 Poster: A snowHead
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Question. I'm in a resort (zell) and it's not snowed for some time it seems. I'd describe the conditions of pistes as...ok..
I'm a fairly proficient snowboarder and not for first time I'm thinking about paying for a guided trip howwver I'm concerned the snow simply won't be worth it ie I'm not going to get any fresh lines.
I guess I wanted to ask a) do you think It would still be worth it and b) what do you think is a good general rule of thumb in calculating days since last snowfall to worthwhileness of an off piste guided trip ?
Cheers
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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It hasn't snowed for 3 weeks in France and I can find you good snow conditions incl powder today. A guide could do better.
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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?
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Encore @davidof,
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Ski toured with SAC on Sunday, well tracked but still pulver up at 2400 so not very high at all.
Plenty of spots to find the mystical "untracked"......
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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@davidof, @Rogerdodger, don't think you'll be having too much luck down our way!
Just look at the Chamonix La Grave thread in the Piste section.
Even if there is no powder to be had you could then usually ski Spring on South facing slopes but we have no snow on the usual South facing slopes.
Only possibility is to stay in refuges at altitude.
Few guides I know have been relocating to where the better snow is such as Austria, Switzerland along with their clients.
I had a long chat with my mate today who is a guide in La Grave and I've more or less signed up to a trip he's organising up near Kiruna Northern Sweden circa April 20th !
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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| Rogerdodger wrote: |
Ski toured with SAC on Sunday, well tracked but still pulver up at 2400 so not very high at all.
Plenty of spots to find the mystical "untracked"...... |
Same down our way, powder (destructured snow) down to 1800 m on north slopes, nice spring conditions on south aspects.
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@DarrenBee, whilst guides will always find the best there is they can't perform miracles and there is a limit.
I wouldn't have a hard and fast rule (number of days) it's more about my situation (am I skiing with a lot of newbies/alone and bored) and how I feel about the general conditions. Not that I have hired a guide too often (a couple of days in Val D and Cham)
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Depends what your exact question is.
If you're asking "Do days since snowfall correlate to finding untracked powder?" then the answer is "Broadly, yes, but depends what the weather's been like". If it's basically stayed below zero and not rained you'll get pockets of wind blown powder that will get 'refreshed' with every good windy day and a guide will know where those are likely to be, based on wind direction/temps./sun exposure/etc.
However if you're asking "Do days since snowfall correlate to worthwhileness of an off piste guide?" then the answer is "No". You hire an off piste guide to take you off piste, which is just anywhere that isn't pisted. Now that will often involve finding those patches of wind blown powder but it also it also means the guide taking you where the conditions will be best/most interesting that day, and that time of day. I did a guided off piste week in the PdS back at the end of Jan, so with no snowfall of note since the start of December and our guide would tell us he was taking us to X in the morning, as it was shaded so didn't melt in the day/crust overnight and to Y in the afternoon, as that was exposed/did crust but the morning sun would have been enough to losen the surface by PM. He also took us from the PdS to Chamonix one day to ski the glacier, not because the conditions would be great there, but because it would be interesting and challenging for us - which it was. Did our guide find us constant testical deep, untracked powder all day every day? No. But did he find us some, yes. Did we get to go places and ski where we saw more wild goats than people? Yes. Was it worth the money? Definitely yes.
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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.
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Good summary from @Mjit,
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Over the years (started in 97) with guides I've had some truly memorable days that will last with me forever and as @Mjit, says they are well worth the money.
I've also had a fair few days when even they failed to find the goods and instead of 1,400m of a superb descent it was 1,000m of very technical skiing but it's to be expected in that eventually even they are human.
Where guides excel is also in logistics, and with the current snowpack they are having to work hard to maximise the conditions for their clients/stay at altitude in refuges/huts, but that does tend to only happen when you have a guide booked for a week with a group of mates, and not just for a day tour etc
Also a UIAGM guide is just in another league compared to non-qualified guides, in Japan a few years ago our Czech "guide" was a snowboarder on snow-shoes who was just so out of his depth when it came to guiding and what we've had the pleasure to experience over the years, his people skills/empathy were atrocious!
His only use was getting us from A to B and speaking Japanese 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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I think there's an unasked question here, do you have a splitboard, or are you prepared to walk?
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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.
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As others have said, off piste doesn't just have to be about powder. I love powder skiing but I almost prefer it later in the season, when you get spring snow that transforms and you can get on more interesting terrain. We have had quite a bit of spring snow recently which has been great fun, but even when the snow hasn't been that great you can enjoy the experience and where you are. I am not saying just wanting powder is wrong, many lift fed skiers only see off piste about powder but it doesn't have too be.
Maybe see if you can find a guide (maybe ask on here for recommendations), and ask them what the options are. Most are honest and can tell you what the conditions will be like or what kind of day experience you should get and see if that is interesting to you.
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Yesterday we witnessed a guide maybe not taking the best route for his clients?
We came across a group of nine (!) or so Brits who were of more mature years, though less than the group of 80 something Frenchies we met later on.
And evidently, if I heard right their guide was a Brit from Chamonix so maybe new to the area, or at least the sector we were in, and again I don't know the capabilities of the group but they were not exactly taking a sensible route at all.
By sensible, they had started from the wrong location, ending up traversing/climbing probably 3km more than they had to, prior to ending up where we met them, and then they were heading a very dubious way (more traversing) basically following the Galibier road and if they were to get a decent descent (very doubtful) from Pic Blanc given the conditions, they'd end up 3km from where they started??
And that's the issue down our way at the moment, we've probably lost 50% of the touring area (South facing) so many organised groups are concentrated in a smaller area. They also said the day before they skied La Grave and apart from the glacier it was not good.
That said I found a nice line, ironically just below Pic Blanc but on the other side where no one goes, on the Vallons Roche Noire side.
Looking down to KenX, and the OH.
Meanwhile the Swedish guide I mentioned has been scoring great conditions doing various huts in Switzerland at altitude with a pretty hard core group going by the Insta pics posted.
https://www.instagram.com/p/Ca4ogmVt-yz/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
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You know it makes sense.
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| ecrinscollective wrote: |
As others have said, off piste doesn't just have to be about powder. I love powder skiing but I almost prefer it later in the season, when you get spring snow that transforms and you can get on more interesting terrain. ...
Maybe see if you can find a guide (maybe ask on here for recommendations), and ask them what the options are. Most are honest and can tell you what the conditions will be like or what kind of day experience you should get and see if that is interesting to you. |
Yeah the word "powder" is often used to describe something else, so there is that. If it's not snowed for some time then the only way you're getting real powder is if it's been consistently cold, which I suspect is unlikely here.
Untracked, well that's a different thing....
On the spectrum from powder to corn snow, I don't know a useful word for the stuff in between, other than "untracked snow which is somewhat consolidated", which doesn't sound very catchy.
In BC at least I would just ask the company if they can take you to untracked lines or not.
If the answer's "no", and if that's what you want, then don't go.
The cat operator in Whistler essentially sells "untracked snow", and they're shut down now because they tracked out their terrain.
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