TR: 7th Braemar Telemark Festival

This weekend just passed was the 7th Braemar Telemark Festival. I
headed up on Friday to get an afternoon ticket at Glenshee, rather
whiter than in previous years, though it was rather on the icy side.
Luckily the Heliums still have pretty sharp edges and I did okay before
heading on to Braemar to register in the afternoon, sign up for my class
on the Saturday, check in to the bunkhouse and munch a fish supper
before heading on to the official Welcome.

Due to the weather closing in after I'd left the ski area in the
afternoon, quite a few folk were yet to arrive so there was /lots/ of
complimentary Drambuie before moving on to the Fife Arms and after
realising I really had rather overdone the Drambuies, off to bed.

Next morning I did feel a bit rough, and listening to the radio over
some breakfast heard the roads were shut and ski area stormbound, so
back to bed for a while and hope my head would improve. Roads opened,
so off I went, but all lifts shut when I arrived, and I sat in the car
park being rocked by the wind. Thought "never mind the tows, I've got
skins", but then figured it was still remarkably unpleasant outside. I
saw a few people braver than me skinning up, but the head was still a
bit sore and I decided returning to bed was my best option, so I did...
Got up rather later, feeling much better, bought some odds and sods at
Braemar Mountain (and was given some ex-display Pilot skate bindings for
free, thanks guys!) and since it was still a bit blowy, even in the
village, I just went for a dander along the Dee and Claunie. So much
for the Saturday telemarking...
Hey ho, come 7 pm everyone congregated for the buses to Mar Lodge for
the ceilidh. Chatting with others revealed a few who'd wimped out like
me, some who did go out, but wished they hadn't bothered, and a few who
persevered and found that come the afternoon, once they'd found a
nice-ish spot, they had a good day after all. Hats off to them, but I
think getting my head back together meant that back to bed was the right
call for me!

The ceilidh, in the remarkable venue of the Stag Hall at Mar Lodge (a
good size hall with all the walls and ceiling /covered/ in antlered stag
skulls) was a real belter, with a very good hot buffet, an excellent
band and lots of slightly mad telemarkers dancing the night away.
During the evening a revised program for Sunday was handed around, with
the Mountain Race (cancelled in Saturday's gales) rescheduled in place
of the Crazy Race and lessons for those who had dropped out, so it
turned out I hadn't escaped the Mountain Race after all...

Sunday was much quieter on the wind front: still a fair breeze, but not
enough to keep you off the slopes, and festival goers congregated at the
ticket office, which had rather shorter queues than one would expect on
a nice Sunday with snow, probably put off from the day before. I
dropped out of my lesson early to get to the Mountain Race, which
involved skinning up from the Cairnwell Cafe to the bealach above Loch
Vrotachen, skins off for a schuss down to the Loch, skate around the icy
bits, stride around the drifted snowy bits, skins back on and up to the
top of the descent gully and then back down to the cafe. I'd chosen
nordic tourers, narrow skins and track poles, which got me up the hill
making places and round the loch making more, up to about 5th/15 (the
leaders were never going to be troubled by the likes of me!). Going
down, I lost most of those places falling over in the gully as folks
passed on wider skis, but the whole race was good fun and I came in at
8th, pretty good for me, I thought.

Didn't take part in the tele-cross, but watched the final and it looked
fast, fun and furious, with a visiting Swiss party taking the honours
for both men and women. They might have been a bit lost stripping the
willow at the ceilidh, but they certainly knew how to ski!

General skiing over the afternoon, with plenty of telemarkers all over
Glenshee of all standards from never been on free heels wobbling to top
level instructors. Coire Fionn and Glas Maol had some very good snow,
verging on powder in places! Not bad for Scotland in March, certainly.

Later in the afternoon was the final meet and prize giving at the
Cairnwell Cafe, full of people sipping mulled wine and clearly happy
with the weekend, despite Saturday being "a bit breezy". A final plea
from Dave Latham, the organiser, that if folk want it to run next year
then /please/ book as early as possible, putting some blind faith in the
weather. That may seem a bit silly in light of how bad the weather can
be for skiing in Scotland, but the festival has always run, often with
far less snow than we had this weekend, and I've yet to meet anyone who
really regretted going. Hope to be back next year...

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/