Cleaning up the deZk...

Spent the past days cleaning up the desk, filing away papers, paying bills, and generally getting the office closer to being just that, an office. Sometimes I wonder I how I managed to keep it in order when I was traveling all the time (but I did).

By the way, swung by the Swedish Cultural Center for the first Pancake Breakfast of 2008. Always yummy!
After that took the dogs for a walk through Pike Place Market and downtown. Phoebe just loves to venture where there's tons of (friendly) people. As it is January in Seattle, it started squalling after a while and we ventured back to the car and home to make a fire. I bet however that this was a great day on the slopes, but no point in heading up during the weekend, fighting the crowds when the week seem to be even better - and less crowded.

Less crowded, one of the better skiing days of late, was up in Alpental on Superbowl Sunday 2006. Empty slopes, sunny skies, and perfect snow. Can it be better? All football fans couched in front of their TVs, leaving the mountain for "us" to enjoy!

Ski Zeason have come and gone...

OK, many weeks have passed since anything was written in this space. Time for a short update, and also an attempt at more regular entries. With the great snow we've gotten up in the Cascades, there has been a few wonderful days up at Stevens Pass. Actually, the very first skiing in a few years. First the winters were crabby, then it was too much traveling (for work) and the finally, this winter, SNOW. Plenty of it. Over the past 35 years, I've had many great days skiing. Most memorable and on the "top 10" are probably the three years I spent in the French Alps. Living in Tignes Le Val Claret (http://www.espacekilly.com), never being further away from a slope than 2 minutes, 24/7, was simply the best. I have no idea of how many days of skiing I actually got in during those years, but it was more than I managed since. At the same time, I sometimes wonder how it came to that I did survive. Back in those days, there was little talk about the danger of avalanches, rock falls, getting lost in a white out, etc. Skiing was simply about finding "great lines" down the mountain. You followed the "locals" a few times, and when you felt comfortable, you went on your own - totally disregarding the fact that changes in snow conditions voided what little you learnt over the previous days. But, we did so much "stuff", extreme skiing of the days - with out ANY safety equipment (beacon, probe, shovel) and many times one even went alone - the 3-4 hour lunch break was precious and dragging people around (visiting tourists) had to wait until a you had a full day off. At lunch you wanted to get in maximum vertical!I specifically remember one time in the spring of 1983. I had taken the cable car up to La Grande Motte, did a few warm-up runs on one of my favorite slopes, a long and wide empty dance floor served only by two double chairs. It was exposed on top of the glacier, a bit to the side, and few people bothered with it (probably considered a bore due to its location). It resulted in short lines and A LOT of skiing - a hidden gem in plain view!Anyway, up to the summit again, crossing over the glacier (yes, alone) and then up to the summit of "Dome du Pramecou". It is a mild mountain on its south side, but with a wonderfully steep north face where all wind driven snow was dumped (deep powder as late as May...). In order to get there, you had to traverse the glacier, aptly named "mer de glace" (sea of ice), hike up to the summit and I think all that labor kept many away. The run down was as great as ever, soft snow, but no Utah powder (which I did not know at the time, but you just don't find that in the Alps). From the bottom of Pramecou's north face, one can ski down a couloir, or take another small hike up to the summit of a small peak with a name I no longer recall, but it can end up in a viciously steep and narrow couloir run back to the village. From up there, EVERYONE could see you - if they looked up that is... But, this day I was lazy and took the couloir down towards the valley where the cable was located (cable car is long gone and replaced by an UNDERGROUND tram that ferries skiers up the mountain). The couloir was as good as it could be after having been skied w/o any new snow for a couple of days. It was always in the shade and the snow was cold any nice. This steep and narrow chute, was accessible via a long traverse and hence frequent by quite a few on a daily basis. Even so, it rarely turned to ice until very late spring. Out of the couloir, I cut out to the left (north), and traversed a the shaded wide open East face of the "unnamed mountain" in order not to have to take the slope back down to the cable car. I've done this many times. You keep altitude and get a decent run in the final fall line down towards the village.
Tired after only three great descents in one? You can always rest on the way back up again. I did so, sitting in one of the cable cars going back up, looking to the west to see if I can see my tracks in the dark shadow of the unnamed peak. To my amazement (and later horror), the entire side of the mountain is now a debris field after an avalanche. It must have happened when I was waiting in line to get up again. Had I been 10 minutes or so (=one more run on top of the glacier) , I would not have been sitting here today at all. I'd probably be one of the small "snow boulders" strewn across the mountain side. Next day I did take a look at these small snow boulders, they were about the size of a VW Microbus and just as hard. It would have hurt, really bad, to be there when they came down from above... I'm not religious, but I do believe in fate and the importance of having impeccable timing...
Oh well, just another day of skiing in the wild 80ies. When there really were no rules!

I return to Tignes summer of 1986. I am greeted with the sad news that M. Perinet (my landlord) and "George" (the local butcher) have died in a climbing accident on the same glacier. "Mer de glace" ends just south of Val Claret with the "ice fall", or "le langue du glacier". It is a popular ice climbing spot in the late summers when the real ice actually gets some exposure. What I hear is that the glacier "calved" and they were crushed under the falling ice. Took many days before their bodies could be recovered. Looking back, it could just as well had been me...