skiing closed pistes

A snowHead

I get the feeling the most insurance companies consider you have been an idiot (and are thus not covered) if you ski off piste when the avalanche risk is greater than or equal to 4 out of 5. So I guess to all intents and purposes it is closed when that is the case.

I'm not sure what the situation would be if you were with a guide off piste when the overall avalanche warning is high, but a particular aspect is safe? I guess you would be covered unless is specifically mentions a resort avalanche rating in the terms and conditions.

As for skiing closed pistes I had a brilliant 2 days skiing the same closed run in Alpe d'Huez last Jan on loop. It was closed because wind had badly affected the cover at the start. Leaving nasty bare patchs. But once you were past them there was untouched glorious powder to be had.

A snowHead

Sideshow_Bob,
Did the norwegians tell you off? I mean clearly you were up slope from them so the responsibility was on you to ski responsibly and to avoid them? Toofy Grin

On a serious note: what was their actually initial reaction (after establiching their son was OK)? anger or guilt?

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

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Kruisler, they did try to have a go at me as I was lying on the floor winded and then argued with my coach when he skied down to check up on me saying there should be people manning every entrance to the piste. We were at the far side of the resort and had four or five manned flagged zones (where there are blind corners/drops etc where a racer could crash without being seen from above) and had proper full-height crash netting across the track they came from, not just the normal "piste closed" flags, so they had to make a fair effort to actually get on the piste. They skied off PDQ back through the trees once the coach got his radio out and started talking to the liftie at the bottom to report them.

I've also had other near misses skiing both slalom and GS on closed "stade" pistes in French resorts. People will see a quiet pisted roped-off slope and think they're fine to duck the nettings. Some even have a go round the gates in their flying radio 4 snowplough. I wish lifites/pisteurs took a harder line with such people as it's incredibly dangerous.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

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alex_heney, re-read what snowball actually wrote: "closed off-piste", i.e. off-piste that is closed (the hyphen makes the meaning very clear), and consider whether your response was relevant.

snowball, while true in general, there are actually a few areas that are non-pisted, non-waymarked "freeride" zones (e.g. there is one in Zinal) that have entry gates, which may be open or closed - sort of following the American model. Again, generally very good reasons for it to be closed, if so. The first time I was there it was closed, as the avalanche risk was very high all that week.

brian

GrahamN, Zinal freeride opens about a day and a half per season from what I've seen. Doesn't make much difference to how much traffic it has.

After all it is free

brian,

so is the gate similar to the one in Blazing Saddles then?

GrahamN,

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GrahamN, Yes, you are right, of course.

I had completely failed to register the position and meaning of the hyphen.

Although actually, there are quite a few areas which could be considered off-piste but which you are not allowed to ski (e.g. all the area below the mid station of the gondola in the Zillertal Arena). But they are permanently closed, rather than the temporary type of closures we are generally talking of in this thread.

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snowball, no, but there are sometimes avalanche warning signs at exit points - it's this sort of sign that could invalidate your insurance.

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What exactly is a closed piste?

nixmap, a piste that has been closed - usually with a rope barrier and "closed" signs?

You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

worst crash i ever had was on a closed green run Embarassed

A snowHead

A snowHead

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

I remember a few years ago ducking under the tape to ski the Face when it was closed.
l
We were "ok" skiers at the time and were more or less in survival mode when skiing French blacks. Anyway it was the last run, of the last day on that holiday and we had caught the last lift up and had watched a great sunset over the mountains so it was dusk going down it. Turns out it was very scraped and mogully, not necessarily dangerous but waaay beyond our abilities.

I managed to stay upright but my mate fell two or three times, then eventually lost a ski and froze on the steepest iciest bit (of course). No amount of persuasion got him to move. Then the piste patrol lady turned up and gave us a right old rollicking. But she kindly got the missing ski and after a long time we started skiing again to head for the bar and a stiff one to calm my mates nerves.

Not clever but we still talk about it today, especially when he is getting overally cocky. No one hurt and we learnt our lesson. Embarassed

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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

The great thing about Jackson Hole is that there aren't any pistes so much as identified trails, or in other words, it's not 'on' or 'off piste', but in or out of bounds. snowHead

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After all it is free

abc, really? Wow. That must be why the ski areas aren't that big. All that effort expended to ensure that there are zero hazards in the entire ski area. In Europe you step off the piste and you could be riding the crevasse elevator to Santa's grotto, scrounging some schnapps from a St.Bernard, or rappelling down a rockface freestyle. But, it sure was fun in JH knowing you could go anywhere without such worries.

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The trouble with Jackson is, if there is nowhere to make new tracks in-bounds (which there wasn't when we were there - it was all hard snow), you can't take a guide to find it in the back country (Granite or beyond) since it is a National Park and they can't guide there. So we had to buy a map and do it on our own which I wasn't totally happy with.

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snowball, don't think that's true. We went out with a guide (who took the day off to ski with friends).

[EDIT]
I just checked the JH website: http://jacksonhole.com/lessons-guides/backcountry-guides/guided-backcountry-tour.html It clearly mentioned guided back country ski OFF THE TOP OF THE CHAIR out the backcountry gate!

So your guide had simply fed you some silly bull$hit. You didn't tip him, did you? Wink

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snowball, agreed with abc, had two of the best skiing days I've ever had in the back country around Jackson, courtesy of Jackson Hole Mountain Guides.

abc, we didn't take a guide since they told us that they were not permitted by the agreement with the National Park. I also saw this stated on a resort website. They can take you on the very limited area of the side-country which we felt happy to explore on our own since one of our group knew it from previous trips. However we only found one slope that we could make fresh tracks on (from Four pines) - the rest were very wind affected or had been skied out - and by the second day we went there, that was skied out too. However when we skied into Granite it was all powder and there were no other tracks from the gate nearest the tram, and late in the week only a few from other gates which we generally quickly diverged from (those descents all involved some quite steep slopes - Mile Long Couloir for example). Our one day with skins, going beyond Granite, we didn't see another track all day.
Granite Canyon stretches many miles - all the way along the back of the resort - and involves a long walk out on skis to get back to the resort. The side country (other than one heavily skied valley which I'd hardly call off-piste) involves (usually) only short walks of 15 minutes to half an hour to get to things - and you can ski out.

You know it makes sense.

Here is a quote:

Jackson Hole Mountain Resort was one of the first resorts in the litigious USA to reverse the trend of discouraging skiers and snowboarders from venturing outside the ski area boundaries, and possibly the first to introduce a European-style guiding service. Today 5,000 acres of legendary back-country skiing terrain is available to good holiday skiers in the Bridger-Teton National Forest throughout the winter.

As a result of Jackson’s policy, the resort now has a burgeoning guiding programme. But although skiers and boarders can now access terrain outside Bridger-Teton National Park, the guides are not allowed to escort you into neighbouring Teton National Park, where runs like Endless Couloir, Air Force Couloirs, Mile Long Couloir, and Cardiac Ridge await hard-core skiers. The only “safe” way to ski such terrain is to do it with someone with a sound local knowledge. A friendly ski patroller on his day off would be ideal. It is not that all the skiing in the back-country is either difficult or dangerous. But without a guide – official or unofficial – you will have far less chance of anticipating the degree of hazard.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Does anyone know if there are American (or Canadian) resorts where the Back-country guiding policy actually allows guides to ski the off-piste accessible from the resort lifts (with perhaps a little walking)? My experience at Jackson rather put me off skiing in the USA.

A snowHead

snowball, whistler, certainly

A snowHead

snowlamb, see the bit where you said " little girly swot "..............yeah that bit....................

okbye

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abc, As I said, they can guide in what is locally called the Side Country (which is at the left side of the resort, on the same side of the mountain as the resort, rather than behind it). But technically this is also Back-Country since it is out of bounds. All the other gates only access the back country behind the resort, which was where the powder was when I was there.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

snowball, as for bc guiding, Aspen is another option.

But you do need to keep in mind due to the 1) un-pisted inbound 2) expensive lift pass, it doesn't make sense for most north American skiers to spend the extra to hire guides to slide down "side country"! As a result, there's not nearly the same number of guiding services as in the Alps (lacking customer base).

The focus on NA BC skiing has long been cat/heli access instead of lift accessed.

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Double M was closed a few weeks back but it was the best run at Tignes

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I don't hear much from folk complaining of the dangers when pistes haven't been closed when they should be. I'll start the snowball rolling.

I walked over to the top of the Swiss Wall (Chavanettes) last April and there were no signs saying it was closed. No usual rope saying 'ferme'. Just wide open. And yet no sign of life anywhere. No chairs. No skiers. Nada. And yet a chair had brought me up to within 50 yards of it. Even on the way back I couldn't see any sign saying it was closed. I presume everyone simply knows that if the Chavanettes chair isn't working then the wall is effectively closed. I guess it's probably something to do with the fact it is an itinerary and not a piste, i.e. perhaps you can't close itineraries? But, I could have sworn it's sometimes closed due to avalanche hazard. Then again, perhaps there was no such hazard when I came to it, just no lifts operating out of it. I guess ski tourers may have been into doing it. Puzzled

After all it is free

Why do you think it's closed, only because you don't see others on it?

I once saw a rope being taken away by the patrol! Very Happy

So obviously no one else was on it and I got the second track (the pisteur layed down the first track) Smile

crosbie, if the Wall is closed, there's a great big sign at the top saying closed and netting all the way across it. If the chairlift's not running you just need to divert back via Mossettes. Possibly it was empty as most people were making the same assumption as you? IME it's usually closed because it's too icy or rocky, and more dangerous than usual.

Mind you, regardless of snow conditions, if it is empty that would get rid of the biggest danger - all those poor fools who feel they need to add it as a notch to their bedposts or something - when they really can't ski it & won't enjoy it.

Further to your point, I don't think I've ever come across a piste that wasn't closed when it should be?

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Our guide was once going to take us onto a closed piste and the liftie stopped us. Our guide argued with her that it was safe, so she radioed down and then opened it. We made the first tracks down as people on the lift whooped. (Mind you, he's quite a big name in that area).

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skiing closed pistes

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