Hi, Again. Another request for info.

A snowHead

Hi, all.

My apologies for being absent for several months. It was a busy (and snowy) winter here in Jackson Hole and I somehow seem to have gotten all the way to the middle of summer without checking in here.

So, as usual, I have a question:

My wife and I will be in Italy and Switzerland during the middle of September. We'll be in Alleghe, IT, for several days starting on 10, September, and then we'll be in Zermatt for a few days starting on the 17th.

Thanks to a contact provided by Martin Bell, I've now confirmed that there will be lift-served glacier skiing possible at Zermatt, so my wife and I are planning to ski for a morning while we're visiting. Weather permitting, we'll probably try to ski on Monday, September 19.

Will any of you be in the area and would you have an interest in meeting up to try to ski for a bit with a couple of lost American tourists?

Also, any suggestions about things to do/see in Alleghe or vicinity would be appreciated. We'll be doing a few days of guided Via Ferrata climbing. If you know of special restaurants or bars in the area, we would love to try to visit them.

And again, I invite any of you with an interest in visiting Jackson Hole to contact me. I'll provide any info I can and I really like to make a few turns with visiting skiers if at all possible.

Thanks in advance.

Bob Peters

A snowHead

Bob Peters, regretably I shan't be in either place. I'll be in my office in London. Don't expect too much from the summer skiing in Zermatt. It is limited and dull (and expensive and probably wet), but it involves a ride on the highest cable car in Europe (I think) and the setting is as spectacular as you could possibly wish. In case you don't already know, the walking around Zermatt is wonderful; good lift access over the steep lower slopes to easily accessible spectacular walking (and less easily accessible as well, of course). The walk from the top of the Gornergratbahn across the Gornergletscher to the Monte Rosa hut (which does decent grub) is easy and very enjoyable.

Have you Via ferrata-ed before? I'd be interested to know what it's like.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

btw Bob's a great guy, I hooked up with him in Jackson many years ago, shame I can't make it Bob, good luck!

You need to Login to know who's really who.

Bob Peters,

I can only comment on the summer aspect of skiing in Zermatt which is very high and you will take your time to get through 3 big lifts from 1850 mtrs to 3899mts. To top out at 3899 you will need a little T bar. When I did it in '88 the skiing went down to the bottom of the KM cable which was quite a descent vertical for the time of year... I expect you are used to T-bars as these will be the main method of lift apart from the Cable. The temps in the middle of August were 30C in the village. everyone gets up early and the sking is over by about 2pm latest. Thee things may vary depending on the weather. I would expect 45mins easily to get from bottom to the top but as far as summer sking goes it is quite extensive. Spring skiing clothes obviously as it can get very hot

I don't know what the cabled walks are like in Alleghe region.

Enjoy your trip.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Hi, gregh... nice to hear from you again.

JT and richmond... thank you for the information. It actually sounds pretty fun to me but I have a warped sense of "fun" on snow.

To help you understand the context, I have this thing going where I've skied at least once a month for many years now. In the course of that streak, I've skied some really, really bad conditions after gasping my way up high-altitude boulder fields to find little patches of snow that I could ski.

Assuming I make it to September (which shouldn't be an issue), skiing while we're in Zermatt would be my 108th consecutive month of skiing. I can't think of anywhere more appropriate to mark my ninth anniversary of skiing every month. JT, a couple of times I've spent four hours hiking up mountains with skis and boots on my pack, only to ski for a few minutes and then load everything back up and hike all the way down. Given that, riding a few lifts and t-bars sounds like a walk in the park. Cool

The skiing is really secondary to the visit. We'll be hiking to several of the huts and we're really excited about that. Everyone I've talked to here in Jackson Hole just raves about the summer hiking in Zermatt.

richmond, I've not done a via before. My wife has (also around Cortina) and really loved it. We rock climb a bit here in the US (my wife is much a much better climber than I). We were scheduled to go on two days of via climbs with a guide in the Julian Alps of Slovenia late last September, but we got snowed out.

By the way, if any of you are thinking of visiting Slovenia, I recommend it VERY highly. We were there for nearly three weeks last fall and had an unbelievable time. Beautiful countryside, wonderful people (a large percentage of whom speak English), good food, good wine, not crowded, and inexpensive. I've posted some photos and comments about that trip here:

http://jacksonholediary.com/Page8.html

So, thanks again for the help. Any other suggestions about things to do and see are enormously appreciated.

Bob

You'll need to Register first of course.

I'm sure that the skiing in Zermatt will be fun, it just won't be exciting skiing. It will definitely be a great spot to celebrate 9 years of (more or less) non stop skiing. Providing you have the weather, and you should in early Sept with a bit of luck, the views from the ski area are among the best I've seen. We went up in cloud and were groping our way down the first run when it cleared to reveal (not entirely unexpectedly) the Matterhorn, apparently within touching distance.

Can't really help with ideas, I'm afraid. I suspect your mountain walking/climbing level is significantly above mine.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

Help!!

Hi, Again. Another request for info.

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