J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ir12daveor

NoHelmet wrote:Sure and why not Wirzweli, that's your Mikey Mouse ski resort if you ever are looking for one. http://www.wirzweli.ch/

Warm... but that valley has a lot of stuff, especially if you are willing to skin or hike a little bit!

The only reason I went to Engelberg was to do a course. Otherwise I'd usually only go there during the week if there had been a fresh snowfall!

Finding empty pistes (or even untracked pow) on the 26th Dec. It's easy avoid the resorts that you have every heard mentioned anywhere. Usually there are smaller areas but still large enough for a day trip nestled somewhere in between, usually not on the snow'n'rail list!

Look for the places only locals go to or the places that have more then one or two access points to the mountains. There is a very good reason that some of the places are not mentioned on the web too much but others are hidden in plain view.

NoHelmet wrote:Hi,
The road toll is yearly and it cost CHF 40.- to use the highways. All the resorts on a Sunday in good weather will be full and you might just as well not go.

This is not strictly true! The well known resorts will be chocka and not worth going to, but there are still hundreds of alternatives where there are less or no crowds!

I've skied a bluebird day on the 26th of Dec which is statistically one of the very busiest days in the resorts and never qued at a lift and most of the time when sitting on the left we were getting views of empty pistes!

Engelberg is not a well connected resort for Piste skiing. It's great for freeriding but its very disjointed. Also if it's busy you spend the most of your day in lines. Even yesterday it took us way over an hour to get from the valley to the top and that was a bad weather day before the season has begun properly!

Seems like the powers that be have no idea what a winter tyre is!

Dave Mac wrote:What I read is that they are at least trying. It is tempting to test the wording by offering sets of circumstances. So I'm going to! )
In relation to item 1 ~ what if you are experienced, but only go slightly off-piste?
And item 2 ~ In Lech, last year, I lead a group, (only in the sense that I went first, I was the most experienced, and that they blindly trusted and followed me), where we joined the zigs to the zags, and then the zags to the zigs ~ all the way down a red run. The only time we were on the run was to cross the piste. 95% was off piste. We were in full sight of the whole valley, and easily reachable by the first aid ackier. Risk wise, I might suggest we were safer than being on-piste.
I would be wary of skiing down Av Risk level 3, where the slope was south-facing ~ not an aspect that I have seen mentioned.
I am concrned that the insurance companies hook up so much on avalanches. My experiences of dead bodies in my local resort, have been 2 dead on piste, both heart attacks, and 3 dead off-piste, all impact fatalities. (with trees)

bandit wrote:

Dave Mac, as the most experienced person in your crowd, you would likely have been held liable for the actions of your friends, especially as you took decisions and led from the front AIUI.

The Underwriter mentioned above is suggesting that we be experienced off piste, and know a particular resort very well, we are not talking about pistes here. Would you have met that criteria in Lech?

I differ in my view about the safety aspect of a south facing slope in L3. I think a north facing slope would be much more risky because the layers of snow will be less bonded without the sun melting the top layers regularly (notwithstanding any other local issues like warm ground).

I believe that Underwriters are focusing on avalanches because of the increased costs of search and rescue in those circumstances. From your example, tree impact, straightforward and inexpensive recovery. On piste heart attacks, again inexpensive when compared to helicopters, dog teams, lines of searchers with probes....

Of course my views are those of an amateur "muggles" as J2skiers were recently labelled, and should be viewed as such.

In Switzerland (at least in the German speaking Kantons) there is a movement to try to hold the most experienced group member responsible in the event of an avalanche accident. I'm not sure if this also applies in Austria.

While most resorts do some avalanche control on off piste areas directly accessible from lifts you can't assume it is always done. Last weekend when skiing in Lenzerheide I witnessed 5 snall to medium sized slabs that had been skier triggered. Some of them on slopes less then 35deg the majority of them within metres of the piste! All of them were associated with windloading but not necessarily on the areas the avalanche bulletin said to look out for. The Avalanche risk was 2! Moral of the story is don't just assume something next to the piste is safe.

As for the south facing slope being more/less dangerous. Surely you've got to take the time of year into account. In deep winter North facing slopes tend to be more dangerous for the reasons that Bandit mentioned. In spring the risk for wet snow avalanches on south facing slopes increases dramatically. What you really should be looking out for is the slope exposures specifically mentioned in the avalanche bulletin too.

You didn't say if you are driving or using public transport. If you are on the train you'll end up going through Zurich for most places which means you'll have about an hour tagged onto most of the resorts.

Toggenburg is about 2.5 hours from you by public transport (not going through Zurich).

The other easiest places to get to would be Pizol, Flims/Laax (expensive and over rated), Flumserberg (but avoid at all costs on a busy day)

If you are driving then the world is your Oyster. With the new Uetliberg Tunnel you can be in Central Switzerland in almost no time and much quicker towards Graubunden too. That means the majority of the resorts accessible from Zurich are within reach.

Probably my favourite for diversity of runs, and the least time spend in ques is Lenzerheide. It's a little over two hours drive from you, but it has 8 access points to the mountain so there is much less queing at the bottom then somewhere like Flims/Laax which only has two, the lifts are fast and if you have a halb-tax card the self service restaurants give you half price food.

It's very hard to give you advice on the best place for you. There are literally hundreds of resorts within about 2 hours drive of Zurich and they all have a bit of their own character. Some like Flumserberg which are particularly easy to access get way too crowded and in my opinion dangerous on busy days so are best avoided.

Places to try:
Elm
Lenzerheide
Davos
Pizol
Hoch-ybrig (better on a quiet day, but not as bad as Flumserberg)
Braunwald (maybe)

There are hundreds more, but these ones stick out particularly for a mixed group, reduced queing and relatively easy access from Zurich.

I see you moved from Waterford Ireland. I'm a paddy too. Been living here full time for 6 years now and a regular visitor for 10.

Are you sure the issue is with the tyres? Here on the continent most people have a second set of wheels for a winter tyre and the wheel have to conform to the manufacturers list as if they don't the different wheels are counted as a modification. From the insurers point of view it's the other way around. In Switzerland the insurer can decide not to cover you if you DON'T have winter tyres on!

Don't worry there is plenty of natural snow and they've been running the snow machines for the last few weeks.

It's still very early in the season. They will open up the rest of the resort over the next few weekends. I know someone that was riding there on Saturday and there was enough snow to ride right down.