The Five Mile High Club

Fresh from 8000m ski descent of Manaslu in Nepal, legendary Everest climber Kenton Cool is still buzzing from the trip. Arabella Mileham caught up with him at the Ski Show at Olympia to find out how it went.

When you've summited the world's highest mountain as many times as Kenton Cool has, there's the slight chance of getting Everest fatigue, at least for a short while. With some of the toughest technical terrain firmly under his belt, alpine climber and adventurer Kenton Cool set himself a different challenge this year. Only four months after sitting on the top of the world for a jaw-dropping eighth time, he strapped a pair of touring skis to his rucksack, slung on his crampons and skied from the 8,163 metre peak of Manaslu in central Nepal, the eighth highest mountain on earth.

Kenton is now the only Brit with two 8,000m peak ski descents to his name, having shushed down Cho Oyo on a solo ski four years ago. So what prompted him to join this incredibly niche club?

"I love mountain adventure and the ski descent added that extra element", he explains over a coffee, although sheepishly admitting to healthy competition with business partner, Guy Willets, with whom he runs Dream Guides in Chamonix. During the winter the pair can be found creating private ski tours in the Mont Blanc Massif, while the summer sees them head off for the Alpine and Himalayan climbing season.

For someone who spends the majority of his career helping others push themselves to realise their dream, he confesses that it is good to have the chance to pursue his own every now and then.


Manaslu - one of the less well-known Himalayan mountain that sits in the Mansiri Himal, in the west of Nepal's central region - is only really on the radar for climbers keen to get some practice before attempting Everest. The unusually high level of snowfall for the region and pyramid shape of the mountain lends itself to a ski descent, however with blasts of 80mph winds regularly scouring the mountain, any pockets of powder are quickly demolished, making for a less than comfortable few runs.

Although Nepal was moving out of monsoon season when Kenton and the team arrived, the weather was still pretty abominable, both during the trek into basecamp and while waiting for the all important weather window.

"We were hit by a particularly bad year – the team was really challenged, we lost tents and had to dig the ropes out. If it has been Europe, it would have been fantastic powder, but the snow was blasted. Even on summit day there was howling wind and it was all in the balance all day long."

After a gruelling night at camp 4, the wind dropped and, heavily laden with rucksacks, touring skis and pole, they were able to make the six hour climb to the summit.  Then it was time to click into their bindings and rip down the mountain. “The initial gully from the top was quite good snow and we both made some good turns down it. As the mountain expanded out the wind crust appeared and linking turns became almost impossible. We slowly and steadily picked out way down to camp 4.”

He makes it sound so easy - but what is skiing at 8,000 metres really  like?

"Sodding hard work" according to Kenton. "Your legs and muscles are burning and your muscles screaming for oxygen. The fatigue, the heavy rucksack – it's a lot harder than walking down. You are very aware all the time and trying to scope the best lines and see where the dangers might be. We skied as much as we could – all that was ski-able, really and occasionally we managed some linked turns – but it's adventure skiing, not powder heaven."

Oxygen but no powder

"Climbing Everest is probably 85% mental strength and only 15% physical – and I think Manaslu was the same. Mentally I really had to build up to it – a lot of people didn't want me to do it, " he explained. "Obviously I’m a ski guide - but I’m a climber who became a skier, not a skier who became a climber."

Although proud of his earlier ski descent of Cho Oyo, this was the more enjoyable trip. "It was stressful skiing on my own - really tough. When I got down I was mentally exhausted. But on Manaslu, I came down re-energised. It was great to have a partner to share the ski adventure with – and I’m still buzzing. It was a brilliant trip".

He explains that every now and then, something happens in life that makes you think, 'that's how it ought to be'. "This was one of those rare times".

"Skiing for many people is a week in Val, a few piste runs, a nice lunch and a few more pistes then après in the bar," he says thoughtfully, adding that while there's nothing wrong with that, skiing is a far bigger sport and ought to be embraced. "There's freestyle, touring, cross–country - why not branch out and see what's there?"

With so much infectious enthusiasm for the mountains and pushing himself further, Kenton is already planning to complete his trilogy with another epic 8,000m ski next year – this time from the top of Shishapangma, over the border in Tibet.

Somehow, when he says he's not a strong skier, it’s very hard to believe him.

photos copyright Kenton Cool. This article was published on welove2ski, October 2010.

Blissfully soft 'n' fluffy snow

Fantastic day today with some of the best skiing in ages - which is just as well as I fly home tomorrow. (Sigh!)

 

When I moseyed back from the Pub Mont Fort last night, it was one of those lovely crispy clear nights where all the mountains were lit up by starlight and gleaming atmospherically through the darkness. So I wasn’t really expecting there to be lots of fresh snow up the mountain this morning. Unfortunately I didn’t quite get first lifts (damn both beer and packing!) but it was still fabulously soft and fluffy underfoot when I did.

Perhaps I should have had a proper plan of where to ski on such glorious snow, but there were lightly shifting clouds screening the blue, so it seemed best to follow the densest patches, where the cloud appeared the whispiest.

Warming up with some lovely off-piste around Lac de Vaux, I whipped through the pow and then headed up Mont Fort, where the only patch of blue sky was lingering. The snow was deliciously soft, probably the best I've seen it in ages, but unfortunately the cloud started to creep over and soon the peak disappeared into glittering mists so I started chasing patches of blue, down Tortin and over towards Siviez and Nendaz.

As usual the Combatzeline was rather cruddy and juddery by late afternoon and the least said about the Medran the better, but otherwise a fab day. It's been slightly weird coming out again as a seasonnaire, but also a lot of fun. So until next time, Verbier, farewell.

Savoleyres and seasonnaires

Arabella Mileham, reports on the snow conditions in Verbier
- February 23, 2010

Great day skiing over in Savoleyres today. It’d snowed overnight and although it was still pretty cloudy in resort, the cloud was definitely the thickest over the Medran, so I headed out in the opposite direction. Despite expecting another white-out, I was really glad that I did. The snow conditions were lovely – lots of fluffy goodness with some patched of powder to be found here and there. Although it was making a half-hearted attempt at snowing, some weak sunshine managed to get through and even when the snow became proper flurries in the afternoon, the visibility remained good. However it is beginning to feel like Spring– riding up the cranking chair-lift from Tzoumaz, I could hear birds singing, although the tell-tale Spring sound of running water luckily still hasn’t made it.

Over the last few days, I’ve been concentrating on improving my technique – having become horribly lazy in recent trips and indulged my desire to rip up the miles. When you only have a few short days as opposed to five long months in resort, it’s easy to get into the habit of just doing the stuff you enjoy rather than being a tad more disciplined. So it was lots of short, stabby turns and heavy mogul-busting, which has been crying out for improvement for a while.

Most of the off-piste was already fairly tracked out, but there was still a little of the fresh stuff off the shoulder of the Verbier-facing south side of the mountain and a great little gully hidden between the main wide pistes. I finished up skiing through the trees under the lift, heading towards Tzoumaz, which was fine, until I found a steady trickle of people walking uphill towards me.

Now I don’t mind hiking anywhere when there’s the promise of a glorious powder field at the end of the hike, but I when you have to drag yourself up to a chair-lift because Televerbier can’t get the Tzoumaz bubble going and don’t warn you in advance, it’s a slightly different matter. I think people were stuck on it for a while. It’s a shame there were no ice-hockey playing monks on the small rink below the bubble this week, robes flying in the wind – the slightly random sight that greeted me last time I was over in Savoleyres.

Right now, a seasonnaire party is about to break out in staff accommodation, so perhaps I’d better remove my laptop to a safer place. One of the chefs is returning home tomorrow with a bust shoulder so it looks like it’ll be an interesting night. Things are kicking off with Jaeger-bombs followed by the promise of champagne. Considering there aren’t any glasses (and even the jam jars have run out), it’s proving slightly difficult to coordinate – the preferred method seems to be swigging from the bottle first and then the can of red bull, followed by vigorous head-shaking to mix the two together… Classy!!

Skiing through coffee icing

Arabella Mileham reports on the snow conditions in Verbier - February 22, 2010
Now that the English half-term is over, suddenly life is a lot more relaxed. The slopes are still busy but the queues are nothing like as bad. The temperature has been yo-yoing all week – one minute you’re skiing through fresh snow, the next it’s more like caster sugar and by the time you get to the bottom of the Medran, you are almost surfing through the top of a coffee cake. The rise is temperature on Thursday last week meant that the slopes became pretty melty in places and as soon as the temp dropped again, froze over forming hard-packed ice. There are also some patches of mud and even a few blades of grass poking through, especially on the final run home –the top of Carrefour is getting particularly carved away as everyone takes the same route home. I bumped into Roddy, one of welove2ski's Verbier snow bloggers yesterday though, who assured me that there is still powder to be found - Vallon D’Arbi is apparently particularly lovely at the moment.
Despite the meltiness though, I still managed a great ski today with my new ski-buddies. As everyone was a little hung-over, we took it fairly easily. Somehow I ended up skiing switch most of the way down to Ruinette, slightly unintentionally... hmm, still not quite sure how that happened…
One piece of good news though - staff accommodation finally got a once over this morning. The person with the lowest tolerance to squalor (which wasn’t me for a change!) finally snapped and after a whirlwind of chucking out dead cake and stale bread, retrieving mugs from underneath the sofa (I wish I was kidding!) and transferring the piles of manky crockery from the sink to the dishwasher, a semblance of civilisation has been restored. I give it until Wednesday before it needs doing again…
Right, I’m off to the Croc Bar with the others to chill with a mojito and some über-kitsch, smoky euro-lounge tunes...

The foodie blog...

Food-wise, the week’s actually gone pretty well. Considering I was out here to replace a chef and therefore guest expectations were extremely high, it really could have been a lot worse. Freed from the tyranny of a set menu and with flagrant disregard for the budget, it's been quite a lot of fun to experiment again and push out all the stops.

As I arrived in resort a few days ahead of my guests, it was helpful to spend the first few evenings as a sous-chef with a couple of the 5* chalet chefs, getting inspiration and derusting myself generally. Once again, I was back in regulation polo shirt and appointed to Ski Armadillo’s flagship chalet, Le Marais-Rouge, ostensibly to help chef Jake McWilliams prepare dinner - although I'm sure the help that was required was only to humour me.

As it was Chinese New Year’s Eve, Jake had decided to welcome in the Year of the Tiger with an eight course tasting menu, starting with a delicate celeriac soup with a hint of truffle oil, moving onto a smoked trout and fennel salad, with poached quails' eggs and hollandaise sauce. Next came creamy scallops with asparagus and a pea foam, followed by the 'main' course, flash fried sea bream with new potatoes. Finally, it all came to a close with a massive fruit platter, a traditional Chinese New Year dish to bring good luck and prosperity.

The following day I was with chef Helena at Chalet Katarina (a chalet I can't help having a sneaking fondness for, having written an article about it), where Helena, despite suffering from a busted shoulder, produced an array of canapes, including cool gazpacho shots, sizzling chilli prawns and piping hot spoons of revueltos (spicy Spanish-style scrambled eggs), followed by perfectly cooked steak with rosti potatoes, and tarte aux citron.

So, the following night, having added a dash of cheffy inspiration to add to my own collection of tried and tested recipes, reacquantined myself with what you can (and can’t) get in the local Coop, ordered the meat from the butcher and stowed the provisions away in my new kitchen in Plein Cie, I was ready to face my guests.

With six adults (one of whom was a veggie) and six kids to cater for, as well as a couple of pretty impromptu cocktail parties thrown in for good measure, there's been a lot to do. However, probably the most challenging bit was writing the shopping list  - how many eggs do 12 people go through in a week again? I'm sure I used to know these kinds of things, but I've no idea off the top of my head now!

Catering for kids in the chalet is usually pretty easy – lots of nursery favourites, but made that little bit more interesting. As well as the perennial favourites of cottage pie and my crispy chicken nuggets (bite-sized pieces of chicken breast coated in crunched-up ready-salted crisps and then oven baked), I gave them fish goujons with a spiced flour coating and'tatoe wedges, chicken and veggie kebabs and easy-peasy homemade pizzas.

Go, go power rangers!

Ah, I'd forgotten the other side of life as a seasonnaire! Last night I found myself dressed as a power ranger and dancing on a bar with a whole lot of ski bums in drag (you don't want to mess with these people - they're the only ones out here who can put on a pair of snow chains in a whiteout, a vastly under-rated skill). This came after an entire afternoon spent in the T-bar with my laptop subbing copy from the Olympics in Whistler and writing about the quality of the snow here, shortly before dashing off to fashion an outfit out of tin foil and cardboard... Oh, and somewhere in the middle, I cooked a four course meal for my guests and all their offspring...

Am confused – I thought I trained to be journalist?  Does this really count?

Tin foil and sticky back plastic

Arabella Mileham gears up for the Mardi Gras celebrations in Verbier - February 16, 2010

Now that Valentine’s day is over and we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief that enforced romanticism is over for another year, the main question on everyone’s lips in Verbier is what to wear for Mardi Gras. I feel a little sheepish for completely forgetting to pack a half-decent fancy dress outfit so I’ve got about an hour to either cobble something together fashioned out of tinfoil and sticky-back plastic (actually, I don’t think you can get the latter in resort) or be a party-pooper and make a stand for personal dignity. As I’m feeling totally uninspired at the moment and the only think I want to make is a chocolat chaud, it may end up being the latter.

There are some aspects of seasonnaire life that I had conveniently forgotten in the years since I was last working out here - much as women reputedly forget the pain of labour shortly after giving birth. My hands are already as dry as a bone despite the wonders of Elizabeth Arden’s 8 hours cream and I’m not sure if it’s heartening or slightly worrying that I remember my way around the Coop with unerring accuracy.

However the weirdest thing is being back in staff accommodation. It’s a return to eating bread and brownies during the daytime, the kettle fusing every time you want a cup of tea, and the usual seasonal deprivations of no mugs, milk, loo paper or light bulbs because no-one has remembered to bring any back... I don't really do squalor - well, I guess I do now! It seems that the state of staff chalets in the Alps is inversely proportional to the spotless-ness of guests’ chalet – my guess is that chalet staff use up all their cleaning prowess in one the blast in the morning and cannot muster enough for another 24 hours? However, my housemates for the week are a great bunch and it’s lovely to catch up with loads of people I was out here with several years ago.

As staff accommodation is clearly not the most propitious place to work in, I have found myself a great new ‘office’ to operate from. Le Rouge, a bar/ restaurant at the end of the piste by Brunet bus stop, opened at the end of last season and does a fine line of relaxed chilling, with loads of sheepskin rugs and a good vibe. Last night, I came with a few of the Armadillos and had a game of giant backgammon and a quiet pint, which made a change from the rigors of an evening in the Pub Mont Fort or après in the Farinet.

However, having sat outside on the terrace for the best part of two hours, the DJ pumping behind me, my tiny hands are too frozen to continue typing and I think my laptop battery is about to give up the ghost. I guess I had better start thinking about that costume again…



Click here for welove2ski's Verbier resort report.

The Ghost of chalet girls past…

Arabella Mileham dons her marigolds to revisit life as a seasonnaire and report on the snow conditions in Verbier - February 13, 2010

I’ve definitely just stepped back in time. Half-term week was looming fast when I answered a plea to come out to Verbier for a week to fill in for a chef who’s had to return to the UK (it’s that time of the season when chalet staff are like in high demand as half of them have falled ill or fallen over) So I find myself back in rubber gloves, oven-timer in one hand, laptop in the other and acting as a chef for 12 guests, while trying to snatch the odd hour to sub-edit the latest snow blogs for welove2ski and check out the conditions on the slopes. (Hey, although this is a working holiday, someone’s got to do it!).

Unfortunately I seem to have just missed a fresh patch of powder that fell on the 4 vallées at the end of last week – Bruson in particular has been awesome (or so I’m told) and should be the best place to head to at the end of next week, when another dump is expected. However, it was lightly snowing when I first arrived (Thursday afternoon) and the temperatures have been around minus 10, so the conditions have remained pretty good, although increasingly tracked out and mogully in the afternoon.

Friday was a bluebird day but bitterly cold and punctuated with a fair amount of glittery mist - it looks lovely but pretty much hits you in the face on chair-lifts, freezing your nose before heading towards your fingers and toes. Before I got just too damn chilly to even breathe, I had a great couple of hours warming up, starting over by Lac de Vaux, Atelas and then Ruinettes, skiing all around La Chaux for a while, before heading up to the base of Mont Fort (though I thought it wise to err on the cautious side so early on in the week and therefore had to wuss out of the mogul field in front of me, as inviting as it looked.).

The queues weren’t too big, but next week will be mega-busy as the half-term hoards descend. Bearing that in mind, I skied over at Savoleyres on Saturday in an attempt to avoid the crowds. The slopes didn’t seem too packed but there was the odd wait at the chair-lifts, which is quite unusual over there. I didn’t manage to find any powder but kept to the pistes, which were pretty fast, with good snow but a few patches of ice in places. After playing on the south facing slopes, I blasted down to Tzoumaz, eventually skiing back to Verbier via Carrefour as the valley was shrouded in mist.

Ah, there are some views you just don’t tire of…

Click here for welove2ski's Verbier resort report.

The art of skiing

Arabella Mileham reviews the Christie's vintage ski poster auction. 

The annual ski sale at Christie’s South Kensington yesterday was a steady, if lacklustre affair. Perhaps it was just bad luck, being the thirteen annual auction of vintage ski posters, but whereas previous sale have seen bidders scrambling for the top lots, this year’s sale totalled just under the £500k mark, with only 70 per cent sold by lot. That's nearly £300k less than the total sale made at the sale's height in 2008.

Traditional favourites proved to be the safest bet, with rarity again realising the highest prices. The top lot of the day was an anonymous 1913 poster of Gstaad's Royal Hotel & Winter Palace (£22,000 including buyers premium), while the visually arresting cover lot, a 1931 poster of Zermatt by Pierre Kramer, came in at £15,000. The stark graphics showing a shadowy ski-jumper set against the Matterhorn had elicited to a lot of interest on the phones. 

 © Christie’s Images Limited 2009

Elsewhere, Emil Cardinaux's domination seemed to have slipped a little to make way for Olympic fever. Two of the top five portrayed the Olympic rings - Gordon Witold's 1932 Lake Placid poster and the 1928 poster by Hugo Laubi, II Olympische Winterspiele at St Mortiz - although ironically, both posters hark from an era before downhill skiing was included as an Olympic sport. 

Since its inception in 1997, the Christie’s Ski Sale has enjoyed steady growth year-on-year with prices far exceeding estimates on some of the top lots. An anonymous 1925 poster of Wengen was the favourite two years in a row, increasing from £16,800 in 2006 to £22,800 only a year later. The most staggering result however came in 2008, when an anonymous Russian poster of 1952, originally estimated at £600 - £800, became a tug-of-war between two bidders and achieved a new record of £36,500.

However, it seems that prices have returned to a more sustainable level and estimates have been very firmly ‘recalibrated’ this year. With the Russian market talking a palpable hit at the onset of the recession, the presale estimate on the same image was a meagre £1,500 - £2,000 which actually proved a little on the generous side. Despite such a gloomy prognosis though, the middle market remained fairly steady and it is still possible to pick up a bargain.

Christie's Olympic fundraiser

With the Winter Olympics only weeks away, a charity auction held at Christie’s South Kensington last night helped raise £18,000 towards Team GB’s costs in Whistler. Organised by Snowsport GB and ASK4 Events, the evening was to highlight the work put in by our Olympic Squad as well as to raise funds to support their training and costs. Members of the Olympic teams past and present mingled with snowsport enthusiasts and art aficionados against a backdrop of fabulous vintage ski posters, which will be auctioned next week in the annual Christie's Ski Sale.

There's no denying that Team GB would benefit hugely from an injection of cash, after a summer of financial turmoil for its governing body, Snowsport GB. So with great gusto, Hugh Edmeads, Christie’s Head of International Auctioneering, set about whipping up bids from the assembled throng. However, the party atmosphere seemed to get a tad uncontained and there was furious shushing from strategically placed Christie’s staff at the back of the room.

There are now less than three weeks to go before the Winter Olympics start in Vancouver and the athletes are firmly concentrating on those few moments that will determine whether they earn their place on the podium.

Huskies and canyons

Arabella Mileham recovers her aching muscles with a spot of canyoning in the Leutasch Valley - January 13, 2010

Oh, I can also definitely feel muscles that I was not aware of before today! Stupidly, I wasn’t quick enough of the mark when we arrived and failed to book a massage - a quick swim and a sauna had to suffice for my aching limbs before dinner in Seefeld. After wandering through the picturesque centre of the little town, snow softly falling all around, we came to the Krachelemoos, a fab restaurant tucked away in a corner side street. This originally started life as two farmhouses several hundred miles apart, but they were carefully demolished and rebuilt in the centre of Seefeld. As well as the atmospheric decor, the food itself was absolutely fantastic – a particularly mouthwatering shashlik of pork on creamed Savoy cabbage with a traditional slice of surprisingly light Tirolean dumpling. The description barely does it justice - I haven't had anything so beautifully cooked for ages - but this was followed by apfelstudel with a cinnamon and toffee ice-cream and the now obligatory schnapps.

After the strenuous activity of yesterday, today’s plan of snow shoeing and dog-sledding with www.tirolalpin.at Tirol Alpin sounded a lot more chilled. However, I hadn’t reckoned on being leashed to Maggie, the most inconsistent and noisy husky on the planet. She didn’t get off to a brilliant start by lying down in the snow to have her tummy scratched and it soon became clear that she just wanted attention - running up the hill with me lumbering after in my unwieldy snow shoes only to stop dead and wait for me, just as the gradient increased. After the first hill, she was relegated to the sled and I was attached to a rather less high-maintenance dog to enjoy the walk through the walk. Tramping through the trees in the woods behind Kirchplatz was lovely – so rarely do you get to wander quietly and just enjoy the scenery rather than whizzing past it. However our destination was a gorge further up in the forest for a spot of canyoning.


Now, I have to admit that I’m a bit of a wuss when it comes to throwing myself off cliffs. I probably shouldn’t be as I spend half of my childhood clambering over rocks, climbing trees and swinging across the garden on ropes, but I generally prefer to hold on wherever possible! The zip-wire across the gorge was great fun but I was distinctly less keen on the 40m abseil when we got to the other side. But a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. So with jelly legs and a white face, I braved it for the descent. There was quite a large over-hang so I ran out of cliff to walk down after 15m or so and it was with undignified relief that I reached terra firma and was able to clip myself onto the ropes strung across the rocks.
As it was pretty nippy so we didn’t explore the canyon for very long and emerged at the top to a picnic, complete with tea mit rum and a rather good schapps. (It seems that anytime is schnapps time in Tirol!) After racing home through the trees on the dog sleds, there was time for a quick coffee before collecting our stuff for our final cross-country trail.

We’d already pumped Steve, the Headwater rep, for information about where to go, so armed with maps and cross-country skis and with the light slightly fading, we were dropped off at Moos for our 5km langlauf home. Our route took us along the floor of the valley with views over the Wetterstein to our left. After a great deal of faffing getting into our skis, we made quite good time and became so mesmerized concentrating on the tramlines in front of us that we only stopped for a quick hot chocolate when we were in sight of Kirchplatz - about 5 mins from home. Perhaps it wasn’t such a good move as sitting down made my newly discovered muscles start to seize up and it was with great difficulty (and not a little swearing) that I clipped my skis back on for the final 200 yards towards home.

I think next time I go cross-country skiing, I might spend a little bit longer preparing my pretty pathetic leg muscles. The Vikings who allegedly invented this great sport were probably a darn sight hardier than I am!
First published on welove2ski.com

Bambi on skilaufs

Arabella Mileham tries her hand (as well as her arms and legs) at a spot of cross-country skiing in Leutasch in the Austrian Tirol - January 12, 2010

Tucked in a corner of Olympiaregion Seefeld, 25km northwest of Innsbruck, the Leutasch valley and neighbouring Seefeld is a mecca for cross-country skiing. I headed out for a few days with some seasoned ski journalists, eschewing my normal downhill in favour of this ancient, Nordic sport.

Innsbruck was unusually snowy when we landed and the white stuff was still falling as we arrived at the Sporthotel Xander, in Kirchplatz after the shortest possible transfer– a smooth and painless 45 minutes after touching down. It had been very peculiar flying over a snowy Britain on an almost empty Easyjet flight (an unheard of combination) en route to the Tirol so this made it a hat-trick of unusual proportions.


Although we were primarily here for the cross-county, a visit to the Alps wouldn’t be complete without a little downhill, so Tuesday morning saw us up, bright and early, making out way down the road to Rosshütte, to check out the local slopes at Seefeld. It's only a ten minute ride by car down the valley, so pretty painless. After all the snow the night before, it was beautiful groomed corduroy all the way, with some great powder to the sides of the pistes.

I probably should have put my nice, fat all-mountain Salomon Tornado Extremes through a darn sight more gruelling test, but as the first run since April last year (and after a few schnapps the night before) I was very restrained on the powder-front.
It was a pretty blinking cold -9 degrees up top but gloriously sunny – my teeth were definitely the coldest part of me because I was grinning so much to be back on the slopes.

We worked our way around the slopes of Rosshütte with our knowledgeable and charming guide (the head of the Tourist Office for the region, no less) and ripped down virtually empty pistes towards queue-less chairs, only stopping for a brief and very welcome der Kakao mit ruhm at the new Rosshütte restaurant. As well as the new café and terrace, the lifts have been upgraded over the last three years to speedy six-chairs, although the Seefeld Jochbahn is still a dinky, red phonebox style, 12-person gondola. Although it’s a bit of a tight squeeze, it was worth it for the views over the spectacular Karwendel Nature Park to the northeast and Wetterstein mountains, as well as the only black run of the area.

Looking towards the Karwendel national park

Over the other side of the valley at Hamelekopf, we could see some interesting lines off-piste down a jaggedy couloir, but apparently the off-piste can be unpredictable and it is not readily encouraged. However, the top of the route yielded some beautiful, ungroomed powder, on the way to lunch at the Reitherjoch Alm. We rounded off the feast with a massive shared skillet of ‘Kaiserschmarrn’ – a whopping Tirolean caramelised fluffy pancake, liberally soused with icing sugar and served with apple puree. A main course in its own right, it’s completely delicious but probably highly dangerous to the waistline -a few spoonfuls each were more than enough to send us pelting through the trees, to the alarm of the locals walking up, and down the final run towards town.
A quick scoot across town and a boot swap later, we were kitted out and ready for our first foray into langlaufing. There are two styles of cross-country, classic and skating, and we were going for the former, apparently the most efficient way to move across a flat area of snow - although maybe not the way I was doing it! The Cross Country Academy in Seefeld is situated by the Seekirchl and Olympicabad, by the entrance of one of the many cross country trail and run by former Olympic medallist, Martin Tauber. The upside of this is great tuition but the downside is that they make it looks so damn easy while you’re slipping Bambi-like across the frozen plains.

Bambi on skilaufs – how the hell do you stay upright?

Although the boots are a lot comfier than their Alpine counterparts, I felt horribly precarious perched on top of my ridiculously thin skis. Settling into tramlines cut in the snow of the trail made it a lot easier to keep boot, knee, and nose in line while walking in arabesque. However, by the time I’d worked up enough steam to light up Oxford Street, I started to get into some sort of rhythm, swinging one arm forward, the opposite leg back and slightly bouncing on the middle of my ski to prevent myself slipping backwards. (they are softly rippled on the underside which is supposed to help) This was fine, after a fashion, on the level but far less effective when faced with a slope. However, after an hour and 40 minutes, we’d done a mind-boggling 7km around the course, stopping only to look at the Olympic ski jump and check out the new biathlon range.

Star pupil or sympathy hug, you decide

Although it was a huge fun, I fear in will be agony tomorrow no matter how many hours I spend in hotel's steam room.

Arabella travelled to Austria with Headwater on the “Cross Country Skiing in Leutasch and Seefeld” holiday. Prices of start at £1,009 per person for seven nights 4* accommodation at the Hotel Xander including breakfast and dinner, ski equipment hire (skis, boots and poles) and a guided ski programme with a Headwater resident representative. With flights and transfers, prices start from £1,187 per person Gatwick to Innsbruck with Thomson Airways, or can be arranged from most UK airports.

First published by welove2ski.com