Current Conditions Quarter Deck Mt Aspiring 20 Dec 2012

We've had lots of enquiries about the current condition of the Quarter Deck. 

Andy Cole took these while flying out:

Simultaneous Summits !

On 12/12/12/ our guide Matt Chessor topped out on Mnt. Lendenfeld  (3194m) with Mike Hall.  A beautiful climb of one of New Zealand's highest peaks. Here is the happy couple on top with Mnt. Cook in the back ground.

While they were climbing they could watch the progress of Mount Aspiring Guide's Federico Varengo and Bett Koch as they climbed the south Ridge of Mnt. Dixon.

While these two routes are close by each other, Dixon is accessed from Mount Cook Village on the eastern side of the mountains and Lendenfeld is approached from the the western side, over 6 hrs away by road!

Racing the weather on Mnt. Cook

December 3rd Cook Ascent

Summit Rocks at sunrise.  Red sky in the morning proved to be accurate measure of the coming front.

From the top of the Summit Rocks the approaching front is clearly evident

 View from the summit! With the winds increasing it was time to get down

By now the front has clearly covered the western side of the mountains and is beginning to spill over onto the Linda Glacier Below and the Tasman Glacier in the distance

Down to the safety of the lower Linda Glacier just as the rain is starting

It is all worth it for the memories of a great summit

Pure NZ Mountaineering - Climbs Without Helicopters

Great mountaineering accessed by foot!

It's easy to forget that there are so many interesting & worthy peaks in NZ that can be  accessed on foot.  Sure, glacial recession has made the going harder, but there are still many peaks that don't require a slow and arduous battle up glacial moraine.    Moreover, many of the them can be climbed on foot in 4 days.   We have a list of just a few of them on our website.

Dan Turner, is one of our Australian clients who likes his NZ mountaineering to be more on the "natural" side.   An avid amateur film maker he has generously made a neat little clip of last years ascent of Mt Brewster 2515m with IFMGA Guide - Stefan Sporli.  It's great footage!  

This years mission was Nun's Veil 2700m in the Mt Cook Climbing Region.  We'll leave Dan's next video to tell that story.

Enjoy. 

Mount Aspiring IS ON

Guide Simon Howell along with Adam Coates and James Mantle just finished an 8 day Aspiring Expedition.  With a ton of new snow just before the course they were lucky enough to be just in time for some great weather.  With too much snow on the Ramp Route to be safe, the trio climbed the North West ridge gaining it via the "Kangaroo".

Planking, Slack-lining... Railing??

A New Sport?

You've all heard of Planking and Slack-Lining.   Do we have a new sport?   "Railing".  Guess the jibbers have been doing it for a while now.  But perhaps, not on foot and not at 2200m / 7200ft.

14 November, 2012 - Federico Varengo, IFMGA.  Plateau Hut, Mt Cook National Park, NZ

How Do You Get to the Top of NZ?

Sheer hard work & determination!

Says Julie Burton, Bathurst, Australia  

Julie Burton has a been a long term client and friend of Aspiring Guides.  A keen canyoner and speleologist ("caver"), she's been on many a mountain adventure with us over the years, including an ascent of Mt Aspiring.   Her next challenge was always to climb Aoraki Mt Cook.  But earlier this year she faced her greatest challenge.  Julie was seriously ill and underwent major surgery in April.

All through the ordeal, she focussed on one goal..."making it to the top of NZ".   A punishing fitness regime and sheer determination, saw Julie make a speedy recovery and have enough stamina to make the physically demanding climb in 18 hours!

Congratulations to Julie.   While canyoning and caving will always be her first love, we think she's got a lot more "up" to go in the future!  Peru 2014 with us... is next in her sights.

How would you celebrate your honeymoon?

As you may know Tim Steward, NZMGA Aspirant Guide recently tied the knot and to celebrate he kept tying those knots all the way up Mt Cook with his new bride Helen.  Honeymoon highlights, apart from the obvious views from the top... being able to ski the Linda Glacier to get back to Plateau in 30 minutes!  Whoo hoo! 

 Low points for Helen: super-cooled kneecaps and viscious ski boots!   If anyone out there knows of a sure-fire cure for uncomfortable ski boots (apart from an incinerator) - let us know.  Both Tim and Helen will be eternally grateful.

Profile of Freddy

So how old do you have to be to go Ski Touring?

Going Touring with your kids is cool!

New standards of "cool" were set by the Rees Family who joined us for a couple of Ski Tours this week on the Pisa and backcountry TC.    Guided by NZMGA Ski Guide,  Geoff Small, Dad and his boys 16 & 14 really set the pace.  Even their 12 year old sister has got the bug!    Go team Rees!!  **Update... little sister is actually only 10 years old - even more of a star **

More for the Weather Geeks

Was there any doubt that we're in the Roaring 40's?

According to the weather guru's ie., our guides - the weird Easterly flow of an La Nina weather pattern has "left the building" and the windbag El Nino is moving in for the summer.   

It's dumping down with snow on the west coast, which is great to fill in all those crevasses ready for the summer climbing season and prime ski touring months of September & October.    But over this side of the divide we've been getting some extraordinarily strong wind - gusts up to 140km/hr!!    Whit decided, wisely not to get the kite out for kite-skiing this week!

If you are weather geeks like us and you'd like to understand more about the El Nino & La Nina weather effects - here's the link to our NZ long term weather forecasters - NIWA.

Spring has sprung!

4.30pm - September 1st

9.30am - September 3rd

Pictures courtesy of Whare Kea Chalet at 1700m.

How's this for the first few days of spring?!  Over 50cm of fresh new snow to help keep our toes tickling with ski fever.

Woohoo!!!

A new Winter Olympic Sport?

Just couldn't help myself with this one!

Avalanche Awareness Course - the latest!

aka Winter Backcountry Awareness Course with Aspiring Guides

Our 4 day course is all about teaching you the smart way to access the NZ backcountry.  Avalanche awareness, terrain selection, transceiver searching and avalanche recovery are all part of this.  But in addition, we teach you how to survive in the backcountry with skills like navigation and building emergency shelters.   Our Black Peak Hut is a unique location for this.  Located at 1800m far from any commercial ski field you are in the true NZ Backcountry  (not just ducking the ropes at a ski field).  

Check out the photos from our latest course just back on Monday. 

More from Summit to Sea

A picture is worth a thousand words, so 14 pictures should be pretty damn good!

Most Spectacular Sunset Photos in the World?

Sunsets over the Tasman Sea from Pioneer Hut

Perhaps we're a little biased but I think we could probably lay claim to some of the most spectacular sunsets in the World?    The view from Pioneer Hut, at 2380m over the Fox Glacier Neve to the Tasman Sea is pretty hard to beat.   These photos were taken by our crew of "Summit to Sea" skiers who returned from 5 days on the glaciers yesterday!  More photos to come, but here's the sunsets for starters!!

That's Fox Glacier Township in bottom RH corner and the Tasman Sea beyond

Just to prove that Andy does escape the office!

Good snow at Ohau

For those of you who don't believe that I ever leave the office.  Suck it up!!!   Had to negotiate a day of skiing by braille to be first on the chair next morning after it had snowed all night and the cloud lifted.  Ohau the virtuous are rewarded!

Winter Wild Walks

An Exclusive Siberia Valley Experience!!

While we don't traditionally think about hiking in the winter, the new DOC hut in the Siberia Valley is toasty warm with a new log burner as our Wild Walks trekking guide, Tim Hudson discovered with his clients this week.   With not another human being in the valley, our family visiting from the UK enjoyed a very exclusive experience! 

The Backcountry Conditions are On!

Thursday 9 August in the Treble Cone Backcountry

Great conditions in the backcountry at the moment.  We've been receiving regular top ups of snow and temperatures have remained cold - keeping the snow in tip top condition.  Frost dried boot top powder...well the images from our latest ski tour says it all.   Stuart, Robert and Adrian are also joining Aspiring Guides for our Summit to Sea Ski tour - a 5 day ski touring odyssey on some of NZ's highest glaciers.  Watch for more photos.

Extreme Snow-Shoeing

Snow-shoeing on the Pisa Range

Well there's not much snow in Western Australia so Andrew and Kent were pretty much up for anything.  They knew they could walk...so how hard could it be?   Jo Haines, NZMGA took it as a personal challenge!!   Andrew & Kent did survive and also came away with the distinction of being our first guests at our new Rob Rosa Hut!

Check out the pictures.

Robrosa Hut in place!

 The hut has landed!

In cooperation with Robrosa Station, Aspiring Guides has a new place to explore.  Situated at 1700m this is a ski touring paradise.  With the Black Peak Hut nicknamed the Dog Box after its creator Nick Cradock, the new hut has been dubbed the "Cat Box". Stay tuned for more photos.

While everyone is complaining about lack of snow we have been happily ski touring away.  See photos of Robert and Barbara's day out.  This was Barbara's first time on touring skis and despite first timer nerves she had no problem at all enjoying a beautiful day out.

Did we mention that Ice-climbing was cold?

More from this week's ice-climbing at Black Peak

Did we mention that it was COLD ice-climbing at Black Peak?   
Not sure our guide Felix had many layers left to put on?  Rumour has it that the latest No.2 haircut has left him feeling the cold a bit more than usual?   At least he had a smile on his face!  Karly found the sun on one of her climbs - hence her smile.   It was great to have Karly back with us after her Aspiring Ascent earlier this year and we wish her luck with her trip to Cotopaxi (5,897m)  with our overseas expedition partners Jagged Globe in October this year.    

So how cold is that haircut Felix?

Karley found the sun on a sneaky gully back to the hut.

More on the weather!

Our weather tools - NZ Mountain Webcams

At Aspiring Guides our whole lives revolve around the weather.   We like to think with our years of collective knowlege we're pretty damn good at picking when to "go" or "stop"  At certain times of the year, NZ weather can be fickle.  Given our maritime climate, weather changes happen quickly.  Checking the weather on a 3 hourly basis can show amazing changes.   But we've been fortunate that kind people are investing in web-cams to make our job easier.   One of the best for seeing what the weather is doing on Mt Aspiring is the web-cam at the luxury lodge WhareKea on Albert Saddle (1681m).    While we can't yet see how much cloud is sitting on Bevan Col, it does give us a really good idea of what the weather is doing.

Try the link for yourself http://wharekealodge.com/weather/index.php 

Sat 28 Jul - 8:51 am

Sat 28 Jul - 11:31 am

Will we get more snow?

Is this a forecast for snow?

Certainly these weather maps are ones that have everyone in Wanaka wondering?   We've been so spoiled on the weather front lately, with day after day of sunny, freezing cold days (perfect for ice-climbing) that we've forgotten what NZ weather can be like.   As the ice-climbing wraps up for the season, we'd love a drop more snow for our up-coming ski touring .....so stay tuned!!

http://www.metvuw.com/

http://www.metservice.com/

Sunrise at Black Peak Hut

No words necessary.

Really Useful Websites - Learn Mountaineering Knots

Animatedknots.com

Every so often, we come across really useful websites.  For many years now we've been recommending http://www.animatedknots.com/ to our clients.   It's a great website to learn all the basic mountaineering knots required for good ropework.   Lets face it, unless you are working every day in the mountains like our guides, it's easy to get a bit rusty with even some of the most common knots. 

With this website - and the mobile apps, you can take a piece of cord with you on your next plane flight, train ride or boring road trip and practice them until you can tie knots blindfolded!  [Actually given how dark it is when making an alpine start in NZ - learning to tie off in the dark is a pretty good skill to learn!]. 

Once you become the Knot Guru...then you have to know when and how to use them...that where we come in!