Day 2 of our little trip out to the Hurrungane and after eying up a few possibilities, we decided to ski Store Ringstind. According to some of the guide books, this is one of Norway’s most classic ski tours. I cannot really argue against that, not having done much skiing here but it was certainly a great tour if that comes close to classic. And it really is a ski tour in the true sense of the word with a short boot pack at the start of the climb but otherwise skins are on all the way.

Lars on the start of the long approach.....Store Ringstind centre right

It’s pretty long approach of around 4km (you ski out the way you came in) with little altitude gain. I think it was around 200 to 300m before you start to climb proper and the vertical gain for the trip was 1300m. We did it in around 5.5hrs including breaks, faffing and everything else. Unfortunately the weather hadn’t improved much from the previous day but sun was forecast…..and it promptly came around 11.00.

Nice scenery on approach right

Taken approach right (Store Soleitind side) at start of climb/bootpack

I was really impressed with the terrain around here. From the road around this area, you can be forgiven for thinking it’s all rolling and quite tame but it’s all in there. You just have to get in there. It was as good as anything I’ve seen. There is a 1000m 50 degree couloir which is on climber’s right on the approach. I thought I was in Chamonix there for a second. Oh, the delights!! It’s really exciting to realise that this kind of terrain is only a car drive away!! Oh yeah, baby! ;).

We took a different bootpack up to everyone else (oh and there were quite a lot of people. Seems the Norwegians like this tour a lot!) but we didn’t really gain much time for our difference. This is used as the descent exit for most skiers.

We bootpacked up climber's far left

Lars skinning up after the bootpack

Me boot packing after the long approach courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

The actual face of Store Ringstind is like a giant wedge, sheer faces on three sides and then this perfect 35 degree snow clad slope. Whoever came up with the idea of earth must have been thinking about skiers when they made this face. Perfect! There are a few large crevasses in it but they are large.. and therefore easily avoidable. We didn’t have glacier travel gear (some did and maybe it would be sensible to).

Store Ringstind obscured

The face of Storeringstind

The very top of the summit steepens to low 40 degrees but it’s not very long before it becomes less steep. Unfortunately, just before we reached the summit, the clouds and wind came in and it was a complete whiteout, so no nice views for us.

Me on the summit.....beautiful!

And not very many nice pictures of us on the way down. I got cold hands and didn’t want to hang around, so just shot off down the face…400m of great cruisy and fast turns and then…….glue. Not so much fun that bit. Everyone was getting caught out. It changed instantly from spring corn to glue and threw everyone. It got better again lower down though.

Me skiing out and back to the approach courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

And then the long ride out back to the car. Board back into ski mode to practice my telemark turns.. or lack there of. You can pole out pretty much the whole way with a little ascent at the end back down to the car.

A great tour and surely one of Norway’s classics……..

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South couloir of Store Soleitind (taken from ridge of Austabottind)

Unfortunately due to its southerly aspect, the snow was not the best and was choked with a lot of old sluff slides. We did manage to find a few pockets of soft snow but for the most part it wasn’t the best skiing I’ve ever done. Still, in the right conditions, it’s a great little couloir.

Lars at the start of the climb with couloir in the background

It saw quite a lot of traffic the day we skied it, with three other pairs than ourselves. And it was hot. The sun wasn’t out but the cloud cover kept it uncomfortably toasty.

Looking up the couloir

Topping out. Couloir of Austabottind in the background. Courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

We were up and down in no time. A great day out.

Me and first few turns in the couloir courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

Lars on the descent

Lars on the way home.... (Austabottind couloir in background)

Job done courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

Linking up both couloirs without any incident and going at a pretty leisurely pace took around 4.5hrs (including breaks, transitions e.t.c) and the altitude gain over the day was 1050m with 1300m skied down. We skied out of the same valley that contains the couloirs. This meant that we had to get a lift back to the car which was a few kms up the road. We did think about just skinning over the ridge on the way back to get to the car but managed to sort a lift out before that was necessary.

And then off to Turtagrø Hotel. What a great little place that is! It was my first time there. A real little ski community with a great vibe and a really nice, basic but somehow swish hotel. We camped outside for 100 NOK each and were able to use the shower and dry room and sit in the communal area and library. The library is something else and supposedly quite famous or at least it was before it got burnt down in 2001 with an enormous collection of mountaineering books. Fortunately for us and thanks to donations from around the world, the library is slowly recovering and they had loads of interesting, rare books to read.

Turtagrø Hotel

Turtagrø tenting

A great place to base yourself (probably the only place actually) and explore the area.

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The light was really flat when we arrived. But that was okay. I mean, what do you do when the light’s flat…? You ski the trees. And what do we do if there are no trees…? You ski couloirs! Ja da! And luckily for us, there were a couple of couloirs on the agenda.

Store Austabottind (2202m) on far left and the North couloir

The west couloir on the Austabottind massif is really wide, evenly steep and just great fun. I’m guessing, excluding the fan, that the couloir is around 400m and at least 45 degrees (and not much more even though I have seen it rated at 50 degrees). This is a great and relatively quick tour to get to the entrance (we did it in a leisurely 1.45hrs) and the great thing is that you can link it up with the south couloir on Store Soleitind which is on the opposite side of the valley and where the above picture was taken.

We skinned up the backside of Austabottind and scrambled along the ridge to the entrance without getting to take a look at the couloir first.

Me scrambling up the ridge to get to the couloir entrance courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

The scramble is not that long (maybe 30mins, I cannot remember) and you cannot miss the entrance. If you see a cornice, keep going. There is no cornice formation on the entrance.

We've got company.... The entrance to the couloir

The first 30m or so are less steep and form a blind rollover as the couloir falls away. Conditions were variable with hard chalk snow and a few patches of nice powder. I think it had seen a fair amount of traffic as it felt pretty rutted from skiers traversing the face and not skiing it! And snowboarders get blamed for side-slipping everything

Lars after dropping in

What a cracking couloir! It’s so wide when you’re in it and although I didn’t feel I could charge it with the snow conditions, it was a great descent. Highly recommended.

Look....there's some snow!

Me skiing the couloir courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

We skied out of the fan and across the valley to ski the south couloir on Store Soleitind (see next blog post) which is clearly visible from the fan of this couloir. Two opposing couloirs within easy reach. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Want to see more splitboarding in Norway…..? Click here.

South Couloir of Skogshorn

Things have been quiet on the ski front the last few weeks since returning to Oslo from Chamonix and I have to admit that I was definitely over the season. But not now….!! Wahoo!! I hooked up with my Norwegian friend, Lars Thomas, a telemarker (but of course ;)) and we left Oslo at 8.00 with nothing particular in mind and were geared up and ready to skin up the apron of the couloir by 12.00. The skies were completely empty of clouds and the couloir had been taking a lovely dose of sun all morning. One of the luxuries of skiing here is the latitude and the angle of the sun (i.e., it being much lower). The snow was taking nowhere near as much of a beating as say the European Alps where timing is essential on southern aspects. Ridiculously early starts… Not a fan! That afforded us a nice leisurely pace and made the day a lot more enjoyable.

Me starting the boot pack courtesy of Lars Thomas Nordby

From the road which runs right below this peak, it’s about 850m to the summit (according to my watch) which is just off to the East of the couloir entrance. The actual couloir itself is about 350 to 400m long (that’s my guestimate). The lower section of the couloir is high 30′s to 40 degrees and gets steeper as you climb past the “crux” which is a 3m rock band around the middle of the couloir. There was a thin section of snow/ice here on climber’s left which made it easy to climb up (even with 1 ice axe and no crampons). In the upper section of the couloir, there are sections of 45 degrees but it is never sustained. Bit of a mixed bag…..

Lars climbing the crux

Looking up the couloir after the crux

There were a few people skiing down the couloir while we were climbing it so we didn’t get untouched corn. I’m not sure how often this gets skied but it’s supposed to be a bit of a Hemsedal classic, so I suspect a fair bit. I’m pretty sure we did witness one first that day though…..!!! One crazy Norwegian (by the name of Simen) skied it clad in his cross-country lycra and his cross country skis!! Why….I have no idea but he seemed to be enjoying himself even if it was extremely sketchy and he looked close to losing his balance a few times on solid 45 degrees. Each to their own.

Simen in his lycra and cross country skis!

Oh, by the way, for those who use this for beta, the boot pack up was perfect. Just enough penetration for solid steps which never collapsed. Beautiful.

Nearing the summit entrance to the couloir

Lars topping out

From the car to the summit took us just over 3 hours (not including a lunch break) at a pretty leisurely pace. We didn’t hang around long on the summit as it looked like the top of the couloir was about to return to the shade, transforming the snow to something a lot less pleasant to ski. We caught it perfectly.

First few turns......

Lars free-heeling

What can I say…..it was just brilliant! Great snow all the way down and some lovely turns. The couloir narrows after the first section (about a board length for a metre) before widening again and gets steeper (the steepest section of the couloir: 45 degrees, maybe a bit more…).

Lars nicely camouflaged about to drop into the steepest section above the crux

This then leads to the “crux” which we downclimbed. One of the snowboarders who passed us on the climb up let go of his board downclimbing this and it raced another 400m to the bottom. And this was the best part of the couloir……… Not good. Rack it up next time, mate!

Just above the crux

It would be nice to have a rope next time unless you drop it which is doable (I was feeling much too sensible and my hero juice is not what it used to be ;)). There are a few bits of tatt to use although I didn’t look to see how safe they were. What was to come was just some of the best skiing in a while. A lovely pitch and beautiful corn, linking turn after turn. Bloody ridiculous!

All good things have to come to an end and we navigated our way down the patches of snow to the car.

One happy customer......

I do look rather pleased with myself, don’t I!!

Right….where to next!!!!

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God, this turned out to be a very long day. Up at 5.45am to get the first bin off the Aiguille du Midi with good friends, Greeny and Nick and down off the mountain at 1am.

The three of us had attempted to climb la Tour Ronde only a couple of weeks previously with the intent of skiing the west couloir (le Gervasutti) but there was just too much snow on the lower section and we got nowhere fast and had to abandon the route. It was probably a bit of a cocky move anyway and conditions really needed more time to settle.

The North Face of la Tour Ronde

This time round, the weather forecast was a little on the dodgy side but then it had been for the last three days and each of those had been beautiful and blue bird, so we hoped the weather forecaster would get it wrong again. We got the first bin up at 8.10am  and were at the Bergschrund for 9.30 with lovely blue skies. So far so good!

Greeny down the arete from the Aiguille du Midi. Look at the weather!

Greeny and Nick on the way to the Tour Ronde

As we were rounding Le Mont Blanc du Tacul, we could see that a group was already on the face and making their way up the ice chimney in the middle of the face. Great for us. There would be a boot pack in all the way!

Start of the skin and la Tour Ronde

We made our way up the lower snow field slowly but deliberately. I was supposed to be down and meeting Seb in the Argentiere hut that night to ski something on the Argentiere basin the next day, so had a bit of a rocket up my arse. And the weather was closing in………

Nick just below the first ice pitch

Soon it was snowing but it didn’t seem like there would be much accumulation but then the spindrift started ripping down the face. Cool, dry powder snow which got heavier and heavier as the day wore on. The actual ice pitch up the centre of the face is only 2 pitches of 60m.

Nick on the first pitch

We simul. climbed up, with Nick climbing the first 60m till the rope went taught on me and I would start climbing and Greeny started climbing when my 60m went taught on him. I’m not sure what the ice grade is but it was probably not more than grade 4 (similar to the Chere couloir). The ice was good with only a few sections of plating.

By this time, the weather was really not looking too good and visibility was terrible. As Greeny topped out at the top of the ice chimney at around 14.45 with 100m left to climb, we decided the safest bet was to abseil back down and bin the route. The spindrift was coming down fast and furious now and one episode hit us with enough force to almost knock us of the face or so it felt (we were all safely on a belay point).

Greeny nearing the end of the second pitch

So, back down we went the way we had come up off a nice v-thread. Nick went down first to set up the next belay point, then Greeny and then me. Safely down to the next belay point and last abseil before the bottom snow field and the rope got stuck. We tried and tried and lost a lot of time trying to free the rope in vain, knowing deep down that the only way was to climb up again and free it which Nick ended up doing. Legend! A few moments of fearing for my frost bitten toes during the interlude and we were finally down to the bottom snow field by 19.00 and the board was on my feet. That was a nice feeling.

We skied the bottom snow field with poor visibility but the snow was deep, steep and cold and then started to worry about finding our way out in the white out. Fortunately, things improved the lower down we got. It was as if we had been sitting in a snow cloud all day on the Tour Ronde.

Down the Vallee Blanche we went, me skootching for about 1hr on flats having gone too far skier’s right, switching to ski mode and then losing one of the skis when I was about to put it back into board mode. It shot off and narrowly missed a crevasse, contouring round it. Greeny saved the day and went a retrieved it. What a day!

Thankfully, things went pretty smoothly thereafter and we skied/walked to the buvette with headtorches donned and then had to walk all the way back to Chamonix due to a lack of snow. Amazing bootbang and very tired.

Long day.

By the way, there was a great little trailer to the upcoming film “Deeper” by Jeremy Jones with himself and Xavier de la Rue skiing this face. The top section wasn’t quite in condition when we were there but there’s some great footage of them riding from top to bottom. I’m just looking for it to link it but it seems to have been pulled. A real shame. Two of my favorite riders.

I’m now stuck in Chamonix trying to find ways to get home to Oslo. If anyone is heading that way, give me a shout!

For more trip reports in Chamonix, click here.

The weather has been playing havoc with touring plans since I arrived in Chamonix 10 days ago. I don’t think I have ever wanted it to not snow so much. The normal stable weather at this time of year has been non-existent, with the odd blue bird day peering through masses of grey and snow; nowhere near conducive to safe and stable conditions. The few attempts to get out there have been thwarted by chest high snow on the climbs, literally swimming in snow.

So, when I partnered up with my good old mate, Nick, for a foray in the Argentiere basin, we were pretty accepting of whatever the outcome would be. Good times in the mountains with good friends is what it’s all about in the end anyway and I couldn’t have been out with a better touring buddy. Nick initiated me into the finer points of ski mountaineering not so many moons ago. Great person to have in the mountains.

We managed to get first lifts Chamonix style and headed towards the end of the basin, one objective in mind: the Col des Courtes.

Heading towards the back of the Argentiere Basin: Mont Dolent centre, Aiguille de Triolet far right

It turned out to be such a warm day and the mountains were talking to anyone who would listen. Frequent point releases from rock warming but nothing big and not a single slab avalanche which would have sent us home with our tail between our legs. So we sat out the warmest part of the day and waited for things to calm down. The avalanche activity earlier in the day had sent everyone else packing, so there was not going to be any help with the boot pack but today was a good day to be on northerly aspects.

We decided on Col des Cristaux in the end, the face next to Col des Courtes as it seemed a more realistic proposition given the time we had waited and the fact that it had been more active earlier in the day and hence safer. A 600m shot at around 48 to 50 degrees (I checked it with my inclinometer).

We set off around 13.30 and were at the bergschrund for 14.00 which was easily passable. We managed to skin up 200m of the face before starting a long boot pack up on the avalanche runnel looker’s right of the face, nice at times but a few episodes of wallowing in snow which lost us time.

Nick on the way up

Nick leading some tricky mixed climbing mid-climb

We were on the summit at 18.00 or should I say 10m from it. It took another hour to finally get on the ridge with the rock-affected, faceted snow but the view was worth it!

Nick on the summit (les Grandes Jorasse off centre and Mont Blanc du Tacul far right)

We got ready to head down, the first section was pretty steep (around 60 degrees with hidden rock), so we took it pretty easy on this section.

The story so far from the summit

And then we could start to enjoy some turns.

Where to next....?

The snow had transformed with a bit of a sun crust on skier’s left so we headed down and across skier’s right and found some nice cold snow although the sun crust soon came back further down the face. It was a great line and everything came together nicely considering the last few attempts we’ve had in the mountains.

Done...quite literally. Col des Cristaux in the background

And just in time for some nice Alpenglow.

Beautiful views: Aiguille d'Argentiere and the Y couloir, high right Tour Noir

It ended up being a pretty long day…. Queuing at 7.30 for first lifts and getting to the Argentiere hut for 21.00. Vertical gain according to the guide book is 1050m.

For more trip reports in Chamonix, click here.

I’m lucky enough to be here for the next three weeks but have not been so lucky with the weather. A lot of weather instability and snow is going to mean taking chances when they present themselves (safely of course) over the next week.

And today was one such day! Not in Chamonix but over in the Chablais region of the Swiss Alps. My good friend Sebastien de Sainte Marie suggested skiing the 400m NE Couloir of Le Luisin. Never heard of it but sounded like a plan, so I took the train from Argentiere to les Marecottes. Great to see him and be back skiing with old touring partners.

We took the chair lift up (got to love the lift access in Europe ;)) which took us in sight of the couloir for the first time and the first col we would have to skin up.

NE Couloir of le Luisin taken from the chair lift

Col de la Golette

It didn’t take long before we were up the first col and descending down into the valley on the backside to skin back up and over to the Col D’Emaney. Good snow and a few nice turns. We were going to try a high traverse to avoid losing altitude but there was some big wind slab formations (I managed to release a small one on a convex roll with a crown 1.5m), so decided for the safe option and a longer skin.

Col d'Emaney

Once to the Col d’Emaney, it’s a fairly long ridge walk up to the summit of the Le Luisin. It took us 2 to 2.5 hours but we were and had been breaking trail all day (sorry, Seb had been breaking trail all day!).

Seb near the summit

Me on the SW ridge of le Luisin. Courtesy of Seb de Sainte Marie

The mountains are stunning around here, offering amazing views. It was great to get a different perspective on Chamonix:

Chamonix views from right to left: Mont Blanc, Aiguille Verte, les Droites, Les Courtes

We finally made the summit and tried to find the entrance to the couloir which was not too obvious. We worked it out in the end and got the ropes ready for a rappel in. We had two ropes of 30m for the rappel but it would probably be better to have two lots of 40m. We just about made it with 30m but had to down climb another 5m or so. Really nice rappel in on an almost vertical wall. Great atmosphere. I love couloirs!! By the way, you know when you are on the summit; there’s a big Cross and a weather station.

Seb on the summit

Seb rappeling into the couloir

Me rappeling into the couloir. Courtesy of Seb de Sainte Marie

And then the fun begins…… The couloir is in the low 40′s and had some great snow in it in sections. A bit crusty in places but hey. Nice turns had by all and then home.

Nice turns (Seb)

More nice turns (Seb)

What we thought was going to be a quick tour turned out to be a lot longer. As a result we missed the last lift down and had to ski and then walk a lot of the way. The boot bang on my poor fragile toes was really enjoyable….. It probably took us around 7 hours from putting skins on at the Col de la Golette to hitting the trail down.

Highly recommended (but then I suppose it wouldn’t be on here if it wasn’t!)

For more trip reports in Switzerland, click here.

Splitters rule! All three of us were on splitboards with the Dynafit setup. It’s actually thanks to these guys in a short film on Greg Hill’s site that I even came across this set up. It makes such perfect sense when you think about it. But I hadn’t until I saw these guys using it. Genius.

We headed up the Asulkan trail unsure of the day’s object, a few possibilities on offer: the Forever Young Couloir (my nemesis), over Sapphire Col and into the Lilly Glacier or the Jupiter Traverse. We plumped for the slightly “cockier” option of the Jupiter Traverse, a Rogers Pass Classic which both Joey and Karkis had done eight times between them. At least I was in good hands.

Pollux, Leda and Castor from left to right courtesy of Joey Vosburgh

The tour involves skinning up to Sapphire Col and then climbing Castor Peak, Leda Peak (with a sketchy downclimb of Leda Peak) before finally climbing Pollux and getting the board on your feet (my favorite bit) and boarding down the Thorington Descent.

Castor Peak. Start of the traverse. Courtesy of Joey Vosburgh

Me and Karkis on the traverse. Courtesy of Joey Vosburgh

Boarding down the first steep section from Pollux was magic, with great snow…..,  just not long enough. After that it was a nice cruisy board back down varied pitches to the Mouse Trap where the real fun began. These guys have skiing out in split mode down to a tee. Something I definitely need to work on.

Karkis descending the Thorington. Courtesy of Joey Vosburgh

It was a long day and my first real tour for a month after recovering from frost bite. We were on the go for a total of 8 hours and a vertical gain of 1900m/6200 feet.

For more trip reports in the Revelstoke area, click here.

Balu Pass

Although the tour is very low angle and short, it does take you through some potentially very big avalanche paths, so beware. On this occasion, something had ripped on pretty much all aspects, so things were pretty safe. The only aspect that wasn’t sun-baked and offered some nice fluffy turns was the East aspect which we were going to ski. Nice!!

Approaching Balu Pass with sub-peak of Ursus Major

We left the car at 13.00 and were at the top of the pass for 15.40 to enjoy amazing views and get my first really good look at the drainage and beyond for the first time. The main reason for the post is to get some nice pictures on here for others to use for trip planning.

Looking from Balu Pass

Balu Pass is the first of three cols in “The Three Cols Traverse” continuing on to the Cougar Pass and then onto the McGill Pass along the Bostock Creek and out at the Bostock car park. Sounds like a nice traverse and definitely one on the to do list.

Views towards Cougar Pass

It was a quick tour. 2.5 hours and 800m/2600ft

For more trip reports in the Revelstoke area, click here.

Well, I did promise some more trips reports during my convalescence but the truth is, I didn’t really take any decent pictures while I was doing them (not having a blog in mind at the time), so I’ve scrounged around a bit and may be able to cobble a couple together to make this text a bit more interesting.

So, as already mentioned, I’ve been struggling for touring partners all season (the dangers of coming to a new place and not knowing anyone. Maybe I should have stayed in Chamonix……). I was checking out Greg Hill’s blog as I tend to do for good beta and saw that he’d been up Grizzly Mountain a few days previously. Conditions hadn’t changed much since his outing, so I felt good going up there on my own. I don’t know why but I love couloirs, so there was no other line for me than the couloir on the south face of this mountain.

Grizzly Couloir. Photo courtesy of Greg Hill

You can actually get a good view of the couloir just before you pull into the Rogers Pass centre on your way from Revelstoke.

Grizzly Couloir from the NRC car park

It’s straightforward to get to: from the Rogers Pass Centre into the Connaught Drainage following the beaten track over the bridge and then passed Grizzly Shoulder and the first avalanche run out from Grizzly bowl and then straight into the next set of trees (I think it’s called Teddy Bear Trees). This is the safest skin up with little exposure and once you pop out of the trees you are nicely set on the ridge to take you up to the summit.

Sir Donald on the way up

It was a nice skin up and I was on the summit in reasonable time to enjoy a blue bird day. The entrance to the couloir was dipping in and out of wispy cloud, so I grabbed a window of better visibility to enter the couloir and saw Greg’s tracks.

Entrance to Grizzly Couloir

And that’s where the day became less pleasant. It was sun-baked and rutted from the few tracks that had already been down it. There were small pockets of powder to skier’s right where the sun hadn’t got to it but it was a pretty terrible, bone-jarring ride down! Oh well, at least I was getting fitter for the rest of the season….. (or so I thought!). I would love to ski this couloir in better condition. Barring conditions, it was a fantastic line.

So, some stats (4th tour of the season):

Total ascent: 1550m/5100ft

Time up: 4hr from car.

For more trip reports in the Revelstoke area, click here.