An opening weekend report from Flakey – a Hotham regular.
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TR: Glacier de Toule, Italy
This is a repost of a Trip Report posted on ski.com.au and TGR in January, and the public reaction to it formed the nucleus of my desire to create this site:
We met with our guide Jerome at the Compagnie des Guides in Chamonix, which is conveniently next to our hotel in the morning, to find him on the net looking up the weather and snow conditions and finding out what was open. The top of the Grands Montets is still shut so Pas de Chevre wasn’t possible, but Punta Helbronner did open so he said ‘On y va a l’Italia!’
30 minutes later we were in Courmayeur via the Mont Blanc tunnel – 11km underground and after the horrific accident there many years ago the safety precautions are amazing.
In the car park he started filling his back pack with Ice Axe, Crampons, Ropes, Ice Screws and various other hardware to haul people out of crevasses. The then handed us climbing harnesses which we duly donned, and started feeling incredibly hardcore, until we saw everyone in the car park doing the same.
We were in the shadows of Mont Blanc de Courmayeur, and Mont Blanc itself fleetingly revealing themselves through the clouds:
So with the Ice Screws jangling off his belt off we went to the first of three trams to get us to the top:
Didn’t get photos of the other two but they were increasingly smaller, crappier and scarier!!!! Once we reached the top we walked down a walkway with an automative Avie Beacon tester, and once we made it out on the snow we caught our first view of the Dent du Geant:
We then went for a 10 minute walk/sidestep to the top of the Glacier de Toule which was our objective for the day. Towering over us was Mont Maudit, Mont Blanc du Tacul, Mont Blanc de Courmayeur and of course Mont Blanc itself:
Don’t fall in the hole!:
Jerome and I working our way to the Glacier, with the Tour Ronde & Combe Maudit ahead, and Mont Maudit towering above:
An icefall/seracs off to our RHS:
L’Aiguille du Midi as seen from across La Vallée Blanche. Poubelle looks pretty sketch so no Blizzard of Aahhs imitations this trip:
The goods. Looking down the Glacier de Toule:
The first obstacle – a massive staircase to get us on to safe ground:
Me descending the final ladder:
The stairs again:
Finally we get down on to the snow and it’s time to rip it up. Jerome is very strict with his instructions on certain parts of the glacier, saying to follow closely to his tracks on the more dangerous parts, but let us open it up wherever possible. His routefinding skills were fantastic, we crossed precious few tracks all day.
CarveGirl having fun:
Me smiling:
Big powder 8’s in the middle are me and Jerome’s handiwork:
After 1300m vert of virgin powder we decided to head back up again. This time the views over to the Vallee Blanche and the Aiguilles de Chamonix were much better.
Aiguille Verte & Dru, Dent du Geant:
Aiguille du Midi & Upper Vallée Blanche:
Mont Maudit:
The upper reaches of the Vallee Blanche and variations:
The middle section of Vallee Blanche and variations:
This time instead of taking the stairs we decided to ski a couloir that would get us on to the glacier. 45-50deg, firm snow but unfortunately the top half had been sideslipped by so many people that it left quite a trench that would have been difficult to ski so we had to side slip too, followed by jump turns below with a sharp turn to the right to avoid the bergschrund:
Back on the glacier with the Couloir in the upper middle of shot:
Little skier amongst the big seracs: (This may be the best ski picture I have of myself)
Our handiwork in the middle of shot:
After another 1300m of largely virgin snow it was time for a fabulous Italian lunch:
This was followed by a ski down to the Valley floor – a mix of light fluffy pow in the trees, to light fluffy pow on top of avvie debris.
Safe, Sound and Smiling:
So in my usual fashion there are precious few action shots, but honestly when the skiing’s that good, life’s too short to break up the day with poses etc. So you’ll just need to take my word for it that it was without question the most unique day I have ever had on skis, and may well be the finest as well.
Here’s some Youtube footage of the day:
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Falls Creek Pics & Report
Snow Report and Pics from opening weekend at Falls Creek.
Courtesy of currawong and ronny from the ski.com.au forums.
Snow on the Go
Snow lovers are information addicts. The advent of the Internet has allowed us to cut through the marketing guff and make our own decisions on what the conditions are like and what to expect.
Ian Dunlop & Richard Tribe, owners of ski.com.au pioneered Australian Snow Cams in the mid/late 1990’s, around the same time Pete ‘The Frog’ Taylor began using experimental long range weather forecasting models to predict snowfalls, first on the ski.com.au forums and now on his own Snowatch site. The Bureau of Meteorology has live reporting weather stations (AWS) from all the major resorts and their Alpine Forecasts have improved vastly in content and accuracy over the last few years. Moutainwatch have also upped the ante with their panning, zooming live streaming cams and Weatherzone is also a particularly comprehensive source of weather information.
None of this is particularly new, however the recent advent of 3G Networks and Smartphones such as Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android platform has meant that this information is all available on the go and in your pocket. Even aussieskier.com has a site formatted for mobile devices.
Smartphones have also revolutionised user-generated contribution to many of these sites. My weekend updates, including photos, will be coming from my iPhone and iPad, forum members have been posting about conditions from their Smartphones and communicating via Twitter and Facebook. Usually the first signal to me that it is snowing is the cavalcade of Facebook status updates from friends on the hill.
So I thought I would list a few of the mobile enabled websites, and phone applications that I find particularly useful to keep up with things while out and about:
Mobile Sites:
ski.com.au Mobile offers Snow Cams, Snow Reports, Weather, News and many other of the site’s main features formatted for mobile devices.
Snowatch Mobile – this will automatically redirect if you enter https://snowatch.com.au into a mobile device
Bureau of Meteorology – BOM is not smartphone specific, but generally pages are low on fluff so will load quickly and not blow your data quota.
Facebook and Twitter are also very useful ways to access information as both official and unofficial Snow Reports are communicated this way.
Some iPhone Apps:
Quiksilver Snow is a free version of the Mountainwatch app with branding.
Mt Buller have their own iPhone App with Lift Status, Snow Cams and Trail Maps (but strangely no snow reports)
Weatherzone app is very useful for Weather Observations, Maps, Radar, Satellite & Synoptic Images
Pocket Weather presents BOM Weather forecasts and data in a concise and visually appealing format
As I only have access to an iPhone/iPad I’d love to hear what’s out there for the other platforms such as Symbian and Android, also please let me know what websites, mobile and otherwise, that you use to make decisions regarding the snow.
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Buller Report 13/6/10
Looking down Shakey Knees:
Looking back up Shakey Knees:
Mt Buller Summit from Baldy:
Once again after more festivities a late start to the ski day was on the cards.
After cold temps of -5c overnight, more snow was made – every little bit counts. The weather was a lot nicer than Saturday – blue skies, cold temperatures and very little wind.
Actual snow conditions were not particularly different to Saturday, and due to our late start the snow on Shakey was softening but holding up OK. As it is on the Northside of the mountain there are often a few thin patches on the lower right hand side of the run, so the conditions today were pretty typical for any time Shakey is open, not bad for early June.
Again it was reiterated that LBS is not far off, if there is no rain during the week and favourable snowmaking temperatures then we should expect it to be open next weekend. A friend skied down there and hiked out on his touring gear, he said the cover on the first pitch was perfect.
Today being more clear you could look across to the Summit – it would seem there hasn’t been as much snow made there yet – I do know that the capacity of the snowmaking infrastructure is such that all the guns cannot be run at once, so it would seem that LBS is the priority and Summit will follow afterwards. See the above photo for Summit conditions.
Tirol Cafe was busy at lunch, but not overwhelmed, the line for service was long but our food arrived shortly after ordering. I do much prefer Koflers however and will be looking forward to that opening.
All in all it was a great opening weekend. Good to catch up with all our friends, the fireworks were particularly good – the new venue down near the village square is much more appropriate, and any skiing on Queen’s Birthday is a bonus.
Not 100% sure if I will be on the mountain next weekend, but will certainly be reporting if I do make it up.
Feel free to ask any questions below or contribute your own experiences from the weekend.
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Bluebird Buller
Reporting live from the hill, it’s a beautiful sunny day, cold with snowmaking overnight. Shakey Knees and Bourke St are in great shape, no lift lines.
Full report with pics this afternoon.
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Buller Report 12/6/10
After the traditional festivities of Queen’s Birthday we woke up at the crack of noon, followed by the also traditional visit by the Plumber to our lodge we headed into the Village to pick up our season passes and then up for a ski.
Natural snow cover is not enormous however one more snowfall will cover up a lot of the exposed grass to get area like Baldy, Skyline and presumably Family Run going.
The snowmakers have done a sterling job and the cover on Bourke St and Shakey Knees is great, Shakey being much better than I was expecting. The word on the hill is that if there is no rain this week then LBS will be open next weekend. It is not far off being able to be opened at the moment.
A small rail park was set up at the top of Bourke St.
Weather was pretty grey with a chilly wind, hope for more snowmaking tonight.
All in all it is great to be skiing on Queen’s Birthday, and any skiing during June is a bonus.
I’ll report again after tomorrow’s skiing, and most weekends this season.
If you have any questions about the coverage please ask in the comments, also if you were skiing today let everyone know your thoughts.
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I Ski For Tommy
“i ski for tommy.” is a not for profit initiative directed by friends of the late Thomas Lewis-Mathias, a national level alpine skier who tragically died from malignant melanoma 6th Jan 2009.
The aims of the program as endorsed by the Alfred Hospital Foundation are:
1. To raise awareness of the dangers of Melanoma amongst young people – highlighting the indiscriminate, yet preventable nature of the disease. This will be done by way of presentations at schools, workshops, social events and by the support of national-level winter athletes who will act as ambassadors of the movement.
2. To raise money exclusively for the Victorian Melanoma Service by the selling of “i ski for tommy.” branded merchandise and by the direct collection of tax-deductible donations.
3. To allow supporters and the public to track the progress of the ambassadors of the foundation who include Mike Rishworth, Katya Crema and Dan Portelli.
4. To create a lasting legacy for Thomas Lewis-Mathias.
This is an extremely worthwhile venture in memory of a much loved member of the Buller Family. aussieskier.com is proud to be a supporter.
New Live Streaming Cam for LBS
Mountainwatch has launched a new live streaming cam on Little Buller Spur, Mt Buller.
Not much to look at for now, but when the weather clears and the run opens I think this will be a great addition.
Mountainwatch’s live streaming cams are also available on their new iPhone apps which I will be reviewing shortly.
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One More Sleep…
Typically the excitement for opening weekend revolves around catching up with old friends you may not have seen since October. Snow lovers are nomadic, heading to the corners of the globe after the snow melts in Australia, only to reconvene at their favourite watering hole on Queen’s Birthday to catch up and share stories of their adventures.
Snow folk are a forgiveable type, it’s perfectly acceptable to have not been in contact for 8 months but then pick up exactly where you left off, some high-strung city friends could learn from this!
However this year is a little different. The hills are white, the lifts will be running and turns will be made. Will this subdue the partying? I’m not too sure, perhaps people will be content with a later start to their ski day.
Having only spent QBW at Buller and the ‘Golden Triangle’ of the Whitt, Grimus and Kooroora, I’m not too familiar with the festivities at the other resorts.
Where are the places to be? What are the hot parties and what are the annual rituals?
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