eaf Posted January 18, 2020 Report Posted January 18, 2020 Holy cow, another trip to the Skiers Paradise! A place with endless groomers and highest number of sunny days in Alps. A rough start with crazy outbound weather with snow peaking right around the departure time. When it hit, it hit hard, and I even started looking at rail options, but then miraculously the snow took a break, and I zipped to EWR in no time at all. Stupid United flight this time. Far from the luxury of Emirates, longer en route, but timely departure and free booze in the United Club. The only thing left before departure is deicing. Whoo-hoo, looking at the webcams and forecast, it's gonna be truly epic. Lots of sunny days has its unfortunate side effect on snow quality or even availability, plus this time I'm flying earlier than ideal, but the storm that drowned Venice in December dumped enough in the mountains to last till now. 4 1 Quote
toast21602 Posted January 18, 2020 Report Posted January 18, 2020 Should be good. Snow incoming? Have a good time. Quote
eaf Posted January 19, 2020 Author Report Posted January 19, 2020 Lol, I think I mixed up my flight somehow... 2 Quote
indiggio Posted January 19, 2020 Report Posted January 19, 2020 2 hours ago, eaf said: Lol, I think I mixed up my flight somehow... Jerry helmet sticker game right there... Quote
GrilledSteezeSandwich Posted January 19, 2020 Report Posted January 19, 2020 1 hour ago, indiggio said: Jerry helmet sticker game right there... They just want everybody to know that they’re expert skiers from jersey. 1 Quote
eaf Posted January 19, 2020 Author Report Posted January 19, 2020 (edited) Somebody took all the snow away! I even climbed a bridge, and then a hill, and then a whole mountain, to see if perhaps there would be a glimpse of whiteness in the distance... It was all in vain. Edited January 19, 2020 by eaf 8 Quote
RidgeRacer Posted January 19, 2020 Report Posted January 19, 2020 Damn...here we go again Eaf. Nice work!!! Gorgeous!! Quote
eaf Posted January 20, 2020 Author Report Posted January 20, 2020 That was Verona. A small old town about half way from Milan to the mountains. There's more to see in the streets, but I've already been there and was in a hurry. Today's gonna be the first skiing day. People are saying that besides the big December storm that dumped 6' of snow there was little since then except half a foot this Sat. Quote
Popular Post eaf Posted January 20, 2020 Author Popular Post Report Posted January 20, 2020 I'm beyond tired... All's well, the weather is awesome, snow is terrific, so firm and supporting, yet no ice, and they do their nightly grooming for A+. The plan for this trip was to visit two new isolated areas where I've never been to before. One is Hidden Value, which everyone says is the prettiest place in Dolomites, and the other - Kronplatz, which is just an area that I've heard of a lot but never got to visit. It may be a good base for an approach from Austria, plus there's a ski train going to yet another area... But anyway, for today I just wanted to take it slow, refresh the map in my mind and remember the connecting lifts. It went well. I even came across a leaf zone that I didn't get a chance to see before, and it turned out to be a great place to spend a couple of hours at. A collection of blue, red and black trails, discovered a restaurant on top, right around lunch time, not too many people and snow holding well throughout the day. My biggest gripe is the stupid navigation app that they've "upgraded" since last year. Now the 3D map is a joke, and even though there's a way to browse trails and lifts offline, it can't build point A to point B routes without service as before. On top of it, it lies and made me walk sloped streets of Canazei for half a kilometer in ski boots and with skis on the shoulder. Right when I was in a hurry to get back to home area before the closing time. 13 1 Quote
eaf Posted January 21, 2020 Author Report Posted January 21, 2020 I found the best ski tow ever. The only problem is that my daughter will kill me if she sees this. So IDK, perhaps I should just cancel my return flight and ride this back and forth, back and forth... 8 Quote
GrilledSteezeSandwich Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 Wow reminds me of when my grandma got runover by a reindeer. Quote
Schif Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 13 minutes ago, eaf said: I found the best ski tow ever. The only problem is that my daughter will kill me if she sees this. So IDK, perhaps I should just cancel my return flight and ride this back and forth, back and forth... This is legitimately amazing 1 Quote
eaf Posted January 21, 2020 Author Report Posted January 21, 2020 Damn, I wish I had one of these on the trip! 4 Quote
toast21602 Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 Looks great @eaf!! Another great trip. Keep the reports and pictures coming! Quote
eaf Posted January 21, 2020 Author Report Posted January 21, 2020 Then I would be able to go higher than this. 5 Quote
GrilledSteezeSandwich Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 35 minutes ago, eaf said: Then I would be able to go higher than this. Are you skiing off piste at all?? You eat anything good?? Spaghetti and a meatballs. Quote
eaf Posted January 21, 2020 Author Report Posted January 21, 2020 Today was all about a trip to Hidden Valley and the adjacent Cinque Torri area. It's far, three valleys by ski, then a ski bus, then a few more lifts to get to the farthest point of the day - the Five Towers. Honestly, the trails aren't any better than in the valleys much closer, quality-wise. They're much longer though, emptier, and since there's so much snow in the mountains this year (sorry, Venice), sometimes it feels like skiing in the plains. Yeah, there's a groomer, but if you want you can just go sideways and get lost. So, I took the first lift up from the hotel, and was so rushing to get to the destination that had to spin wheels on local slopes for some time because the next connecting lift wasn't running yet. Followed the Sella Ronda circle counterclockwise till I reached Alta Badia - the final area before the bus hop, took me 90 minutes to get there, then boarded the bus, and after following winding roads for 15mi or so got to the bottom of Lagazuoi lift. A picture from the top of it is in the previous post, but I didn't take the lift yet. The lift would take me to the 11km Hidden Valley trail back, and I didn't get to my towers yet. So I passed the lift line, crossed the road and entered the Cinque Torri skiing area. Like I said, piste-wise it's hardly anything special, but views were different, and that's all that matters here. Alas, after some time skiing the same place you get used to it, and so like a junkie, you seek for something new, something different, something far, doesn't matter if it's any better, you just want to take in more and more... The only limiting factor is that you must get back to your home area by 4:30pm, for everything gets closed for grooming at 5, and lifts are starting to shut down before then. You can miss the last lift by a few, and land in a different town of the same valley, that's fine, just take a ski bus to get home. But if you miss by far, then IDK what can possibly help. If passes are closed, look for a place to stay overnight. Anyway, somewhere below is a pic with the Five Towers. Luckily (with all bussing, exploring, trying all the trails in the way, etc) I got there by noon. 5 Quote
eaf Posted January 21, 2020 Author Report Posted January 21, 2020 (edited) 42 minutes ago, GrilledSteezeSandwich said: Are you skiing off piste at all?? You eat anything good?? Spaghetti and a meatballs. They're heavy on polenta, lasagna and goulash. If you get to the German country then inevitably simple things like sausages and fries pop up. I had a deer yesterday. It was like beef, structure wise, just some special taste, which I'm not even sure wasn't due to spices. Yeah, I did some off piste in Alta Badia yesterday, the snow is great this year, but if you want to get far, like today, speed and groomers is all that matters. What I can't place yet is grappa. Finished one blueberry bottle, it was like a sweet liquor. Today got one with Erbe Alpine, and it's smelly, yet bitter, brrr. Edited January 21, 2020 by eaf 3 Quote
eaf Posted January 21, 2020 Author Report Posted January 21, 2020 To close the Hidden Valley subject, here are some pics from it. Basically, it's a long, 11km return trail that undoes both the winding climb of the bus and the Lagazuoi lift. It goes and goes surrounded by peaks on both sides. At some point it passes a waterfall area. Difficulty ranges from blue to red, but overall it's a sightseeing track. It brings the skiers almost back to the point where he boarded the bus, but is about 1km short. This final km can be conquered by taxi, cross-country skiing or a horse tow, like in the pics above. 5 Quote
Schif Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 Out of curiosity, how many snowboarders are you seeing over there? I would imagine almost none considering the amount of flat areas Quote
AtomicSkier Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 1 hour ago, Schif said: Out of curiosity, how many snowboarders are you seeing over there? I would imagine almost none considering the amount of flat areas All the more reason for you to ditch the board and go full send on skiing. 2 1 Quote
GrilledSteezeSandwich Posted January 21, 2020 Report Posted January 21, 2020 1 hour ago, AtomicSkier said: All the more reason for you to ditch the board and go full send on skiing. Schif is a good snowboarder though I don’t know. Quote
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.