Manic May

Well that's it, spring is over and we should be well into summer now, but it certainly doesn't feel like it here in Norway, its still very cold outside, but what a spring its been in the Alps, I don't ever remember a season like this, with this much to do, the water levels have been incredibly good, with high water runs on old favorite's and new opportunities on usually dry creeks.

I've been really quite busy with guiding on rivers already this year, with 3 weeks in Slovenia for Gene17, a one week road trip around Piemonte and Tessin and a steep creeking course in Val Sesia also for Gene17. More recently I worked with Laburnum boat club from Hackney on their annual trip to the French Alps which was fantastic, they are a really fun group to be around, I'm looking forward to seeing them again in Slovenia in a few weeks.

We also did a photo shoot with Palm. Nick Horwood and Tim Trew came out to explore rivers in Tessin and paddle some new runs, their posts of the trip are here and here Simon and I even managed a sneaky run on the Sessera near Borgosesia which rarely has any water.

Put in on the Sessera

...and lower down

Enjoying high flows on the Vercasca

The hike in to the Basso took a while, not cos its that far, just cos every kept taking photos.

... the top however is spectacular

hmmm granite, 4kms of bedrock slides and drops to the Loana, this is the first rapid of the day.

Ninja boof into a shallow pool

The last cascade on the Loana, and time for a Pizza after 7 hours of Class V adventure.

The last thing for May was to paddle some of the Piemonte classics with friends, nothing beats a day on an alpine river with a good strong crew.

The 25 footer on the Gronda

Sermenzina

I'm now guiding in Sjoa, but heading over to Voss soon for Ekstrem Sport Veko, and adventures on the West coast of Norway, see you out there! : )

Rarely Run

Last week I went with a small team from Palm, to test some new PFD's and get some photo's, we had great water levels in Ticino, and on the way back, bagged a seldom run, hidden gem in the Toce region. The Alpi di Basso and the Loana. I'd visited a few years previously and never found enough water, this year it was cranking, and well worth the hike in.  Brief report here

http://www.palmequipmenteurope.com/blogs/?p=701

The Place To Be

My last post, I've written for the Palm blog is all about Piemonte and the Italian Alps, you can see it here

Click

Start of the season

Spring is most definitely here, and on mainland Europe its all kicking off with high flows around Ticino and Piemonte.

At the end of March I swapped my ski's for my kayaking gear and headed over to the Slovenia to run some Gene17 courses on the Soca.  

The last time on this Spring's snow

Changing allegiances & swapping the ski's for kayaks 

The first week was an invitational training week for potential guides, I worked with a great team from the South West on guiding and coaching techniques in quite challenging conditions, as the Soca was running at 170 Cumecs! Not surprising with the huge snow pack this year, and the rain that fell that week!  Check out the team's notes from the week on the Gene17 blog 

Warming up, guiding and PFD testing on the Soca

The following two weeks were also busy, coaching and guiding with G17 courses, the high levels on the Soca remained throughout, with some boils and relatively pushy flows for the Soca. These weeks spent in Slovenia are always a welcome warm up for the season.

The last two weeks of April I took the opportunity to visit home, friends and family in the UK and also catch up with sponsors Fatface in Havant and  Palm in Clevedon. I also met with Laburnum boatclub in London who will be arriving in France at the end of the month and Slovenia in July, I spent an entire day applying for a Indian visa through the new system in Victoria (very frustrating) and in Exeter, Ed Cornfield and I met the students, parents and teachers of Exeter school, and enjoyed the student presentations for the final meeting for our forthcoming expedition to India in August.  My final trip was to Leeds University for an open day for the MSc I'll be studying from September.

The following morning I flew back to Milan, and I'm now ensconced in Campertogno in Val Sesia looking at an unbelievable snow pack above, its going to be an exciting season ahead!

Yesterday I enjoyed perfect levels on the Egua and punchy levels on the Sermenza even if there was still snow at the put in for the former!

Team Denmark arrive this evening for a weeks road trip around Ticino and Piemonte, so more to follow shortly!

Still full winter conditions on Monte Rosa from the South

The view from Campertogno

Plenty of snow hanging just above Alagna

Winding up the Winter

Winter is officially coming to an end here in the Swiss Alps, I decided that as I can now wear shorts comfortably in the valley and there's puddles on the roads where there used to be snow.  Still there is lots of snow still on the ground, and that only means there is an epic spring coming!  

We've been lucky enough to have record snowfall this year, it seems every other day has been a powder day until this last week. The skiing has been awesome, I managed to go on some great back country, and glacier tours with some of the Peak Leaders students (who by the way all passed their BASI 2 exams!! 100% pass rate)

Its been fun, loving the skiing, but missing the kayak now. But with summer on the way I'm back on the water this weekend working on an Alpine river leaders course for Gene17, I'm looking forward it! Lets use the snow again as it melts!

Winter in Switzerland

This winter I decided to make a little change to my normal programme and work with some winter sports for a bit. I've wanted to spend some more time in the mountains and specifically on the slopes for a some time now, so I was happy to have the opportunity to do just that, when I started a short contract at the beginning of January. So thats it I'll be in Zermatt, Switzerland until the end of March. The pictures describe the place quite well.  

I'm running a ski instructors course for Peak Leaders in Zermatt, although not being a ski instructor myself I'm happy to let the experts in the Official Ski School here do the technical teaching bit!  My job for 10 weeks is to help the course run smoothly and deliver a theory course in Leadership (ILM). The work has been challenging especially dealing with local politics here in Switzerland, but on the whole its going well and the students have been very successful so far in their qualifications. Just as I hoped however there has been plenty of time for hitting the hill myself!

A long time ago I learnt to Ski, then I decided that boarding was much better as I loved the way the board floats and carves over the mountain, things have changed since then however, modern skis have a much better shape and performance, and after trying to follow my skiing friends into remote gullies and spending a lot of time up to my waist in powder, it was time to turn back to ski's

I've been learning a lot in the last few weeks on the ski's, its great to be back on a steep learning curve, really rewarding. With the exception of moguls I'm pretty happy now I can go anywhere on the skis, that I've been on a board.

We've had some great conditions here in Zermatt, lots of snow this year, mostly we've had sunshine, but every few days a good dump of snow, to ensure the powder levels stay well topped up.

I'm happy to say the course is quite comprehensive, with lots ski training, but also training for back country skiing, avalanche rescue and freestyle etc etc  Tomorrow we go Heli Skiing!! 

I'm also posting on the Peakleaders blog at the moment for more detail on the course More updates soon.  

Matt

Autumn Update

There is a whole bunch of things that I was involved in during Autumn, and it was an exceptionally busy time for me hence the very late post.

The most important thing that happened of course was the arrival of Eleanor Faith,

my elder sisters first baby, she has the most gorgeous deep blue eyes, a really cute baby.

Eleanor with her mum

The big project I was working on was renovating my house, re-plastering, some plumbing, new flooring, knocking two rooms into one, was all in order, then of course there's all the suprise jobs that need doing along the way. At one point I was working through the night to stay ahead of ahead of Martin and Elwyn who've done a fantastic job on the plastering, on a house that's too old to have any square corners or straight edges.

Some before and after's

Screeding the floor

When I've not been working on the house I've been working on the river. This Autumn I've been involved in training the students of Exeter School Canoe club for their forth coming expedition to Ladakh in August that I've organised for them. So we've spent a nice weekend in Wales, a very cold weekend camping on Dartmoor and running the Upper Dart when the team made some great food collectively under the watchful eye of Tom K. Soon they'll be off to the Bitches for some whirlpool practice. The team are a really nice bunch of Lads who work well together and there's some skillful kayaking I've seen, so I'm really looking forward to going with them to India in the summer. Exeter School Canoe Club have been doing some amazing things over the last years driven by Pete Scott. This trip to India is the latest in a long list of expeditions the club have done, and like the others before this trip we'll be getting involved with the locals in the area and undertaking an aid project fitting sustainable energy systems, in a remote area of Ladakh before we hit the river.

Lastly I've also started to study again, this time Open University Maths, its all quite difficult having not really done any maths since GCSE, but after a bit of work it's understandable and I've been writting some crazy looking sums.

Belated Happy New Year to you all.