Justine’s Blog

I’m back in Wales after lots of great skiing & ski touring. I experimented with filming ski touring a bit and might show some results when I get round to editing it. I am considering a ski touring DVD at some point in the future, but not for a while! There’s some paddling to be done first!

The flowers and buds are telling me it’s Spring but there was a dusting of snow on the Welsh mountains yesterday! Not enough to satisfy any withdrawl symptoms but I did put an extra jumper on! Now I need to catch up with work and I’m looking forward to some seakayaking. Barry & I will be going to the Jersey seakayaking symposium in a couple of weeks which I’m really looking forward to. We’ll be helping out during the weekend and then staying on to do some trips to the other Channel islands for the following week.

“This is Canoeing” DVD is continuing to be popular. There are quite a few reviews still coming out on the internet and in magazines. 

You can read about it in Norwegian on Qajaq.no.

There’s a Dutch review on Kanoweb.nl – I don’t understand it except the title says ‘must see’ so that can only be a good thing!

Kanu magazine in Germany published a review in the magazine and on their website – the website review can be read here in German. The latest issue of Kanu magazine also features a 4-page interview with me about all my DVDs, paddling trips and background. There are links to other reviews on this page on my website and there is due to be something about “This is Canoeing” published in sevearl other magazines including the next edition of “Canoe & Kayak” magazine

There’s also a short feature about me in the latest issue of “Canoeroots” magazine. They kindly profile me as one of their canoeists of 2010 due to my making “This is Canoeing”. Eric Simula, the Birchbark Man in “This is Canoeing” is on the cover of the magazine & the editor Scott Macgregor writes about being filmed with his 4-year old son down the Petawawa river for the film “Dougie Down the Pet”. This film is proving to be one of the most popular of the 12 films on the DVD double disc set & won best professional documentary at the National Paddling Film Festival in the US.

If you buy ‘This is Canoeing” you get a years free on-line subscription to ‘Canoeroots‘ magazine and ‘Rapid‘ magazine, although the current issues of all their magazines are free for anyone to read on-line. Just go to the websites. “Canoeroots” is here, and “Rapid” magazine is here & “Adventure Kayak” is here.

Rapid Media has also launched a new product, Rapid TV. There are 2 episodes already on-line to watch for free on the Rapid Media You Tube Channel. They are regular webisodes featuring interviews with people in the industry, gear reviews & funny film. If you’re not bored of me after all these links (!) then there’s a short interview with me talking about “This is Canoeing” in the first episode. The 2nd episode features a review of the GoPro video camera & a funny short with Kevin Callan about camping.

We had planned to do lots of ski touring in Chamonix, with the ultimate aim of skiing up – and down -Mont Blanc. The weather has had different ideas and after 3 days of sunshine, we’ve had 5 days of low cloud, rain in the valley & snow up top. Every morning, grey clouds greet us as we peel back the curtains. However, every cloud has a silver lining and we’ve been trying to make the most of the fresh powder that has been falling on the tops. The visibility has been pretty bad most days & the high lifts haven’t always been open but we’ve had some great runs down in lovely fresh snow. We also spent a day practicing crevasse rescues on a wind lip, taking it in turns to drag each other up over the lip. We have 4 days left and the weather isn’t looking great so Mont Blanc will have to wait, but I’m sure we’ll get some more good skiing in before we go home!

Firstly, I apologise to any paddlers with no interest in skiing as it’s forming a bit part of my life at the moment! I’m in Chamonix for approx 10 days of ski touring with 2 friends from Wales. We nearly broke ourselves on the first day with an epic 11 hour day… it wouldn’t have been so long if we hadn’t missed the last train back down to Chamonix and had a 2 hour walk/ ski/ walk down the railway track in our boots, carrying our skis! The ski touring before that was pretty adventurous as we skied up almost 1,000 metres us a steep gully to a col. On the other side was an even steeper gully which we abseiled down 2 rope lengths of 50 metres. In theory we could now ski down a great 45 degree slope full of lovely snow. In practice the snow was icy and hard and trying to turn down it would have been crazy. We side slipped down for what felt like ages, making only 2 turns when the snow was a bit softer. At the bottom of the never-ending gully was the bergschrund, a big crevasse which extended all the way across the glacier without a snow bridge. My nerves were frayed enough alread and I had to jump over that, with enough speed not to fall into the hole, but not so much speed that I couldn’t stop and I ended up skiing into the bergschrund further along! We had a few good turns after that, then a long almost flat ski out to the train station. Despite walking up 200metres worth of steps as quickly as we could, we missed the last train… hence our sore bodies and tired muscles the next morning. Today we had a nice day touring some cols at between 3300m and 3500m to help us acclimatise. Maybe tomorrow I’ll be less stiff!?

I don’t have much time to write much about my first proper ski touring adventure, except to say that I had a great time, and really enjoyed the mix of working hard to skin up mountains, the peace and beauty of the mountains around me, and the excitement of the ski down. There were 7 of us moving from hut to hut in Italy’s Ortler mountains.Sometimes our day involved moving from one hut to another over a col, on other occasions we stayed in 1 hut for a few days and did day tours. I enjoyed skiing up 3,692metre San Matteo and 3770m Monte Cevedale – on both occasions we climbed over 1,000 metres. I was panting very hard the first time ( partly due to the altitude and probably partly getting fit for this new type of exercise!), but by the last day I was more used to it and a bit more efficient so it didn’t seem quite such hard work. The best skiing was on other days as we climbed less high but sought out the slopes that the others thought would have the best snow. It’s great after working hard for 3 or more hours to have 1,000 metres of descent beneath you! 

The huts we stayed in were big and busy – there were more people than I’d expected, all ‘getting away from the crowds’, so sometimes it didn’t feel like you were really getting away from people at all! It’s all relative and compared to a ski resort there were far fewer people but as you set off in the mornings there could be a few dozen people heading in a similar direction – small chains of ants in a vast environment. The huts were pretty busy which was sociable at times, we got fed and didn’t  need to take sleeping bags so it made the tour very comfortable. It’s not known as the ‘cappuchino tour’ for nothing! I preferred hot chocolate and it wasn’t unusual to stop at a hut for a drink during the day and then have another drink before dinner at whichever hut we were staying in. 

I was only delayed 24 hours in getting home so I’ve been home about 5 days, catching up with work and a few friends and going seakayaking last weekend. in a couple of hours I’m off ski touring again, to France this time. It’s like busses, I’ve wanted to do this for ages and not done but now I’m going twice in a month. I’m enjoying the break from work after intense months working on “This is Canoeing” – when I get back I’ll have to decide what my next DVD will be! Not ‘this is ski touring’ just yet, but maybe at some time in the future!? 

Thanks very much to Lyon Equipment in the UK for providing me with some fantastic Julbo glasses & goggles which kept me seeing where I was going! They also import Petzl, ortlieb & Exped equipment and will be sponsoring me with some of that gear for future seakayaking trips which i’m looking forward to!

Thanks also to Mike Austin for making sure I didn’t fall into a crevasse or ski out into a high risk avalanche zone!