Ski Mountaineering Failure on the Acropolis

[Minty]

The expanse of white on the Cradle mountain web cam inspired me to head to Pine Valley to try a bit of ski touring. I was picturing perfect blue skies and smooth, crisp white snow, conveniently ignoring the fact that I would be carrying 5 days worth of gear, 10 kilos of ski equipment and that it is 28.5 km from Cynthia Bay to Pine Valley. There was no shortage of snow at Lake St Clair, with a solid foot obscuring all the roots on the lake track. Unfortunately all the snow meant that the scrub drooped down over the track and I discovered that my protruding skis where the perfect shape for hooking these branches and making sure the majority of the snow they carried found its way down down the neck of my jacket. This promoted me to improvise the technique I christened "The Borrowing Tortoise", which involved a lowering of the head below waist level and a blind charge through the offending plants. Unsurprisingly I only made it to Narcissus that night were my ambitions were cut down to size when I heard that two hardened search and rescue guys on a training exercise took 7 hours just to reach the Gould Plateau, with snow shoes.

The next day I managed to AT ski a bit of the the pine valley track, though I didn't want to think about too much about what the numerous washed out, bare and rocky sections were doing to the bottom of my skis. My ambitions were slimmed even further when I passed another SAR team who managed to get most of the way up to the Acropolis Plateau and likened the experience to swimming freestyle. I shared the Pine Valley hut with a group of Overlanders who had an attempt and the plateau and confirmed the freestyle analogy.

Early on day three I set off up the Acropolis track and after some serious Tortoise Borrowing I hit the now legendary chest deep stuff. Inevitably I lost the track, and I can confirm that scrub bashing in snow with skis and ski boots is an activity that I am happy to experience only once. It is best described as a mega-sized version of one of those novelty spatial awareness puzzles. I eventually made it to the plateau in horizontal snowfall and headed north on my ancient, thin and strictly on-piste skis that sunk only marginally less than my feet. I slowly made my way up through the alpine forest towards the southernmost buttress and started the traverse across the pants-browningly steep slope. The snow was insane, I couldn't see a single exposed rock on the main face. However despite at least a couple of meters of depth there was no solid base and any attempt a ski-less walking was practically impossible. About halfway across the traverse things got slightly too epic for my liking and I had a bit of a slide, discovering that a solitary ski pole is not the ideal tool to perform a self-arrest. After wasting about half an hour trying to figure out how to climb back up to the ski pole I dropped, I headed back to the southern buttress and put my skis into downhill mode. I managed to link a few shaky turns before the soft snow completely swallowed one of my skis and I ended up waist deep again, this time the wrong way up. With a crushing sense of failure I headed back down.

The 28.5 km leg cruncher the next day was not a lot of fun and the lake walk was its usual miserable self. The last few hours were spent mentally preparing myself for the seemingly endless ordeal that is the road from Watersmeet to the Visitor's Centre.

4 days of carrying skis on my back didn't quite seem to be worth less than 30 seconds of really bad skiing. But then again, can a price be put on the eternal bragging rights of having (sort of) skied the Acropolis?

[Genesis]

Minty,

Great post, I enjoyed the read and well done! There is no such thing as failure in adventure unless you die of course!

Genesis

[Minty]

To correct my typo: the technique I invented should be called "The Burrowing Tortoise". "The Borrowing Tortoise" sounds more like the title of a picture book.

[tibboh]

You're braver than I am

[Tortoise]

To correct my typo: the technique I invented should be called "The Burrowing Tortoise". "The Borrowing Tortoise" sounds more like the title of a picture book.

G'day Minty. Any kind of tortoise technique is ok in my book.

Thanks for fessing up - Good to hear of the 'failures' as well as the 'successes'. Plenty to learn from them for a lot of us, and as they say, the worst experiences make the best stories.

Here's to some enjoyable skiing soon - though even 30 seconds on the Acropolis may be hard to match.
Cheers,
Tortoise

[donktec]

Those were some pretty hard earned turns Thanks for sharing the story!

[forest]

I have never even tried to ski. But I really enjoyed your honest post.
Ah as the days pass the bad memories will soon be replaced with the fond.

[Lizzy]

Photos???? Please

[Minty]

All optional weight had to be shaved including, sadly, my camera.

[icefest]

All optional weight had to be shaved including, sadly, my camera.

Damn!

I can supply some shots with less snow:
hires: http://puu.sh/4iKlW.jpg

If you want some closer skiing, there are some decent chutes on Mt Olympus.
The slope here is about 40-50 degrees
HiResolution pic here: http://puu.sh/4iKSk.jpg

[iandsmith]

Ah yes, boasting rights. The misery you have to go through to get them!

[Nuts]

Haha, hadn't seen this little epic, can picture it!

To correct my typo: the technique I invented should be called "The Burrowing Tortoise". "The Borrowing Tortoise" sounds more like the title of a picture book.

A Tortoise with a well used library card?