I like both 🙂

Can’t get my head people with a reasonable amount of skill fly to places to then spend a week doing laps on motorway runs, regardless of their choice of sliding equipment. In particular, snowboarding on pistes is the most pointless thing ever. Off piste – Snowboard if conditions are good and there’s not a huge walk out, skis if conditions are a bit mixed/poor or it would save a huge amount of time on the way out. If, for some reason I end up on pistes all day, it doesn’t matter what I’m on, since it’s just run/wine/run/wine/run/wine/wine/wine/run 🙂

My week has probably been 70% pistes, 15% off piste (with an instructor) and 15% halfpipe. Can’t say that I feel like I’ve wasted my time or money personally.

Sat in Chamonix watching the snow come down very heavily.
may have to find a bar and watch the curling.

peterfile – I’m on my 7th back-to-back season at the moment, my 9th in total.

For sure, powder is everything, but when it’s not on, I can still have an awesome day lapping pistes. Carving, jibbing, little tricks and hits at the side, working on technique on the steeps. It’s all snowboarding and I love every minute of it.

Went up the other day – hideously warm (sirroco depositing sand from the Sahara all over the mountain!), zero visibility, only thing vaguely rideable was some slushy pistes down through the trees to the bottom. I had a rad time!

Sat in Chamonix watching the snow come down very heavily.
may have to find a bar and watch the curling.

Does not compute? Go snowboarding!

oh aye, don’t get me wrong, i’d rather be riding something than not at all! my point was more along the lines of going to Chamonix in winter and riding pistes is like taking your bike there in summer and riding fire roads. 100% agree that a day when it’s not feasible to be off piste then pistes are fine for mucking around, but just can’t understand why people choose it over good off piste conditions 🙂

Does not compute? Go snowboarding skiing!

Whatever you do, don’t sit in a bar! Get out there! (Unless lifts are shut and it’s not safe, obviously. If that’s the case, hit the bar. Hard.)

Vis on the hill is about 50 metres, so its not good conditions forecast to be good inthe morning so will be making fresh tracks.
Dont really need to ski in bad weather, plenty of time to wait till its sunny 🙂

More than enough for me, personally. If snow is falling and vis is bad, head for the trees!

X-C in the flakes this morning. There’s some rather flat X-C in Chamonix, Peter, no excuses now you know. Yesterday’s rando was very pleasant though sticky afternoon snow reminded me it’s rainureuse and structureuse on sunny days from now on.

dalesrider: go and play in the trees at GM!

I love those low vis/flat light/white out days when you seem to have the whole mountain to yourself and there’s no lift queue etc …

spot on stevomcd! sometimes you just have to adapt to the conditions don’t you? – I’ve had some fabulous days following a thaw/freeze,when the off-piste is ropey, but the groomers are in top condition! laying down some pencil thin carves and trying to carve huge circles! 🙂

I think the only thing that’s made me ‘dip-out’ on riding has been extreme cold.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4u_z3T9U-8

posted this a month ago, but it’s relevant!

Digby, you asked a while ago, I didn’t see. Been investigating Lofoten and Alta (not the US one) as alternatives, but info’s thin on the ground. Might be France again in April and back to Lyngen next year, booking end of the summer this year. Got a good bunch interested.

Well I’ve just had a full afternoon of off piste instruction….I’ll concede that it was pretty awesome!!! Visibility was awful though!

Well spent the afternoon chilling, beers in MBC and now getting ready for a 7 course meal in a rather posh restaurant
wasnt too bothered about not skiing after driving to chsm in a day, after a bad nights sleep on the ferry, a fire on the car dek(Artic on fire) made for an exciting crossing,

Better day today, spent skiing. The bike rack makes a good ski rack

Moderately concerned – my Knee is still a bit uncomfortable 2 weeks after my trip to Italy. No crashes or tweaks. I did ride a lot of powder on quite a short board. I thought I just had a spot of tendonitis but the’re no graunchiness, ibroprofen hasn’t really done much for it.

Lots of stairs at work so not much of a chance to rest it.

Off on another jaunt in just over a week.

Any recommendations?

@ oliverd1981

Is it the knee of your rear leg that is still giving you discomfort?

Riding a short board in powder can lead to stress on the inside (medial) ligaments of the knee. Whilst I’m clearly not a doctor (obviously), anecdotally, it’s possible you’ve ‘sprained’ your MCL or something similar.

Best thing would be to pay a visit to a good sports physio, who will be able to provide a full assessment and recommend some remedial treatment/exercises.

You could also consider wearing a knee brace whilst riding to provide some additional support/confidence, however like many things you get what you pay for with knee braces and a proper ‘fitting’ session may pay dividends – Snow & Rock /Bodyfactor run clinics in the London and the South East

Thanks Digby that sounds about right – Initially I put it down to just too much weight o0n the back leg, I expected it to feel better by now. Unfortunately I’m offshore at the moment, I have about 24 hours at home before jetting of again so no physios or knee brace fitters, guess I’ll just have to go with whatever I can find in Sports Authority when I get there.

Reckon I mastered the snow plough today.

Check me out.

Stunning weather 🙂

Clearly not mastered the hockey stop.

Ooh nice orange fence.

After today, just 1 more day of work before a mates stag do, followed by a week snowboarding in Serre Che!

Just a bit excited!

Beautiful, dalesrider! Living up to your username! Which way did you come down? And did you ride to Placards, or get the train?

Got the train 🙂
Last time I was here you didnt have the hike out, mind that made the glacier flat and a lot of poling. Cant believe how much its shrunk

“placards” 🙄 Planards!

There’s less of a hike to the little hut and the James Bond run to town, but I think you have to go a bit further down. Pretty sure it’s been skiable this year.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26297175

Teh radnezzz.

Just back from Bormio and Livigno……three and a half days and not a cloud in the sky……just awesome. Did 28miles on the last day stopping at 3pm, slightly tired! Peak to creek was 4.3 miles, 1800m drop which I did in 10mins including stopping to pick up a pals ski. Topped out at 58mph.

Nice stats!

Do we have time for me to say I’ve just finished packing for a 5 day “weekend” in Les Gets etc? I’ll be in the air this time tomorrow!

First go out on the board I bought at the end of last season. 😀

Enjoy Ned!

Cheers, Tom. There’s a very, very good chance I will!

Have a good trip nedrapier! 8)

What’s the board you bought?

Beautiful day today in Les Gets. The snow on the back of Mont Chery was the probably the nicest I’ve had all season. Not the deepest, but properly light and powdery.

View over Les Gets

Lovely morning

Right then.

First things first, I’ve decided.

Snowboards are rubbish. Skis are the bestest.

Did I forget the 😀 *

More pertinently, when the best time to buy skis/bindings. I’m guessing end of season? What sort or discount should I be looking for.

And ski boots in person from a shop. That’s not even a question. **** me rental boots aren’t comfy.

*im learning to ski to get into touring and perhaps mountaineering.

Piemonster – You can get decent deals all year round on new skis and boots from the previous year. If you’re after touring gear then there tend to be less discounts on boots and bindings (apart from extreme sizes of boots) presumably as most places stock less, but picking up skis appears to be easier. [cheeky ad mode] If you’re looking for some fritschi touring bindings, I have a set that I’m looking to sell 😉 [/cheeky ad mode]

More importantly, with a good forecast for the weekend in Scotland – has anyone been out touring since mid week that can report on latest conditions?

Boots? Well, the problem with buying at the end of the season is that you’re at the mercy of the season itself, and of the buying guesses that each shop made way back before that season kicked off! If you have normal/average sized feet, they can and do sell out often.

Still, well worth a look around!

Ski touring boots are never “comfy”, some are less miserable than others. My current favourites are ten-year-old Dynafits with Garmont inners that require require regular re-gluing of the soles. If I had a time machine I’d go back and buy some felt inners from 20 years back because the current thermo-formable things are like having my feet in saunas after an hour of up. I’ve sold the ones I haven’t liked at less than half price after a few trips so you mind find some cheap that don’t suit someone else but suit you.

Touring has been good despite all the early-season pessimism, so stable we only put food and drink in the pack on the last trip. We didn’t like the look of a corniche hanging over one valley (with temperature rising) so took another. Watching TV later we heard an unfortunate Scot had fallen through a corniche near Chamonix, nobody has mentioned it on this thread in three days so I hope you’ll forgive me posting in an it’s-been-windy-you-might-be-standing-on/under-a-corniche-so-take-care way.

Ski touring boots are never “comfy”, some are less miserable than others.

I’ve got to disagree with that – though I feel the same about DH boots. In the past I wasn’t fussy and jsut put up with whatever was on my feet, but I’ve skiied quite a few pairs of modern touring boots and some are like slippers they are that comfy (and great performance as well). Heat is an issue with some liners if you’re out in warm conditions though.

Skin up a bit and get sweaty, traverse for a while to rub the ankles, descend for bit through washboard snow pressing on the tongues then skate for km or so, back up a bit with ski crampons so the skis stop dead rather than sliding at the end of a stride, put on proper crampons and front point up a gully … do that for a few days and if you don’t have bruises or blisters (or both) somewhere then you really have found “comfy” boots. I never have.