Page 12 of 12 FirstFirst ... 7 8 9 10 11 12
Results 276 to 297 of 297

Thread: Ski Chile 2015

  1. #276
    Join Date
    Sep 2001
    Location
    Golden
    Posts
    6,383
    I was just able to make it to the pay screen - but only when I choose spanish as my language. Tickets $41 per person.
    If I choose USA as my country - $303 per person.

    Hell of an upcharge for us gringos!
    Drive slow, homie.

  2. #277
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Quote Originally Posted by Z View Post
    I was just able to make it to the pay screen - but only when I choose spanish as my language. Tickets $41 per person.
    If I choose USA as my country - $303 per person.

    Hell of an upcharge for us gringos!
    Wow, $41 to Balmaceda? Never heard of something that cheap, it must be wrong. $300 is a normal price, it is far from Santiago.

    On a positive note, the snow is piling up in Valle Nevado:

    [/URL]

    Tomorrow will be epic!

  3. #278
    Join Date
    Sep 2001
    Location
    Golden
    Posts
    6,383
    Thats what I thought, but then I saw this...

    http://en.mercopress.com/2015/09/23/...d-sky-airlines

    Enjoy the pow!

  4. #279
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Posts
    345
    "giggles"

  5. #280
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    25 cm fell and the ski areas have extended the season to Oct 4 for La Parva and Portillo and Oct 12 for Valle Nevado, El Colorado and Corralco. Best season end in many years, and more snow is forecast for this week.

    Friday was cold and the powder was great. Here my tracks below the Franciscano peak (3,600m) after scouting it out for the full moon eclipse:



    We are stubborn folk, so even if it was snowing the afternoon of the 27th, we loaded up the tools and toys and headed up with all fingers and toes crossed for it to clear like it did the day before. Here above Las Tortolas and Ancla lifts:



    Built a shelter to keep warm:


    Then did a hobo BBQ:


    The sun popped out for 2 minutes for a photo op, then night descended with no moon in sight:



    By then it started to get really weird:


    And we skied down with headlamps on excellent snow!

  6. #281
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Posts
    345
    Quote Originally Posted by Casey E View Post
    A quick update on the climate in the central zone. There is zero snow, and nothing of importance in the forecast to the end of June. This may sound terrible, and the drought is serious, but take note of the optimism of the ski area association which says "since 1968, 44% of the years had opening dates after June 25, and 25% after July 1."

    I have seen the season become incredible in July. Some examples:

    1978 was a disaster year with barely enough snow to attend the kids on winter holidays in July. At the end of the holidays, about July 23, it started to snow, and blow, and rain, and didn't stop for 10 days. After that we had a 2-5m base everywhere.

    1987 had marginal conditions at the end of June. From July 4 to August 15 it snowed 25 days, and the ski areas were open until the end of October.

    2002 was a mostly dry year up to the beginning of June. Then it snowed hard for 3 days straight, and there was a 1.5m base at the bottom after.

    Keep optimistic!

    The latest weather forecast from meteo chile is now going back to "normal" precipitation in general:

    Well there you have it folks!

  7. #282
    lancekoudele Guest

    Headed down to ski Oct 6/7

    Dang looking for a place up near Farellones for two nights... any body have a good connection for a sweet late season room Oct 6 and 7? On a budget for sure!

  8. #283
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Quote Originally Posted by lancekoudele View Post
    Dang looking for a place up near Farellones for two nights... any body have a good connection for a sweet late season room Oct 6 and 7? On a budget for sure!
    Sorry, can't help you, but Farellones hostals are empty now. Note that probably the only ski area open monday to thursday is Valle Nevado next week.

  9. #284
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Villarrica dawned draped in fresh after getting rained on and battered by the Puelche winds.





    Bounty of the oak forest, digueńes


    Hope to ski around the Araucania somewhere this week. Temperature is set to drop with some new snow. Looking good!
    Last edited by Casey E; 10-03-2015 at 09:33 PM.

  10. #285
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    A bonus extension of winter into October. low freezing levels and snow forecast everywhere:


  11. #286
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Got to ski some of Villarrica yesterday, with a group of Canucks and Chileans. Snowed down to about 1,000m tuesday night, and we drove to 1,200m near the Cuevas Volcanicas, then skinned up to the top of the ghost tbar (abandoned in the 70's from an eruption).












  12. #287
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    The ski season hasn't ended yet! Cool weather with regular snowfalls, supposedly the belated effects of the El Nińo intensification, have kept the base steady on southern exposures above 3,000m in the central zone, and above 1,500m in the south. Valle Nevado has extended their season to Oct 18, and Corralco until "the snow ends".

    Last friday we went exploring the back side of Volcan Villarrica, towards the area of the Pichillancahue Glacier, and found a bounty of nice tree touring and even an unnamed peak to ski. After driving up the to south entrance to the Villarrica National Park, we toured up the old road from where the truck got stuck at about 1,200m. Once out of the trees at around 1,400m we headed west towards the smoking volcano and up a lateral peak which must be some kind of an old subsidiary cone. With views of 11 volcanoes from Puyehue to Tolhuaca, it was an amazingly beautiful ski.












    Don´t let those rocks tempt you, they were surrounded by ice!



    Mocho Choshuenco with Puyehue/Caulle in the background.



    Caburgua Lake, Llaima, Tolhuaca, and Lonquimay volcanoes:


    Quetrupillan and Lanin:


    Las Peinetas and Colmillo del Diablo or Volcan Quinquilil:


    Weird snow to ski, neither winter nor spring, with ice and some powder:



    Then to the inevitable hot springs to round out the day!

  13. #288
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Quetrupillan rocks! Some photos from our tour up last friday, featuring Phil, Sep, Luke, Victor, and Natalie:




















    Last edited by Casey E; 10-19-2015 at 08:35 PM.

  14. #289
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Time for the season closer. Although there is still abundant snow in the Chilean Andes, and people still skiing it, I have to turn to other affairs. Both Colorado and Corralco close next weekend, but ski mountaineering will go well into November. I did get a great couple of days at Corralco last week, and put together some photos including an exposé of 16 volcanoes visible from the peak of Volcan Lonquimay, which follows.

    The lovely Corralco hotel at the edge of the lava field


    Monkey puzzle tree forest view from my room:


    Lonely ride up the Cumbre t-bar (that is as crowded as it got that day...):


    Going northwest clockwise:










    And lastly, some bragging, these are all my tracks:

  15. #290
    Join Date
    Sep 2001
    Location
    Golden
    Posts
    6,383
    Any insight - if you had an international flight at 1030pm in Santiago, would you be comfortable booking a sky airlines flight Punta Arenas to Santiago leaving at 630am? Is that a reasonable move or would frequent delays/weather suggest getting to santiago a day early?

  16. #291
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Quote Originally Posted by Z View Post
    Any insight - if you had an international flight at 1030pm in Santiago, would you be comfortable booking a sky airlines flight Punta Arenas to Santiago leaving at 630am? Is that a reasonable move or would frequent delays/weather suggest getting to santiago a day early?
    Should be no problem at all.

  17. #292
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Posts
    345
    Well, Chile was a riot. 5 weeks of traveling as much as we could and skiing a bunch of really fun lines! Super good to meet up with Casey who had tons of info and we even got a few good days of skiing in together.
    Been real busy since back in Canada with a first aid course and more recently 5 days of deep powder ski touring. Anyways finally have time to toss a few pics from the trip up
    Day one Skiing, little tour up to an old abandoned lift shack on Villarica, wind came in hard and we got clouded in but still got some nice turns in for day 1



    Well after that we summit-ed Volcan Villarica, and listened to the sound of Magma bubbling in the crater before enjoying 1400m of great snow back to the car, unfortunately the SD card in my camera that day was shit and I have no pictures, it was beautiful though hahaha!

    After this I bused back to Santiago and met up with Seb from England and we went and grabbed out rental truck for the next 4 weeks. Then the next day picking up Phil and Natalie we headed up into the Cajon Del Maipo, what turned out into a very epic time, seeing a seemingly nice campspot on some flats past Embalse El yeso, we ventured out into HELL. First crossing a small muddy river which we figured was the hard part we continued on, eyes blinded by the large couloirs and spines looming above us, after driving about 2k we had unsupportive mud and burried the truck up to the axels. without righting 6 pages on it, 15hours later we had finally dug out the truck and built a little road to get the hell out of there! We headed up another few kms to another campspot where we slept well knowing the truck was not stuck in a lake bed. After a rest day we headed up to an active mine in the area and after a quick conversation with one of the workers we parked and skinned around the mine to the great beautiful couloirs of Cerro Arenas. Heading up in nice weather we skinned the fan as we hit the base a storm rolled in and started to lightly snow. Feeling ok with stability we started to bootpack up the couloir. Snowfall was increasing but didnt seem to be loadin to much. Maybe 1-200m from the top it whited out and started sluffing. Taking that as our cue we quickly transitioned and ripped overhead blower pow that was not sluffing all the way back to a safe zone. Waiting for our last party member to go, a ledge about 200m above us that must have been getting heavily windloaded peeled off in a thunderous sluff. Tucking into the safe zone we held on for a solid minute while being dusted by the slide. It all cleared up and everyone was ok and our final member skied down and we hightailed it back to the valley without stopping. A very exciting first couloir in chile.





    More to come

  18. #293
    Join Date
    Aug 2015
    Posts
    4

    FREERIDE MAP Chile

    Planning a powder trip to Chile this winter? Check out FREERIDE MAP Chile for the best off-piste terrain and backcountry routes in and around La Parva, El Colorado and Valle Nevado: http://freeridemapchile.strikingly.com/

    Name:  Bildschirmfoto 2016-06-16 um 19.08.49.png
Views: 266
Size:  334.3 KB
    Name:  Bildschirmfoto 2016-06-16 um 19.09.14.png
Views: 261
Size:  290.4 KB
    Last edited by mike83; 06-16-2016 at 05:17 PM.

  19. #294
    Join Date
    Sep 2016
    Posts
    1

    How is late spring 2016 shaping up

    Hey Casey,
    A buddy and I are heading to Santiago on the 4th of Oct and have a car rented. We have about 2 weeks to ski. Looks a little warm and mushy down there now days, unlike a year ago. Any advice? Totally love all the beta and pictures you have posted. Fantastic!!!

  20. #295
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Quote Originally Posted by m1e348 View Post
    Hey Casey,
    A buddy and I are heading to Santiago on the 4th of Oct and have a car rented. We have about 2 weeks to ski. Looks a little warm and mushy down there now days, unlike a year ago. Any advice? Totally love all the beta and pictures you have posted. Fantastic!!!
    Check out the Ski Chile 2016 thread for my reply. Good luck!

    http://bit.ly/SkiChile2016

  21. #296
    Join Date
    Jan 2017
    Posts
    2
    Hi guys , wondering if anyone had info in what it's like to do a winter season in chile. I'll be going with my gf and we are both advance riders, this would be our 4th season so have been looking at nevados de chillian for deep snow. Also the three valleys but it seems you can't buy a season pass which included a them all?

    Any info would be great

    Thanks guys

  22. #297
    Join Date
    May 2014
    Location
    Santiago Chile
    Posts
    1,719
    Check the Ski Chile Guide thread for a variety of data on Chile. For the 3 Valleys there are passes for La Parva/Valle Nevado for $920,000 pesos, and the 3 Valleys $1,140,000 pesos, expensive. These are 2016 prices, and they go on sale starting in April. Cheapest would probably be a weekday pass (and no holidays, like most of July) in one area and go for the day occasionally to the other areas. These I have seen on sale for around $300. I know they can be bought in the La Parva offices.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •