Saas Fee mini-report

Ace wrote:

[...]
One thing I made my mind up about before I'd even got on the slopes -
I'm not taking my boots on our forthcoming trip to Canada - they're
just absolute agony until my feet have adjusted to them (takes a
couple of weeks skiing)


Likewise. Including being unable to actually get the boots on,
onetime.

First day of the season skied with the boots open to loosen them up
and was still skiing with the boots open at the end of the day.

I began to imagine that either my feet had changed shape completely or
the boots had.


and my recent experience of poorly-fitting,
but comfortable, rental boots in Tahoe made me realise that I now no
longer need moulded-in-concrete, close fitting, rock-solid boots[1]
and inners to ski well. C


So now I'm in a bit of a dilemma - clearly I don't want racing boots
again (I'll keep the , so I'm not sure what I should be looking for.
Touring boots are a possibility, but I know sweet FA about them. Also
not sure if the semi-soft boots would be too soft in practice.


I have been thinking along the same lines. I have skied in my touring
set-up (Scarpa Denalis) with success. I may have to obtain an
'off-piste' boot to provide a reserve for the concrete boots. But for
the difference between that and the Denalis it may not be worthwhile.
I might get some old boots out of the reserve and packing them along
in case the concrete boots halt operations. Last time I had bruised
toes it was so bad.

Meanwhile ....I am applying my low-animal cunning to thinking-up
methods of defeating the concrete boots.

On Thu, 16 Dec 2004 10:58:28 -0000, "WeatherCam"
wrote:

Oh Champ - still out there in Cyber Space - might remember me as the guy who
way back use to post daily reports of our escapades in and around La Grave
many years back

Sure, I remember

anyway - just to say, that after quite a few demanding
tours, we jacked the snowshoe concept, and have gone approach skis - that's
using small skis with skins and touring bindings, they enable us to skin up
much more economically than snow shoes and / or split board variations -

Yeah, I think short approach skis are the way forward, and then strap
on your sac on the way down. Problem is, I've never, ever, used skis.
Do you need any ski ability to use them?

only trouble is that you have to use special boots, either Alpine Touring
boots or like mine, specially adapted soft boots that take a dynafit
tourlite binding - but this year I'm pretty sure I'm going to switch to AT
boots, as I've mentioned here, when climbing starts getting quite technical,
soft boots just do not have the support and even with crampons on your skis
they just don't cut it

And of course, there's the boot issue :-)

- literally - this year we toured for four days in
the Lyngen Alps (Artic Circle) Northern Norway, based on a boat and then
climbing up and descending down the other side to meet the boat - then a
couple of day in Narvik & Riksgrassen - we only had 15 mins or so, where I
was cussing my setup and sphyncter muscles starting to contract as I was
quite exposed - and I would have been far better if I had hard boots.....

Sounds like a great trip. I really don't want to go to hard boots
tho. Anyway, I've found another solution - it's noisy and expensive,
but much less like hard work fx: rotor blade noise :-)

Doing this in Feb: http://www.mcnab.co.uk/sbd/bc/russia.php
--
Champ

Sounds like a great trip. I really don't want to go to hard boots
tho. Anyway, I've found another solution - it's noisy and expensive,
but much less like hard work fx: rotor blade noise :-)

Doing this in Feb: http://www.mcnab.co.uk/sbd/bc/russia.php
--
Champ

Aaaah after our hard days of touring / hiking we then spoilt ourselves by
going over to Sweden ( Riksgrassen) and did two heli ascents - and yes it is
good - mate of mine is doing an awsome 2 week trip in Canada, with just
about every conceivable way of getting up a mountain in the package - but
the only problem is, and he suspects this as well, I don't think his body
could take 12 days of boarding - I'm bad enough after 6 days touring, with
blisters resembling Mount Etna!!

Russian trip sounds great - we were going down to Russia next year as well,
but a couple of group could not make it - so we're back to La Grave -
although we said, as we're not doing to heli in Russia, we'll go over to
Alagna for the a day (or two) - have they itemised exactly how many hours
ascent you get, as I hear this can be the sticky question , when you find
out it's only an hour a day?

Regards
WC

On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 10:08:10 -0000, "WeatherCam"
wrote:

Sounds like a great trip. I really don't want to go to hard boots
tho. Anyway, I've found another solution - it's noisy and expensive,
but much less like hard work fx: rotor blade noise :-)

Doing this in Feb: http://www.mcnab.co.uk/sbd/bc/russia.php

Aaaah after our hard days of touring / hiking we then spoilt ourselves by
going over to Sweden ( Riksgrassen) and did two heli ascents - and yes it is
good - mate of mine is doing an awsome 2 week trip in Canada, with just
about every conceivable way of getting up a mountain in the package - but
the only problem is, and he suspects this as well, I don't think his body
could take 12 days of boarding - I'm bad enough after 6 days touring, with
blisters resembling Mount Etna!!

I imagine 12 days is pretty hard work.

Russian trip sounds great - we were going down to Russia next year as well,
but a couple of group could not make it - so we're back to La Grave -
although we said, as we're not doing to heli in Russia, we'll go over to
Alagna for the a day (or two) - have they itemised exactly how many hours
ascent you get, as I hear this can be the sticky question , when you find
out it's only an hour a day?

Well, firstly, an hour of uplift is actually quite a lot - my
experience of heli is that flights are rarely more than 20 minutes,
and often only 10, so an hour is between 3 and six drops. In fact,
when ferrying up and down a particular mountain the flights can be
very short. And, secondly, the company we are using has pre-paid for
n hours of time - anything we don't use, we get a refund on. So,
should be ok.
--
Champ

Well, firstly, an hour of uplift is actually quite a lot - my
experience of heli is that flights are rarely more than 20 minutes,
and often only 10, so an hour is between 3 and six drops. In fact,
when ferrying up and down a particular mountain the flights can be
very short. And, secondly, the company we are using has pre-paid for
n hours of time - anything we don't use, we get a refund on. So,
should be ok.
--
Champ

That seems very good value, ok you have to get the other flights etc ex UK -
but when doing a trip like this, worrying about the cost of every item seems
to go out the wndow!!
Enjoy the trip, are you going out before hand ?

Regards
WC

On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 11:15:35 -0000, "WeatherCam"
wrote:


Well, firstly, an hour of uplift is actually quite a lot - my
experience of heli is that flights are rarely more than 20 minutes,
and often only 10, so an hour is between 3 and six drops. In fact,
when ferrying up and down a particular mountain the flights can be
very short. And, secondly, the company we are using has pre-paid for
n hours of time - anything we don't use, we get a refund on. So,
should be ok.
--
Champ

That seems very good value, ok you have to get the other flights etc ex UK -
but when doing a trip like this, worrying about the cost of every item seems
to go out the wndow!!

Quite. It's a bloody expensive trip, all the same - well over £2k
(ulp)

Enjoy the trip, are you going out before hand ?

Off to Tahoe in California/Nevada on Boxing day.
--
Champ

"WeatherCam" wrote:

[...]
Russian trip sounds great - we were going down to Russia next year as well,
but a couple of group could not make it - so we're back to La Grave -
although we said, as we're not doing to heli in Russia, we'll go over to
[...]


Where in Russia ?

On Sun, 20 Feb 2005 20:11:06 +0000, funkraum
wrote:

"WeatherCam" wrote:

[...]
Russian trip sounds great - we were going down to Russia next year as well,
but a couple of group could not make it - so we're back to La Grave -
although we said, as we're not doing to heli in Russia, we'll go over to
[...]


Where in Russia ?

Just back from Krasnaya Polyana, in the Caucausus, near the Black Sea
and the border with Georgia. A week of heli (27 drops in 5 days).

Probably the best trip I will ever make - I think it'll be a long time
before I get the same combination of snow, weather, terrain and all
round ambience. It was like staring in my own snowboard video.
--
Champ

On Fri, 25 Feb 2005 17:21:56 +0000, Champ wrote:

Just back from Krasnaya Polyana, in the Caucausus, near the Black Sea
and the border with Georgia. A week of heli (27 drops in 5 days).

Probably the best trip I will ever make - I think it'll be a long time
before I get the same combination of snow, weather, terrain and all
round ambience. It was like staring in my own snowboard video.

MPEG!
--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.

On Mon, 14 Mar 2005 12:11:47 +0100, Ace wrote:

On Fri, 25 Feb 2005 17:21:56 +0000, Champ wrote:

Just back from Krasnaya Polyana, in the Caucausus, near the Black Sea
and the border with Georgia. A week of heli (27 drops in 5 days).

Probably the best trip I will ever make - I think it'll be a long time
before I get the same combination of snow, weather, terrain and all
round ambience. It was like staring in my own snowboard video.

MPEG!

I thought you'd never ask :-)

Switters, a name you should recognise from ukrm (but doesn't post
here) is a dab hand with the old video editing, and has cut a 'taster'
of his Russian footage. I think it looks superb

http://www.vpas.fsnet.co.uk/powpow/T...fOfDreams.html

Also, got a couple of very rough bits of footage of yours truly on my
site: www.champ.org.uk/boards/videos.htm


--
Champ