Snow for the Euros.

**Brecher** · 09-19-2016, 02:48 PM

Some jealousy here. Nice!

**Island Bay** · 09-19-2016, 03:15 PM

Happy days, Peds!

**ClarkleberryFinn** · 09-19-2016, 04:04 PM

^^ Nice!!

Been some new snow at altitude in Tirol the past couple of days too. Pitztal Glacier opened 3 lifts and a couple of pistes the other day.

**McDee** · 09-20-2016, 01:03 AM

Nice peds! Thats an early start to the season.

Originally Posted by ClarkleberryFinn

Been some new snow at altitude in Tirol the past couple of days too. Pitztal Glacier opened 3 lifts and a couple of pistes the other day.

Completly missed that, did you head up there? Wonder what the conditions were like for middle-to-end of sept. I must be getting desperate if i'm realy considering a drive all the way to Mandarfen just for 3 lousey lifts and crappy snow

**ClarkleberryFinn** · 09-20-2016, 04:53 AM

Originally Posted by McDee

Completly missed that, did you head up there? Wonder what the conditions were like for middle-to-end of sept. I must be getting desperate if i'm realy considering a drive all the way to Mandarfen just for 3 lousey lifts and crappy snow

Haha no seemed like too much effort (also not on Freizeitticket). Stubai opens on 30th though!

Hard to tell, but Stubai looks better on the webcams now than when it opened last year, but I guess we'll have to wait and see what it's like when these few cms melt!

**peds** · 09-30-2016, 01:45 PM

Haaaa!

"I'm bored," the dog sighed, looking out the window. "Can we go skiing?"
"Well yeah, but all the lifts are closed... it'll be a long walk uphill in exchange for not much skiing..."
"I don't mind, I do it all the time. You'll be the one carrying the skis."

1800m of ascent later, we get our not much. Just about three hundred metres of chalk, then jagged frozen waves, then bare dry glacier ice; followed by fifteen hundred metres of rubble, then moraine, then bilberry, then mushroom-scented forest; all under a blazing late summer sun.

Not bad for September 30th.

**Brecher** · 09-30-2016, 02:37 PM

So Baldric made it to the glacier. Nice

**klar** · 09-30-2016, 03:05 PM

YAY BALDRIC BACK IN ACTION! and that guy with the skis I guess.

**peds** · 10-01-2016, 02:27 PM

I think he might be Baldric's PA, or maybe his butler.

**Brecher** · 10-01-2016, 04:00 PM

I feel like I'm missing the joke. But anyway: I like dogs on glaciers. Kinda wild.

Edit: Got it. Drunk. Apologies. Bye

**peds** · 10-02-2016, 02:18 AM

Originally Posted by Brecher

But anyway: I like dogs on glaciers. Kinda wild.

You should see him as soon as we set foot on snow, after the 1800m climb on a rocky ridge... he just lights up, you can see him thinking "Finally! Let's fuckin' do this!"

We've only ever gone on sections of glacier that we check out thoroughly beforehand; this particular spot we'd gone up to and around on three separate trips over the last couple of weeks, including when the glacier was still totally dry, to get a good idea of what we'd find... making a note of where the (tiny and easily avoidable) crevasse patches are, how easy the descent from the snout of the glacier is, things like that.

I really want to get him a full harness from Ruffwear, then we might be able to start exploring on the glaciers properly. He'd love the ski from the Tete Blanche in mid-winter... 2200m of descent down to the pub!

edit
Here he is on one of our fact-finding missions last week, when we went looking for the path between home and the glacier snout, to make sure we could get down after skiing...

**abraham** · 10-02-2016, 03:37 AM

Originally Posted by peds

You should see him as soon as we set foot on snow, after the 1800m climb on a rocky ridge... he just lights up, you can see him thinking "Finally! Let's fuckin' do this!"

edit
Here he is on one of our fact-finding missions last week, when we went looking for the path between home and the glacier snout, to make sure we could get down after skiing...

Sounds like he's a mag!

That's a really cool picture, not sure quite why but there's something about it

**subtle plague** · 10-02-2016, 03:50 AM

do you really say glacier "snout" ? Or is it a thing between baldric and you?

I thought you refer to the end of a glacier as "tongue" in English?

**klar** · 10-02-2016, 05:33 AM

I am not peds but I'd say the snout is the same as the toe

, or terminus. Tongue is probably something that german speaking people have introduced to the english language, to the point where it is somewhat acceptable in english glaciology literature but not used much by english speaking people, at least not to refer to the actual end of the glacier (=terminus). Using it this way in german is common but kind of ambiguous too. Tongue might correctly refer e.g. to the part of a valley glacier that reaches lower altitudes and looks like a tongue. The end of the tongue is the terminus, toe or snout. Every glacier has a terminus, not every glacier has a tongue.

**ClarkleberryFinn** · 10-03-2016, 01:58 AM

^^ It was always officially snout during geography/glaciology lectures at uni, but I think tongue is more commonly used/logical from a 'lay person' perspective now (in the way to Klar refers to, reaching down the valley).

**McDee** · 10-03-2016, 03:42 AM

Bugger, i should know this as well.. been too long, gonna scrabble around in my old geo books just to see for myself. Who'd you have as a lecturer for that Clarke? I think i would have had John Smith doing glaciology at the time, but that was 95-99ish.
Oh and nice doggy stoke peds!

**peds** · 10-03-2016, 10:20 AM

I think I've always referred to it as the snout, and many of my friends seem to know which bit I'm talking about... I think my geology-and-geography teaching mother has always called it the snout, too.

It's all a moot point though, really, as I wasn't actually skiing on the snout, I'd say we were more on one of its ears.

Went up again today, to the Col du Tour... two thousand metres of up, six hundred metres of skiing... it was pretty freaking brilliant.

**peds** · 10-06-2016, 09:17 AM

Grand Envers, October 6th

Really, really didn't want to let 20cm of pow go to waste, so we scraped our way along the Midi-Plan ridge to grab the first pitch of the Grand Envers. Was so good we had to ski it twice.

**subtle plague** · 10-07-2016, 07:23 AM

huh. I guess i learned something. I know the term terminus and knew that it was used, but i had never heard of the snout before.

**klar** · 10-07-2016, 07:52 AM

As usual, Peds wins with the early season skiing. We do have a heated chairlift though so I bet he's jealous of that.

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**peds** · 10-07-2016, 09:03 AM

Heated chairlift? Pah! Back in my day (of being six years old and forced to go skiing on the most miserable days imaginable by parents who had already bought a very expensive lift pass for me [thanks, by the way]), if a lift had a reputation for being particularly chilly, they'd give you a woolen blanket to stretch over everyone on the chair. But nowadays... bubble canopys? Heated seats?! Ee by gum, you don't know you're born.

There is a very short video of yesterday's skiing to be found at the other end of the link below. I'm not sure if you can embed instagram videos. Is there a code?
https://www.instagram.com/p/BLQN-8Jh...ughtonchamonix

**twat** · 10-14-2016, 02:10 AM

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**abraham** · 10-14-2016, 02:20 AM

Originally Posted by peds

l.

There is a very short video of yesterday's skiing to be found at the other end of the link below. I'm not sure if you can embed instagram videos. Is there a code?
https://www.instagram.com/p/BLQN-8Jh...ughtonchamonix

Pshhhh that didn't look fun or anything

I'm jealous

**peds** · 10-14-2016, 09:54 AM

Originally Posted by abraham

Pshhhh that didn't look fun or anything

It was all right, if you like that kind of thing.

Originally Posted by abraham

I'm jealous

Be the change you want to see.

Lots of snow falling, from all corners of the Alps as far as I can tell... and no-one else is getting involved?!

It's going to be a full-on powder day up the Midi tomorrow, if they open...