Vanoise touring

Back at the start of last week I had a couple of days touring in the Vanoise to finish off my 'alpine' season before coming up to Lofoten in Arctic Norway. Rob, Simon, Andy, Mike and Hugo are all ex Courchevel seasonnaires from way back in the day (think turn of the century...) and wanted an introduction to ski touring with a night in a refuge. The Col de la Vanoise hut above Pralognan is the perfect venue for this with relatively easy access, with potential for detours on the way up, and lots of summit possibilities before dropping back into the valley. With heavy snowfall just 2 days before we were a bit too early for the spring snow cycle tobe back to its best but still managed to find some great snow!

See you next year guys!

Steep Vanoise 2017

I am a few weeks behind schedule on the blog front... it is hard to believe it is over 2 weeks now since the 9th edition of the now-legendary Steep Vanoise week! Where last year we had 5 days of waist-deep powder, this year was a complete contrast with chalky snow on North faces and some sublime spring snow on the sunny sides:

Day 1:

Day 2: Steep, smooth spring snow you say? Oh go on then...

Day 3: Bellecote North face and a 'Brucie (or Simon) bonus':

Day 4 - perfect spring snow out behind Les Arcs:

Day 5 - a massed ascent & descent down to Le Col with both teams with some 5 star spring snow with not another track showing:

Many thanks to IFMGA Mountain Guide Dorian Labaeye who was assisting me on the coaching/guiding duties, and thanks to Jack, Amanda, Rod, Michael, Dan, Gavin, Mark, David and Pete for being 2 great teams!

See you in 2018 for the 10th birthday of Steep Vanoise - provisional dates are 12-18 March so pencil them in to your diary now!

Maurienne Steep Ski Coaching & Adventures

Last week I was back in one of my favourite stomping grounds running a week of steep ski coaching & adventures for the Eagle Ski Club.

With high winds and heavy snowfall forecast for the first 2 days the start of the week was always going to be 'interesting'. Fortunately the Maurienne Valley has a variety of options and there is always a good venue for any combination of conditions, and we spent Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in the trees skiing great powder:

The weather gradually cleared on Wednesday, but also warmed up considerably so on Thursday we headed up high in Bonnneval to try and make the most of the soft snow left on North facing slopes. By Friday a proper spring cycle had set in, but we still managed to find good cold snow in the couloirs of Valfrejus, along with a few smooth spring turns off the South side.

We finished the week in style with some perfect smooth spring snow from the summit of the Grand Argentier, followed by an impromptu demo from the Chasseurs Alpins:

Thanks to SOnia, Stuart J, Stuart C, Sarah and Paul for a great week and thanks also to David & Séverine at La Turra for their hospitality - see you next year!

Vanoise adventures

The Foehn wind is currently raging outside while I am having a well-timed day off after a busy week of steep ski coaching in the Vanoise for Jerry, Stuart, Jason and Roger. With an average age of 61.75 these boys can still rip and show there is no age limit for making changes in your skiing!

Thanks to the gang for a great week! Next years dates are already in the diary...

Fort William Mountain Festival

This weekend I will be presenting a slideshow/talk on this spring's Baffin Island expedition at the Fort William Mountain Festival on Saturday night (18th Feb). If you are in the area why not come along! Tckets are available here.

Off Piste Perfection Tarentaise

This week I was running the Off Piste Perfection coaching week, a collaboration between www.offpisteskiing.com and Jagged Globe.

Based in Bourg St Maurice this is a mobile week of off piste coaching, and with les Arcs, La Plagne, La Rosiere/La Thuile, St Foy and Val D'Isere/Tignes all within easy reach there is great potential to follow the good snow, weather conditions and pick the best terrain to develop everyone's skiing.

Sunday was forecast snowy and windy, and there are few better places than Les Arcs in those conditions, with lots of open easy tree-skiing to kick the week off:

Stuart checking out some ski heritage at lunchtime in Arcs 1600:

On Monday the forecast was still cloudy and snowy so we headed for the trees of St Foy. Sadly the Marquise and Aiguille chairs didn't open (partly due to a problem with the Gazex avalanche control systems! There is still lots of potential low down though, and we had a very productive day mixing technique and tactics on the lower meadows and tree lines:

On Tuesday we went back to Les Arcs and had a great day in the trees around 1950 and 2000, taking the tactics developed earlier in the week on to steeper angles:

Wednesday saw us heading up to Val D'Isere to make use of the steep terrain for a technically-focussed day which saw everyone making some great changes to their skiing.

The weather forecast was good for Thursday and we headed back up to Les Arcs with a view to finding some untracked snow away from the masses:

Friday was the last day for the team and we chose St Foy as the venue to find some testing snow and slopes to put the week's progress into action:

Thanks to Stuart, Ann and Elaine for their great company through the week, and willingness to make the most of the tricky weather in the first few days!!