoramic view from the safety of the observation deck of mountain peaks bobbing in a sea of fog and snow, my guide, Yann, strapped me into a harness.

He tied us together by rope with a wink that said: "If you go down, you're taking me down, too," for the harrowing hike down a 30-degree incline of ice leading to the start of the run.

But I wasn't properly equipped for this. Yann shook his head and wagged his finger with disapproval, and I made a mental note to buy my own backpack, probe, shovel and avalanche beacon for any future jaunts in the backcountry.

Jean H Lee / AP Skiers make the steep descent on foot from the Aiguille du Midi cable car to the start of the 13-mile Vallee Blanche glacier run at Chamonix, Mont Blanc, France.

We inched down by foot, step by step, among chain gangs of skiers linked to one another by rope, breathing heavily in the thin air. Behind us I could hear another guide telling the tale of a skier who had slipped off the ridge, his body landing about a mile and a half below in the town of Chamonix. Happens, oh, about a dozen times a year, he said.

I peered over the edge into a dizzying drop of ice.

Once safely seated on a ledge of snow, we strapped into our snowboards, the wind whipping around us.

I took a deep breath.

Carving our own line, we started off heading toward Italy - the Italians call the towering mountain Monte Bianco, and their side is known as the "sunny side of Mont Blanc" - and then cut back toward France.

We passed a kidney-shaped outcropping of rocks known as the Rognons and around the cliffs of the Geant and Tacul glaciers, passing the jagged waterfalls of ice said to have inspired Mary Shelley's vision of Frankenstein.

If You Go MONT BLANC: Chamonix, France, 011-33-450-53-00-24, open for skiing until May 6. LOCATION: Sixty miles from Geneva Cointrin International Airport. Chamonix valley is easily accessible by car, shuttle and bus. VALLEE BLANCHE GLACIER RUN: A hired guide is required. Try Chamonix Experience, 011-33-4-50-54-09-36, or Evolution 2, 011-33-820-821-024. About $92 per person for a group trip, or about $330 for a private guide. Evolution also takes skiers on overnight trips in the Vallee Blanche through April. British-run Bigfoot Travel, organizes packages with accommodations, rentals, and guided trips including Vallee Blanche. DINING: In Argentiere, Chez Anais is on Route Plagnolet; La Cremerie is on Chemin de la Glaciere; Le Dahu. The Office, La Flambee and Bar le Stone are on rue Charlet Straton. Le Pcheu is at Le Tour. LODGING: In Argentiere, the Hotel Montana, Hotel le Dahu, and Hotel Couronne, offer quick access to Le Tour and Grands Montets. In Chamonix, Le Hameau Albert 1er, has one of the best Savoyarde restaurants in town. Hotel Richemond, is known for apres-ski partying.

We communed with crows seeking a scrap of our picnic lunch as we dined al fresco on a vast snowy plain with mountain views as far as the eye could see.

It was just the two of us soaring down the wide, glacial plain, making fresh tracks in the powder: no chair lifts, no trail markers, no trees, no snow cannons, no speakers blasting hip-hop, no beginner skiers or snowboarders to watch out for - in fact, no other skiers or snowboarders at all within shouting distance.

On weekends, the Vallee Blanche can get crowded, with hundreds of skiers hurtling down variations of the run each day. But it gave me a taste for backcountry riding and made me forever impatient with marked trails, or as they call them here, pistes.

It's not expert terrain, but you need to be in total control: As we made our way down, Yann pointed out treacherously hidden crevasses known to swallow skiers whole. The glaciers also are lined with spiked seracs - ice pillars - that can break off with deadly speed and suddenness.

Several hours of gloriously quiet, breathtaking riding later, we dipped into the 4-mile ribbon of ice known as the Mer de Glace - Sea of Ice - for the home stretch.

This is the place where Shelley, who visited Chamonix in 1816 while writing "Frankenstein," had the monster meet his maker - on a vast, isolated, icy expanse flanked by rugged mountain peaks.

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By the time Yann and I made it to the bottom, thighs shaking, and had hiked another 20 excruciating minutes out of the valley up what seemed like a wall at a 90-degree incline, we were ready for a celebratory beer along with the dozen other skiers already sprawled out on the slope, exhausted and elated.

For those who don't relish risking life and limb to see the Mer de Glace, a little red train chugs its way up the mountain from Montenvers.

And Chamonix, which hosted the first Winter Olympics in 1924, does have its share of marked pistes at a string of resorts spread along the Chamonix Valley.

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