Ice climbing in Tukino

Woke up at 4:30 this morning to head over to Tukino with Ryan for some ice climbing. Driving over in the light rain and strong winds we were both a wee bit sceptical about the prospect of even making it on to any ice. Knowing how notoriously fickle the weather is here and some being curious about what Tukino was actually like, we figured there was no harm in driving over there- worst case scenario we'd get some beta for next time.

Getting out of the car in the murky twilight of dawn we were nearly blown off our feet by the wind. As we stood there bracing ourselves against the gale and joking about getting back in the car, a fellow poked his head out the door of one of the lodges and called us over. It was Terry the hospitable manager of the small ski field inviting us in for a cup of coffee. We joined the crew inside: warming up, chatting with the staff and generally being shown just how terrifically friendly and welcoming the club ski field scene is here in NZ.

With the wind starting to ease we headed over to one of the main ice gullies, a mere 15 minute walk across the valley. By the time we were standing at its base we were almost completely sheltered from the wind and the ice was in surprisingly good shape.

Ryan leading the "Left Gully"

Ryan on the disconcertingly titled "Bowel Wobbler"

Despite a few downpours of rain we had a terrific morning climbing a few of the gullies on the northern bluffs. My stoke for climbing was rejuvenated as was my faith in the alpine start, and not least of all I got to see my first NZ club field and fondle my first 'nutcracker'... Will definitely be back here in the not too distant future.

Tukino obscured by the swirling mess of clouds as seen on the drive out on the 4WD track

TAC x 2

The famous hiking trail I mentioned in the previous post is something of a local institution: the Tongariro Alpine Crossing (TAC). Last year there were something like 65 000 people who completed the one way 19.4 km route. Its the main tourist draw card for the region and there are hostels, hotels, guiding agencies here in town named after it.

After yesterday's confirmation that skiing conditions were not really in, I decided to focus today's effort on something that this area can deliver on a world class level: trail running. Specifically a double crossing of the TAC: 39 kilometres, 2250 metres of vertical and about 1/3 of the trail being above snowline.

It was windy!

The trail is really well maintained, to the point of having elevated pathways through areas which are prone to erosion. Its all very runnable, but the shear amount of vert. involved in the return from Ketetahi and the utter lack of vert training I've done in the last two months meant that I ended up walking quite a bit of that section.
In the end I squeezed in at a little under 5:05

Another view of Ngauruhoe

The track follows the obvious ridge from the right up to the skyline (Red Crater)

Pretty views down to Lake Rotoaira before a long descent down to the Ketetahi carpark

The only forested section of the track for a few kilometres around Ketetahi

At the end of the run I got some nice views of the always pretty Mt Ruapehu and the Whakapapa ski area

A neat little profile of the track stolen shamelessly from here

Skiing Ngauruhoe: a taste of Doom

A few months ago when I first got word of the job down here in NZ I immediately started scouring the internet for some info on ski touring in the area. Within minutes a peak called Ngauruhoe was in first place on my to do list. Its a proud little volcano on the northern end of Tongariro NP, beautifully symetrical and with a relief of around 1400 metres above the surrounding plateau its a local icon. It might just have become the world's most recognized mountain profile since being used as the filming location for Mt. Doom in the Lord of the Rings films.

Ngauruhoe as seen from the slopes of Ruapehu a few weeks ago.

After over a month of waiting for a day off work to coincide with the right conditions (ie. winds less than gale force, visibility more than 20 metres), I headed up yesterday. Its been a few weeks since the last snowfall, and in the interim we've been enjoying spring like temperatures and a blazing sun, so conditions were a little "summery". 

 After a little over an hour of walking from the trailhead along a nicely maintained track (apparently the most popular day hike in NZ), past the Soda Springs and up most of the Devil's Staircase I reached a continuous band of snow and swapped out running shoes for ski boots and booted straight up. The ascent was uneventful save for one close call with a falling rock the size of a small canteloupe. About 2:15 after having left the car I was on the summit rim, I took my time wandering around admiring the wildly rimed up snow surface and spying a few ski lines for the next time I come back when conditions are a little better...

The crater

More summit crater

Rime in all shapes and forms on the upper slopes

 The skiing was teeth chatteringly firm on the upper slopes and dissuaded me from vague plans I had for doing a few laps. Instead I went to Turangi for a meat pie. It was good to have finally made it up this iconic peak and scoped a few lines which I look forward to skiing in the next few months.

Post ski: snus in lip, and hiking towards a meat pie.

Mt Ruapehu- redefining variable conditions

I've been in NZ for a month now, and whilst I've enjoyed a handful of ski tours, stormy weather and marginal skiing conditions have dictated a focus on trail running. A good thing, because while the skiing potential of this place remains to be seen, the trail running possibilities are world class and easy to access. I've been squeezing in 80-100 km per week since I arrived here and have never enjoyed it so much. Plans are beginning to form in my mind for a trail running tour of the south island's iconic tramping tracks when the season winds up in October.

Today however, I headed out with Jimmy for a quick ski in the Wairere drainage on the volcano's north. The weather, views and company were great, which compensated for some of the more character building snow types that we found ourselves skiing on. There was the full spectrum from boiler plate and rime on high windward slopes and ridges, some sastrugi on the open faces, breakable crust in the gullies and some isothermic muck down low. Sandwiched in between all this were some pockets of corn which was a treat.

I guess this is what they mean by "firnspiegel", there's a lot of it around these parts it seems

Jimmy leading the way down the Wairere drainage with Ngauruhoe in the distance

If Ngauruhoe looks familiar its probably because you've seen Lord of the Rings (apparently its was Mt Doom's double)

Back over Pinnacle Ridge

... and a final skin up to Mead's Wall

Awesome terrain just waiting for a bit more snow

The more I see of the terrain the antsier I get for some more snowfall to fill lines in, it seems that gale force winds and wildly variable freezing levels are common here. In the mean time I’m getting plenty of practice with my crampon technique and am stoked on the running scenery.

Packing for NZ and some season stats

The past few weeks have been incredibly warm here in Narvik, the snow changed seemingly overnight from wind packed with pockets of powder to isothermic porridge. With no overnight freezing we kind of missed out on the corn season which is usually so stunning up here. No complaints though, it's been nice to have a brief taste of shorts weather before I head down to New Zealand and another winter. And the running trails have melted out early, so I've been out trail running a bunch- definitely one of the things I'm going to miss about Narvik in the summertime...

Packing today was a tad tricky, rationalizing the reasons why I need a selection gear for the mountains more than other things like clothes. Luckily my ski gear is mostly on the light side so I'm able to squeeze a little more of it in. In the end I decided to schlepp along all this stuff:

I'll be bringing as many pairs of skis to NZ as I will shirts...

I was looking through my training log for the past winter and compiled a few statistics.

• Total amount of vert I climbed: 107 000 metres (December through February I was getting 25-30000 per month, but with so much work in March and April I dropped down to less that 10 000 metres just when the touring was at its best...)
• This makes for a weekly average of about 4500 metres from early December to early May.
• Total summits: 101 (of which about 50 were laps on Linken, and another dozen were Tredjetoppen)

Partisan GT video

This little video was mostly recorded with a the shitty, little, cheap camera I bought years ago. In addition I was more concerned with having a good time skiing than with getting good camera angles or even holding the camera steady...

On the plus side the song which plays in the background is stellar.
 
Partisan GT from Kaj Sønnichsen on Vimeo.

Partisan GT

 After years of speculating about a ski tour which started in Narvik and finished over the border in the Swedish ski resort of Riksgränsen, yesterday Micke and I finally set out to give it a shot.

We met at 7am and skinned up the frozen pistes at Narvikfjellet, on the way up to Tredjetoppen we were joined by Einar and Trond who were out for an early morning lap. Afer saying goodbye to them at the summit cairn we took off down the wind buffed snow around the cliffs at 1000 metres. From here a short skin brought us up to the pass before Moskočohkka (Jøden) and the first real ski descent of the day down to Forsnesvatn. After some consideration we had decided not to follow the typical ridge traverse over to Beisfjordtøtta, opting instead to get some more vertical into the day and save time which all the ropework on the ridge would require. On the descent to Forsnesvatn we found conditions were surprisingly good with some pockets of soft wind drifted snow up high and corn down low.

Terrific late season pow down to Forsnesvatn

From the lake we skinned up to the ridge again, having neatly bypassed the multiple rappels on Moskočohkka and had some great skiing in the process. We continued skinning up the ridge until a few steeper passages on wind hammered snow made us swap over to bootpacking to the summit of Beisfjordtøtta.

After a quick sandwich we made some steep turns down to the couloir which leads to Isvatnet- the skiing was tremendous and with expansive views all the way over to the Swedish peaks the stoke level for our project was through the roof.

Micke about to descned into some swirling mist just below Beisfjordtøtta

Looking back at the Isvatn couloir on Beisfjordtøtta.

From here we had a relatively flat stretch of transport skating to get across the valley towards Blåisen, thankfully a nice firm suncrust made for fast conditions. After a quick stop to change into some dry socks we skinned up the mellow west ridge of Blåisen.

Looking back towards Narvik from Blåisen's summit plateau.

 Another local classic ski descent lay in store next: Timeglasset (or the "Hourglass"), and a short skin to get us onto a NE'erly aspect and our descent to Sildvikvannet.

Micke ripping timeglasset only 2.5 hours after doing the same with Beisfjordtøtta on the horizon

Amazingly, with the time approaching 2pm the snow was still supportable and fast for our skin up Sildviktind. We opted to not visit the summit because doing so would only have meant backtracking down the ridge again, and in our eyes this summit was superfluous to the traverse.

The line we skied from point 1175m on Sildviktind turned out to be one of the big surprises of the outing in terms of decent skiing. I'd never really examined this face before and was delighted to find sustained skiing in the low 40's.

Our ski line down from point 1175m on Sildviktind

Some more skating and mellow corn cruising brought us over to the base of Hunddalen, the snow was getting rotten in places, but it was easy to find a snowbridge to cross the creek before starting our final ascent up to Nordalsfjellet.

After topping out on Nordalsfjell we skied Branten to get to the ski resort boundaries and finished the day with more frozen grommers down to the base of the resort where we enjoyed a beer before hopping on the train back to Narvik.

A few rough stats and splits from our trip:

Vertical: 4600 metres

Distance: 40-45 kilometres

Tredjetoppen: 1:30
Beisfjordtøtta: 3:30
Blåisen: 6:00
Point 1175m on Sildviktind: 7:20
Nordalsfjell: 9:00
Riksgränsen: 9:30