I'm frankly pissed about UK newspapers and their travel articles (e.g. "discover this hidden highlands spot"). I also hate the way that nowhere stays secret (e.g. people on Grenoble expat FB pages describing nice walks). I also hate the way there is now one upmanship about travelling to more and more obscure places.
On the other hand, can I really justify that? It's a free world right? Maybe I am just an old fart? Harrumph, grumble, wibble...
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Guilty.............must admit I've used several travel articles to identify new ski areas and hidden spots in the past.
Just out of curiosity, does anyone use a map and avalanche reports when looking for a line?
Although thinking about it, we always used e.g. BMC climbing guides back in the day. I suspect the real change is just an increase in numbers, and old farts like me are now applying standards we never actually abided by!
. I also hate the way that nowhere stays secret (e.g. people on Grenoble expat FB pages describing nice walks). I also hate the way there is now one upmanship about travelling to more and more obscure places.
.
The Haute-Maurienne is pretty secret. No-one locally publishes ski tour trip reports and the few ski tour (skitour.fr) people who do it have been told they'll get their tires slashed if they ever come back. As a result people keep fairly quiet about what they do there.
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
davidof wrote:
The Haute-Maurienne is pretty secret. No-one locally publishes ski tour trip reports and the few ski tour (skitour.fr) people who do it have been told they'll get their tires slashed if they ever come back.
[/Liam Neeson accent]
After all it is free
After all it is free
Interesting read and I'm not surprised bearing in mind the propensity for litigation in the USA.
Not too sure if it's the same SnowCat operation we tried to use, but they were booked out for nigh on the whole season!
I was stunned at the disposable income that is there and is needed in Steamboat, can't remember the extra $ that was charged to secure first lifts think it was circa $75 just for one day.
We were guests of Steamboat and they pushed out the "boat" for us, however I had done some research and knew of the SnowCat operation so asked our "host" if there was any chance, it was pretty obvious that there was not a good relationship between the SnowCat op and Steamboat Resort and she explained how they're booked up throughout the season as money talks there, the uber-wealthy just book every day up.
In our quest for powder we tried to rent touring kit in Steamboat and we did not find one shop that was even close to supplying back-country gear, this is more to do with the fact that what backcountry is there is so accessible.
Prior to Steamboat we were in WinterPark and our host drove us to SteamBoat from there and we went over Rabbit Ear Pass and I saw so many feckin snow-mobiles, and he explained that's how they access the back-country, very few actually ski-tour and to a certain extent that's what the SnowCat operation are trying to protect themselves from.
I really regretted on that trip not taking our touring kit as the slack-country options were huge, as it were we did get lost trying to find some lines and our host could not quite believe where we ended up
Where as once I'd publish where we tour (still do it on Strava but not exactly an issue) now I'm more vague, plus I've been lectured more than once by certain guides on not broadcasting over social media etc though 99% of people would not have the chance to do those routes?
Last season I was finding some great touring terrain only a couple of km from home, for sure it meant 20 mins or so of walking to get to the point to put skins on but once on the gradient we had so many options, but that can only be repeated if we get the right early season snow.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
I've driven over Rabbit Ears a couple of times and there are heaps of snowmobiles/trucks there (though I think this is the next pass north). This feels like a bit of a pathetic action to supress something that is broadly public knowledge in the local community (being Colorado sled access skiers) in the interests of preserving a commercial operation using public land. Anywhere where there is a road in, trailhead parking and public land you don't really have any hope of "protecting".
One might suggest that if Steamboat Powder Cats are upset they should rent their own private tenure somewhere and gate the road they put in to access it.
Ski the Net with snowHeads
Ski the Net with snowHeads
Dave of the Marmottes wrote:
One might suggest that if Steamboat Powder Cats are upset they should rent their own private tenure somewhere and gate the road they put in to access it.
This "secret" thing is really pathetic for me. First, for all those who are so much for "keeping things secret". Where did you find out about certain place? I guess majority of us, discovered our "secret places" through someone else. Sharing secret this way, that we benefit from it, is ok, but that someone else would also benefit from it, is not ok? Ok I get it. I have absolutely no problem sharing my "secret places" with others, and I can easily tell about conditions or recommendations where to go or not to go. Contrary to some people I know, and always try to be so damn unspecific and secret when asking them where they were or how conditions are, while at same time, they almost demand everyone else to tell them about conditions where they were skiing.
I agree, ski touring is pretty damn popular at the moment, but at least around here (Slovenia, Italy, Austria) if you go out of those few most popular routes, you can easily find fresh untouched snow, and no people around, even week or two after last snowfall, so why to hide stuff and be a dick when someone asks you about conditions?
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
primoz wrote:
I agree, ski touring is pretty damn popular at the moment, but at least around here (Slovenia, Italy, Austria) if you go out of those few most popular routes, you can easily find fresh untouched snow, and no people around, even week or two after last snowfall, so why to hide stuff and be a dick when someone asks you about conditions?
You haven't been to some of the places @Weathercam skis where tour busses from Grenoble unload hundreds of skiers at a time if someone posts a good trip report on social media.
Sharing with your mates, cool.
Sharing with uncle tom cobbly and all, uncool.
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
Dave of the Marmottes wrote:
... One might suggest that if Steamboat Powder Cats are upset they should rent their own private tenure somewhere and gate the road they put in to access it.
That would not work in Canada as tenures don't affect public access rights, and I'm fairly sure the US is the same.
Cat operators can't legally prevent sledders using their cat roads for access, or shredding every slope within their tenure for that matter.
An operator invests decades of time and effort to build their runs and terrain knowledge into an asset.
They may even sell maps showing those runs - they're not secret - but they're not selling their Intellectual Property Rights.
One would need the IPR owner's consent to legally publish it
=> my guess is that it's not about secrecy or access to public land, it sounds like a simple copyright issue.
You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
You don't have to personally share details of a spot that you like but I absolutely loathe 'locals' who try to prevent other people from doing so. Just living near a particular slope/wave/rock gives you no more right to enjoy it than someone who lives in a city and has to travel for their fix. Below is where this type of attitude ends up:
... One might suggest that if Steamboat Powder Cats are upset they should rent their own private tenure somewhere and gate the road they put in to access it.
That would not work in Canada as tenures don't affect public access rights, and I'm fairly sure the US is the same.
Cat operators can't legally prevent sledders using their cat roads for access, or shredding every slope within their tenure for that matter.
An operator invests decades of time and effort to build their runs and terrain knowledge into an asset.
They may even sell maps showing those runs - they're not secret - but they're not selling their Intellectual Property Rights.
One would need the IPR owner's consent to legally publish it
=> my guess is that it's not about secrecy or access to public land, it sounds like a simple copyright issue.
Yeah that's why I said private - presumably you could find some billionaire's landholding and rent from him. I expect the economic model is however based on a relatively cheap tenure/permit of public land. If it's a copyright issue that can be handled - maybe the book author has to rename runs (though that creates a SAR issue) or draw their own distinct markings to illustrate lines.
I'm not really a fan of any finders/keepers doctrine. So what if they invested time and money in discovering runs, they don't have any copyright over the physical geography.
Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
davidof wrote:
You haven't been to some of the places @Weathercam skis where tour busses from Grenoble unload hundreds of skiers at a time if someone posts a good trip report on social media.
Probably I wasn't on some of those places. But lets be fair. Alps are huge. Single mountain in Alps is big, and if you are willing to go just a bit off the beaten path, you are alone, even if there's buses of people on that popular route. I never got it why would anyone want to go ski touring where 100s or even 1000s of people are at same time (just saw few photos from Marmolada few weeks ago), when you have 20 same mountains with same terrain just around the corner, and with no people. But I guess we are different, and some are there just because everyone else are there.
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Seems weird to me - if I'm going to spend the effort touring up somewhere, I'm going to try to avoid somewhere used by a commercial cat operation. Similarly, if I'm going to spend the cash on a day in a cat, I'd hope they'd take me somewhere sufficiently far from the trailhead that most people won't get there under their own steam.
The inclusion of sleds complicates this a little but the point about avoiding somewhere that is going to be tracked by a commercial operation still stands
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
As @davidof, mentions, December 12th 2018 I witnessed not one coach, but think it was three or four coach-loads of CAF from Grenoble arriving at the Lautaret and then dividing up into groups and spreading out all across the various sectors, I was gobsmacked!
But there was some irony to the day as I'd decided to take another route up as I could not see too many people had started from that particular point, however, after we'd been climbing for 45mins imagine my horror when I saw upwards of twenty or so traversing across to our route with then another 15 or so ahead of us, the feckers had come across from elsewhere in the sector.
My OH groaned as she knew I'd be very wound up and that meant I'd be increasing the speed to get past them, however as ever just like clockwork come Noon they all downed-tools and commenced lunch, for them that is as much a part of the day as the skiing.
I was still paranoid though that they might follow us, so we kept going making out we taking the more traditional route then once out of sight I cut back and over into a vallon I know well and could see on the way up it was untracked.
And that was a very tasty descent and the actual irony of the day was that they all skied back down the route they'd climbed up
Which is the image below, my OH looking back up at our line and a load of CAF below having skied the route they climbed up!
@primoz, I know what you're saying but it's not that easy as it's all about access, for sure you have mountains all around but most people are not willing to skin for two to three hours along the valley floor, so where there's a High Altitude road up to circa 2,000m that will attract many more people.
I spent many an hour in the summer investigating potential routes and then come the winter attempt a ski tour, sometimes successfully other times bit of a mare as I just did not read the terrain well enough, though more recently Google Earth has helped.
And what ticks me off is people suddenly deviating from their route to follow you, and to add salt to the wound skin up in your track, and that's made even worse when it's a large group.
And that's what we've been seeing more and more over the years with many groups now ski touring, it only takes two groups a day to trash a line that might have been good for a week or so.
So each season we explore, what is always good is that you can usually rely on these groups never to enter the forest as their guide will keep them out in the more open spaces, and then yes you get to know the better lines, but it seems it's getting harder to achieve each season
I get upset if I arrive at a parking and find four or five cars already there (let alone feckin minibuses) so those Colorado trailheads are just bonkers!
Another strategy we employ if we do come across the above parking scenario is that we'll do two laps, climbing 700m or so then ski down the untracked whilst the groups ahead are still climbing, then repeat again and we'll still get in the second line before the groups come down.
The above strategy is made all the better when taking into account wind affected snow
And as a postscript I think if we get a season then the touring side is going to be even busier.
Our cunning plan for February 2021 rather than go to Japan was to rent a chalet in the summer village or Granon and take supplies up there before the snow, then from there we have many options, it's never that busy an area as again access is not great, nigh on 2hrs of skinning up a trail and to ski down you have to take the trail so not exciting, but from the village there are many routes.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
@Weathercam, I do pretty much same. I have plenty of mountain running through summer season trying to find something new and more remote for winter, as I don't have much wish to feel like in ski resort when I go ski touring.
As for skiing, that video you put here is exactly what I meant. You still had half of mountain all for yourself, you just needed slightly different route, even though there were buses of people there. But yes I agree. It's much easier to get high up with car, skin few 100 height meters up and then ski down the valley. But luckily where I'm living, it's still not a rule but more of exception and most of people still skin all the way up. But just as you said, most of people don't feel like skinning for hours, so they stick to short hikes (and short skis). Personally I have no problem making 20-30km loop (up and down all together), as also going up (or sort of flat) is part of being out in nature and therefore nice thing for me. But yeah, you add 5km sort of flat skinning on beginning (and again on the end of tour) and 90% of people are gone.
@primoz, fat-tyre electric MTB is becoming more and more attractive, as you could probably tow a couple of people
One valley we have is 5km plateau, only issue it's an XC track so suspect that might annoy the XC skiers, I have thought about taking my XC kit and carrying my touring gear but I'd really be Billy no Mates if I did that as no-one else would be up for that
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Dave of the Marmottes wrote:
...I'm not really a fan of any finders/keepers doctrine.
So what if they invested time and money in discovering runs, they don't have any copyright over the physical geography.
The article doesn't seem to be about those things:
Colorado Sun wrote:
“Defendant’s continued use of these trade secrets is willful and malicious, and Steamboat Powdercats is entitled to damages,”
reads the civil complaint that asks the court to decide whether Bass is using trade secrets that could injure the company.
My bold. QED.
Without reading case D542020CV30074 it's hard to know.
After all it is free
After all it is free
Amazingly I forgot to mention that in advance of going to Siberia my tech-illiterate guide mate forwarded me this, as he knew I'd understand it all and load it up on my phone etc
Your visit to Luzhba getting closer and I'd like to share some info about guiding.
1. Navigation
On spot you will have an access to printed maps, but they are good for general orientation only. To be precise in navigation in Luzhba and be able to guide "on sight" (which can be tricky with dense forest), we strongly suggest to use smartphones as a navigation devices (with any navigation apps, we use Gaia GPS with MapBox Outdoor map). Standard Garmin GPS also works, but not so handy in use. If you don't have tracks yet, you can download them here -
This is .kmz file, for using with Garmin gps you have to convert it to .gpx format.
Then there was a whole load of detail as to what the various tracks were and key to the various sectors and colours
Keep in mind, this is confidential information. We spent 5 years to build it up and would not share this info with the other companies/guides who operate in Luzhba. So, please use it only personally, don't share tracks on the internet.
Thank you for understanding.
So a few months later after I'd written up a feature about Ski touring in Siberia along with a few images of tracks I was contacted directly and asked to take the images of the tracks down!
It was only as a favour to my guide mate not to drop him in it, even though he did not come on the trip (long story about Visas) that I took it down for the MD of the Company screwed me over on the Visa by wrongly supplying me duff info which resulted in me having to apply and pay twice for a Visa
However you have to question the paranoia of the MD as Luzhba is so hard to get to (no roads) and they have the only accommodation there, I think he was probably more worried about other Ruskies doing a similar operation etc
Last edited by After all it is free on Tue 10-11-20 15:47; edited 1 time in total
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
@Weathercam, hahaha we have one similar one here.... super nice terrain, but there's first some 8 or 9km xc track to end of the valley (and then 8-9km back ). Went once or twice, but it's just too much, especially as I'm used to go that track on xc skis, and then you sort of expect to be about same speed, and it's pretty painfull to look at watch that you are only 1 or 2k from start, when on xc skis you would be going back already
Ski the Net with snowHeads
Ski the Net with snowHeads
philwig wrote:
Dave of the Marmottes wrote:
...I'm not really a fan of any finders/keepers doctrine.
So what if they invested time and money in discovering runs, they don't have any copyright over the physical geography.
The article doesn't seem to be about those things:
Colorado Sun wrote:
“Defendant’s continued use of these trade secrets is willful and malicious, and Steamboat Powdercats is entitled to damages,”
reads the civil complaint that asks the court to decide whether Bass is using trade secrets that could injure the company.
My bold. QED.
Without reading case D542020CV30074 it's hard to know.
Oh I agree its all a bit murky and more energy than I am prepared to invest to get to the bottom of it. I work a fair amount with IP and find lawyers don't tend to like "trade secrets" that much as a means of protection, though a lot of value is often tied up in "know how". A trade secret to me is something like the Coca Cola recipe which is jealously guarded even if its not that hard to replicate meaningful by experiment. I struggle with it being something you show your customers literally every day and they presumably video/photograph/post TRs about etc. Maybe there are some stashes where knoweldge of them is totally kept staff only but they cease to keep that secret the first customer they take down that line.
More likely they think (or are pretending they think) he's pinched an operating manual with routes in it and is intending to copy it. I can see a court having sympathy with that.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
@davidof's, link refers to a particular village north of Vaujany where locals slashed tires of non-resident ski tourers. Five minutes with Fatmap suggests two things - first, I'm not surprised the place is attractive to ski tourers. Second, a good proportion of the routes starting from the village are already online. It's really not hard to find good terrain from behind a desk these days - certainly much easier than even 10 years ago. The horse is well out of the stable here and is humping the donkey in the paddock.
On the tire slashing point, guy I tour with had his car keyed in Snowdonia a while back over a similar thing. Offender got a four figure fine for that one. It's all fun and games until you can't pass a DBS check.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
Dave of the Marmottes wrote:
...More likely they think (or are pretending they think) he's pinched an operating manual with routes in it and is intending to copy it. I can see a court having sympathy with that.
Yes, that's what it sounds like.
Arno wrote:
Seems weird to me - if I'm going to spend the effort touring up somewhere, I'm going to try to avoid somewhere used by a commercial cat operation. Similarly, if I'm going to spend the cash on a day in a cat, I'd hope they'd take me somewhere sufficiently far from the trailhead that most people won't get there under their own steam.
But for sledders, a cat road is the best thing ever. It's transformative, enabling them to spend a longer percentage of their time where they want to be. Cat operators and the cat roads they pay to build enable access to the back country which otherwise would not exist, at least not at scale. If it wasn't public land, you could charge sledders to build them a road and they'd pay. As it is, it's a side-effect of the cat skiing business and sledders love it. That's why compromise mostly works: sledders don't want the cat operator to stop building the roads they rely on.
The equation is different for remote back-country cat operators, or heli.
More generally sleds are way faster than a Pisten Bully 600, especially once it's built a road for them. With cat skiing you have to be able to get the cat from the trail-head to the place you're skiing, and to do that you have to spend weeks building your cat roads (they bulldoze snow all through November and December to build roads which the cat can safely navigate). The road needs to be pretty well bashed to be fast enough to use for cat skiing, you're not ploughing the thing through fresh snow (in the mornings you may be clearing a fair bit of fresh, but you're working from a stable base you built up over weeks). Anyway, the point is that whatever you build is a great big attractive motorway for any sledder who knows where the roads are. Which is the information being disclosed here.
I've never seen people "touring" up a cat road, but sledders love them.
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
So if you're just off somewhere snowy come back and post a snow report of your own and we'll all love you very much
philwig wrote:
Anyway, the point is that whatever you build is a great big attractive motorway for any sledder who knows where the roads are. Which is the information being disclosed here.
But isn't that info that any sledder (if he was prepared to sacrifice a day's play) could build easy by simply using Strava (or any other GPS logger) and literally driving around all the cat roads he sees - cats don't tend to levitate between secret staging areas?
You know it makes sense.
You know it makes sense.
@philwig, can certainly see that - it's a while ago but the last time I went to Powder Mountain I remember a big flat area covered with sled tracks. They seemed to keep away from where we were skiing though. I guess a lot depends on what terrain is accessible and how the management of the commercial operation deal with sledders
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
@Dave of the Marmottes, I guess a cat road pretty much guarantees decent terrain at the top. Normal logging roads are more of a crapshoot?
Poster: A snowHead
Poster: A snowHead
Arno wrote:
...I remember a big flat area covered with sled tracks. They seemed to keep away from where we were skiing though. I guess a lot depends on what terrain is accessible and how the management of the commercial operation deal with sledders
Yeah, it's a fine balance, and the company puts a lot of effort into trying to keep sledders "on side".
It's probably a bigger issue there than most places because of the population nearby. The province has done some things (eg better parking) to address some of the issues.
Normal logging roads work also, for sledders, but the snow is not consolidated there. The sledders up around Blue River come from Alberta, where the sledding laws are more restrictive and drive up cat roads which have had no traffic other than them. However given the choice, sledders seem to prefer deep unconsolidated snow when it's steep, not when it's relatively flat, if you see what I mean. As a snowboarder I can relate to that.
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Quote:
I'm frankly pissed about UK newspapers and their travel articles
99% of the time it hits mainstream media it's already past the point of being some hidden spot.
I agree with @primoz that the whole secret thing is kind of pathetic. How many people are really finding perfect ski touring areas without friends showing them, internet message boards, fatmap, guidebooks etc.? If it's accessible and good chances are it's reasonably well known.
There is a certain irony of people that decide to live in/nearby to areas good for ski touring, then complain they are busy with ski tourers. It's like tourists going to visit a place and complaining there are too many other tourists there.
Quote:
And what ticks me off is people suddenly deviating from their route to follow you, and to add salt to the wound skin up in your track
I find it surprising that anyone would blindly follow another group in the backcountry. The idea that people are randomly skinning up with no idea where to go just waiting to see others and then follow them seems unlikely. Its happened to me before that us and another group both had the same descent in mind but have put in slightly different skin routes before realising ok we must be going the same way and sharing a trail. I certainly wouldn't expect them to break their own trail (in fact would be kind of insulting to know they thought so little of your track they broke their own! ). It's always been very friendly with a thanks at the top and the group breaking trail getting first descent.
For those that insist on empty slopes there are plenty of options out there still. Either pick a harder route (as said above) or go to somewhere actually remote (Siberia, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Afghanistan, parts of canada etc.)
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
@boarder2020, it's quite different being shown a route by a friend, and blurting it out (with easily followed GPX tracks) to all your followers on Strava
I know from my trips to Lofoten with Offpisteskiing that firstly the well known routes have got a lot busier in the few years I have been going there and secondly he spends a lot of his own time scouting out routes which aren't in any of the guidebooks. This makes my experience all the better and I don't think it's unreasonable to be a little cagey about specifics on social media.
.......I find it surprising that anyone would blindly follow another group in the backcountry. The idea that people are randomly skinning up with no idea where to go just waiting to see others and then follow them seems unlikely.......
Believe me, it happens all the time!
You have to realise that for many French they opt for ski randonnée, not least it's way cheaper than alpine skiing and as I've mentioned there's a big social side to it.
These people are not hardcore back-country skiers, many up to recently would not even carry security gear and their equipment is very old school, plus many can't ski powder!
They turn up at the parking and follow a skin track, they maybe have an old book with a few routes but once on the mountain they really have no idea where they are heading for and they will then follow you.
IGN French Maps do have ski tour routes on (the big blue dashed lines) so it's pretty easy to work out where to start from etc and theoretically be heading for but obviously, there are many variations to these
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
I'm not entirely sure the habits of the Grenoble mass ski touring gangs totally speak to the point of the Steamboat case. There's more than one account I've seen that it is in any event a total shitshow in the relevant area so I can see how a definitive guidebook with some alignment on etiquette might be helpful. I can also see how a cat operator which invests in packing its own roads for access has a bit of double jeopardy - the very things that they need are also what enable sledders to beat their customers to the goods. It's not even about touring etiquette but mache v machine etiquette
@Dave of the Marmottes, yep, I think this stuff is very location specific. Not sure if you've toured off the Lautaret but it's a bit of a free for all in many places but also give access to some gnarly and/or surprisingly remote skiing
As I was typing my previous post, I did begin to see the Cat Operator's point (potentially). If someone pinched Offpisteskiing's "Lofoten black book" and turned it into a guidebook, I can see that he'd be justifiably p155ed and possibly have legal recourse
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
@Dave of the Marmottes, very true, OH wrote this back in 2017.
Must get her to update it as there are a few additional rules that are missing, not least snow-shoers wrecking the skin track
And obviously, I have a few
And just as a silly aside, lovely kitesurf conditions outside now.
Donned wetsuit, selected kite and board and went to walk across to the beach just as I realised OH had taken the van with my pump in, I thought she was taking it later after she returned from the Cafe not to take the thing to the Cafe
Anyway beauty of kiting is that the sea and waves never get tracked out so I can wait
After all it is free
After all it is free
@Arno, Yep I can see a guide's black book recording what softened at what altitude and what exposure under what weather and some micro nav notes being highly useful and unhelpful if publicly accessible because it would increase the number of people on optimal routes each day. I get the impression that it isn't this degree of know how that is subject to this case more not shining a bright light on go up this road here to get lines A-E, road 2 for lines F-K etc
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
Quote:
If someone pinched Offpisteskiing's "Lofoten black book" and turned it into a guidebook, I can see that he'd be justifiably p155ed and possibly have legal recourse
I have not seen his black book so no idea what is in it. There are already guide books out for ski touring in lofoten though. I suspect there will be plenty of overlap. Unless you set up a lodge in a very remote area and pioneer ski tourism there it's hard to prove you have any ownership of any information collected. I'm sure there are locals in lofoten who could write the same guidebook from their personal experiences. A lot of the info is probably available online already to some degree (fatmap, trip reports, etc.).
FAQ
Poster: A snowHead
). Went once or twice, but it's just too much, especially as I'm used to go that track on xc skis, and then you sort of expect to be about same speed, and it's pretty painfull to look at watch that you are only 1 or 2k from start, when on xc skis you would be going back already 
