 Poster: A snowHead
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Mont Fort, Jan 1989, awful snow, blue ice on the downside of every mogul. Brown trousers within 3 turns.
4 people died on it the week we were there.
I did discover the Stairway to Heaven that week which seems topical at this time 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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The black at Murren from the revolving restaurant that featured in that James bond movie, forget which one. Also the run at passo tonale back down from the glazier to resort ,really steep & narrow at the top part hard to get youre turns in.
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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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Dr. Will, the 1st time I did Sache there were huge icy moguls on the steep bottom pitch. The next time I did it I was with a group and I was scaring them with my description. Needless to say there wasn't a mogul in sight!
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PsychoBabble, IMHO the Sache is a bit of a lottery especially at that turn into the steep bit. I've been down and been horrified and other times wondered why I was so bothered and whilst there was a little bit of skill difference on my part (3-4 years worth) mainly it was the quality of the snow that determined it!
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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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The toughest time I had getting down a piste it was a blue one (in La Rosiere). It was incredibly, mind-numbingly cold, with massive windchill. I made a big mistake about which draglift to get on, with my 6 year old daughter in front of me, and realised part way up it was much longer than I'd thought. She was frozen by the top. I had to get my gloves off, wipe nose, dab tears, give a pep talk, tuck her scarf in, then tell her that even though she was freezing cold, and scared, and yes, I accepted she would hate me forever, she simply had to ski down, or we'd both perish. I had to talk her through every single turn, telling her about the hot chocolates we would have at the bottom, cursing my stupidity all the while (we didn't know the resort well at all). I don't do scary narrow black moguls covered in ice but that was an easy ski, made difficult by circumstances. The most painful descent was in Cairngorm, 20 years ago, after having fallen and damaged a ligament. My 10 year old son waited for me in the cold and wind (all the lifts had been stopped because of the wind) carried my skis for me, and encouraged me down! So sweet.
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pam w, I think I have been on that draglift on a similar day.
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mcfcPaul, the Schilthorn run was in On Her Majesty's Secret Service
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pam w, I had to get my youngest back from Courchevel 1650 (Signal resto) to Les Menuires after he fell ill. Not pleasant but I thought it the quickest and cheapest option. It was a horrid experience. If anyone wants to know the route then just shout.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Helen Beaumont and pam w, I also think I know which drag you both froze on due to a similar experience - watch out johnboy and Mrs Johnboy 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Mike Lawrie, but don't assume it would always be the woman complaining - one of the friends I used to sail with was British, with a Swiss wife. She got very seasick, and was afraid of the sea. You can imagine how she got her own back for those days when he said "it won't be rough today, you'll love it"....
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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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Oh OK - not sure if I did that or not - we did several different descents from Spanky's. I did lots of off-piste routes at Whistler/ Blackcombe which were steeper than couloir extreme and had names. That was with "Extremely Canadian" who are great fun if you like that kind of thing.
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stevew, I suspect you are right. I had my first suspicions when a friend came back from Tignes and asked what all the fuss was about. I presumed his skiing had improved beyond belief, it hadn't!
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You know it makes sense.
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| Martin Nicholas wrote: |
Mont Fort, Jan 1989, awful snow, blue ice on the downside of every mogul. Brown trousers within 3 turns.
4 people died on it the week we were there.
I did discover the Stairway to Heaven that week which seems topical at this time |
4 people died, that sounds very serious, and they still allowed people go down it?
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Mike Lawrie, my wife got straight back in the Mont Fort cable car - divorce averted!
Good plan though. I would suggest near any icy crowded piste no matter what grading for your divorce lawyers office.
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Poster: A snowHead
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1. First section of La Grande Couloir - Courcheval
2. Swiss Wall - Avoriaz
3. Exit from The Tunnel - Alpe D'Huez
All three are ok once past the first 50m though, and all depends on snow conditions.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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The first one
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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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Probably the Clotes piste in Sauze D'Oulx - It was rather icy and it was my first attempt on skis and without any lessons 
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Did a blue last season from the top of a Gondella in Meribel that normally was a bit of a stroll. The Mist came in as we were half way up the lift and by the time we got off it had turned into a real thick pea souper(cor bleimey guvonr), no vis, no definition pretty scary stuff in all. As pam w, says above it doesnt mater what the piste is graded at times the conditions will rough you up as well.
We had to slowly ski, snowplough,sideslip and fall from pistemarker to pistemarker.
I have never skied in anything close to it before and hope not to again.
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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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pam w, The most painful descent was in Cairngorm, 20 years ago, after having fallen and damaged a ligament.
Can recognise this....ruptured my ACL in January (bad turn on black ice - 50m fall with binding not releasing) and then had to ski down with one leg refusing to turn..so not an especially difficult run but nerve racking non the less.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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| pam w wrote: |
| Mike Lawrie, but don't assume it would always be the woman complaining - one of the friends I used to sail with was British, with a Swiss wife. She got very seasick, and was afraid of the sea. You can imagine how she got her own back for those days when he said "it won't be rough today, you'll love it".... |
Did I say that it would always be the woman filing for divorce?
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monster77
monster77
Guest
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April 1990 My first ever skiing trip, the hardest piste I have ever skied.... the nursery slope at Tignes, The ESF lessons started on Monday so I had Sunday to find my feet. I was fine on the carpet at calshot spit where I had my first lessons, but I had serious trouble on the nursery slope and was ready to go home after 15 minutes. But I was talked into trying from lower down where the gradient was less and I soon got the hang of the speed of snow. The rest, as they say is history and I have never looked back. My skiing has gone down hill rapidly. 
Last edited by monster77 on Tue 18-12-07 22:55; edited 1 time in total
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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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Tom from Austria, super diable is a great piste, he means the one going right down to the resort
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The really hardest piste I have ever skied was the whole of the Portes du Soleil one Wednesday in March, '89.
It had rained up to 4,000m the afternoon before and unfortunately the freezing level fell faster than the rain-snow limit. I understand this is a little like an ice storm (?). Anyway, the white alpine peaks of the day before shone a distinctly unfriendly gunmetal blue the next day and it was shear, grey, shiny, slippy, smooth, glasslike ice from 2,245m (as high as we went) to 1,300m (where we stopped).
It doesn't get much harder than that. No soft snow to be found anywhere.
I found an entertainingly masochistic pleasure in it but my guests didn't. 4 runs and home for biccies and beers.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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PsychoBabble, We had a similar experience on Le Sache, where the moguls were up to the waste in height one day which was not good for Mrs Wizard and then later that week when eventually tried again! Next to nothing. 
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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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whitewizard, In the Psycho household the roles are reversed. The present Mrs P skis most things with ease. It was me that saw my backside when I saw the drop offs on those moguls!
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OK, I know this is 9 years old  But- hardest was last weekend with my dad (60, never-ever), down the nursery slope. Much coaxing, him nearly in tears, crouched down snowploughing backwards with him leaning on my shoulders. Instructor didn't fare much better.
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You know it makes sense.
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A timely post! i'm off tomorrow with my wife (53) for her first trip. Now i'm having cold sweats! 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Poster: A snowHead
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The red down to the Mannlichen chair in Wengen . . .
a lovely run but NOT when you've got a heavy 6year old total beginner on reins/ski harness for the first time shouting 'faster dad faster' . . .and 'you're really good at this, I like skiing' . . .whilst you've stopped snowploughing due to lactic acid build up, are now actually skiing alongside a child who has no idea how to stop let alone at speed, and you are visualising a horrific end for either yourself, your child or both of you as you plummet towards no mans land . . . . . . .never, ever again.
Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Thu 3-03-16 15:13; edited 1 time in total
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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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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Signal in Val'Isere. "Only a red" & looked OK from the bottom. Not sure it is ever bashed and on that occasion it had car-sized moguls and ice. Significantly harder than any of the EK blacks I've done.
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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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Agate in Flaine, 3 years ago. Ungroomed black run, huge solid moguls, in zero visibility. I’d only started skiing black runs that winter too! I was not a good skier…
Totally my fault – it was my choice to do it, as it looked ok from the chair on the way up. But the cloud came in as we skied off the top towards the bumps, and they were a LOT bigger than they looked from the chair. There was no bailout option at that point though - we had to go down.
Once the cloud hit I literally could not see anything, including any of the bumps. Even attempting to traverse, I would occasionally just drop about 2 feet without warning as I fell off a mogul I couldn't see. I must have fallen almost 10 times going down that run, and I was very inelegant when I didn't fall. It didn't help that anyone else coming up the chairlift could watch my struggles and laugh for almost the whole length of the run, once the cloud moved a little. My friend, who was a much better skier than me, got down ok but also really did not enjoy it. Some day I’ll go back and ski it again!
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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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Not a piste, in fact very far from a piste, but for me it was last year the entrance to the Combe de Riou, after a hike and a long tour from Monetier.
The entrance was steep and very icy for the first hundred metres, with a very (VERY) long way to slide down if you lost your footing (I think it's at least 1,200m vertical difference).
In normal circumstances that would not have been a problem, sideslip or jump turns, etc. But during that season I had had a bad fall in Verbier, after skiing the Hidden Valley and traversing a rocky valley at the end of the day - I slipped, slid down into thick fog for 50-60m having no idea what's below me, and breaking my ankle in the process).
And then on the first day of my return-to-the-slopes holiday a good friend had a horrendous slide on a steep icy offpiste run in Alpe d'Huez (heli evac and several injuries...we were extremely glad he was still with us and not paralysed).
So by the time we got to the Combe de Riou, just four days later, my brain was offerring me two choices of entertainment: a first-person film of me falling down into the fog, and a third-person film of my mate sliding down for a couple hundred yards and bouncing through three bands of rocks. Nothing else, and no option to turn off the film, either. And my knees were gelatine.
Guide tried to secure me with a rope that he was holding himself, but I was still too worried by someone in the remainder of the group above us falling and taking us out (for the record, they were far less scared than me and in all likelihood would have done just fine).
Ultimately a second guide showed up and together they managed to make a 100-metre rope which we all used to get past the icy bit.
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It was a red run in serre chevalier that was unpisted icy moguls with lots of soft snow on also. Otherwise Mt Fort mogul field in Verbier.
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Black run down from Bellecote glazier in La Plagne last Easter. Moguls all the way till it became a red. Horrendous.
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Face at Val D'Isere a week after a men's World Cup downhill. Steep uber-icy sheet to say the least
Diverted onto it after the run we were on ended up closed! Edges managed to bite all the way down but even many years later when we come across some ice we remark that "it was a bit of a Face moment!"
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Probably mont fort in verbier. Not too icy, but just huuuuuge moguls. My descent down tortin was much easier, thanks to the lift
Most surprisingly difficult - the red under the Becoin lift in la Plagne, java. Covered in huge powdery moguls and evidently hadn't been pisted for a loong time. It wasn't horrendous, but a lot harder work than I was expecting!
I'm going to courchevel next week and debating whether I'm ready for the Grand Couloir.
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During my second ski holiday friends and I agreed to meet the rest of our chalet party for lunch on New Years day further over in the ski area (Selva). We thought we would get the bus but as it was New Years day there were no buses (this was way back in the 70s). So we took a cable car to the top of a run which should have been skiable for us notwithstanding our novice status and which would bring us down to the restaurant. But, it was so icy there was no chance of my skiing it. I ended up sliding on my bottom all the way down to lunch!
My outstanding challenge is the blowhole in Whistler. I know I could do it if there was plenty of snow on the sides and in the bottom but the conditions have just never been quite right when I have been there so it remains unconquered (by me) and I doubt I shall ever do it now.
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