J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ise

ellistine wrote:
My 'Hair dressers' car isn't going anywhere near an alpine pass soon so for getting unstuck in the UK they are superb. Most of the blocked roads I met in my 15 hour stuck in the snow adventure weren't actually that steep and these would have got me up them no trouble at all.

The road outside my chalet isn't steep but it's around 50/50 if someone with autosocks on gets up, quite a few Belgians try it and quite a few end up sideways blocking the road. This can be irritating for the rest of us.

Hairdresser jokes aside, I'd have thought your car wasn't too unreasonable in the snow, front wheel drive, fairly sensible size wheels and so on, the additional traction you might need at times is going to be a lot less than some other cars. Watching the holidaymakers outside it's fairly predictable who's going to have trouble, rear-wheel drive, low profile tyres and autosocks aren't going to help like a BMW for example, small, front wheel drive, small tyres, shorter wheelbase like a Polo and autosocks might just add the 5% extra traction you need.

As for them being approved on mountain roads, no they aren't, even autosock can't sugar coat that one :

autosocks.co.uk wrote:Q6: Are they approved for use on roads where snow chains are mandatory?
A6: This is a grey area. It's better to be safe than sorry, so you should take snow chains for e.g. self-drive ski holidays to the Alps. In any event the tests show that snow chains are superior in hill starts - see Research & Development.

goff wrote:We classic to with no control, ie stopping fall after fall for me and hurts on flat.Just noticed 28k opened at La Brevine a fantastic valley with endless skiing when all open,and the coldest place in Suisse.Great place all so to start is the quarry in Jougne when open, if not we go there and break tracks .
Goff

I'm a member of the Swiss Randonne Society and our journal just had an article about Brevine calling it the Siberia of Switzerland. There's quite a good traverse you can do using the bus to get in and out. I know the area somewhat, back when I worked in an office that was in Neuchatel so it's local.

Thanks for the destination advice, I should have credited you there :D

I think mostly the snow you see is the last fall, there's not much more. I think there'll be another dump mid-week. I may go there tomorrow as well, there's 36km open which is enough for a day or two.

I "classic", albeit not too well :D

Some shots from Les Fourgs, part of the Métabief area, in the French Jura. Not a well known area but nicely setup for nordic skiing. Mostly these shots are on a blue circuit around 8.0km in length and show some of the classic Jura landscape which is ideal for nordic skiing.

AllyG wrote:
Personally I need something that can go in the tumble drier, as I don't like hanging out my underwear in front of our holidaymakers.

Tumble dryers are destroying the planet :) cotton doesn't dry too well, that's really the point and why people say "cotton kills", lycra does which is why you get running gear made from it. Much better on expeditions where you're washing your stuff in a stream and drying it on the side of the tent.

AllyG wrote:
Edit - Ise, you wear lycra underpants? really? Me, I always stick to cotton :D

Ally

cotton kills :-) lycra's a good cheap material nowadays.

AllyG wrote:I expect they go down to the main towns/cities to do their shopping, since stuff is so much cheaper there.

Actually the PAM supermarket in the village does some quite reasonable lycra undershorts :lol:

frostbite wrote:Wow, all this snow & super cold weather; amazing really considering we are supposedly experiencing/suffering global warming ( or is it now 'climate change' as the warming seems to have stopped/declined for the last 10 years or more) )

The head of the IPCC commented, somewhat wryly I thought, it was going to be a tough year.

Given the epic snow in the UK you could easily think it's going to be translated to the Alpes and it's not. It's been a poor year for lower ski stations, a lot of the Jura for example, where I'm just about to be, is barely open at all. Average temperatures remain high, we are certainly getting day after day of -10'c to -20'c but we're also getting days, and nights, where even at my house at 1700m it's not below freezing.

It's this erratic weather that's made snowpack so unstable and prevented it from consolidating which could be a worrying precedent for future seasons.