It's your first time ski-touring - Alpinschule OASE-Alpin

By 3.30pm and various stops, pauses, rests, we had made it to the Karlsruhe Hütte
(Langtalereckhütte) at 2430m; a simple affair with 14 bunk beds in each dormitory and a
cosy dining area adjacent to the kitchen. This was to be our home for the next 4 nights.
At 4.30pm, Simon gave us our search and find lessons in using our avalanche transceivers;
an electronic unit that is switched on upon leaving the hut, and which constantly emits a
radio signal that can be pinpointed by another transceiver should the necessity arise. With
the mountains rising up to 3000m around us, and the sun setting behind us, I felt a raw
excitement at the prospect of our first tour. This was bolstered by our evening planning
discussion, where Simon showed us the 1:25 000 scale maps, explaining to us that we would
manage 350m and roughly 4km in distance in one hour and instructed us in understanding
how the weather can affect the snow and avalanche conditions. We were to head up the
Langtaler Ferner!
Day 2: Blasen Tal (Blister Valley) officially known as the Langtaler Ferner; 3472m
Up at the crack of dawn and a quick face and hand wash and down for breakfast. “So who
was that snoring last night? He didn’t even snore continuously! It was right in my eardrum!”
This was the standard conversation at every breakfast. And this was the standard view from
the dining room:
By 7am at about –5°C we were ready to go.
And even though it was cold, Simon advised
us not put too many layers on as we would
be warming up really quickly.
Having checked that our transceivers were
functioning correctly, we started to make
headway East into a long valley up to the
Langtaler Ferner. Everything was silent, just
the noise of the skis in the snow and my own
heartbeat and breathing. The crazy thing
was, the scenery was magnificent, but it was
impossible to appreciate it. The sheer
concentration in keeping up with Simon’s slow but adequate pace led my eyes to become
focused on his skis in front of me. My thoughts began to wander to times in my life that
were almost dead and forgotten; a kind of trance meditation whilst in motion. This is a
prevalent aspect of ski touring that certainly didn’t cross my mind when I started to toy with
the idea of ski touring, but is definitely a phenomenon of this sport!
And slowly but surely, I found my rhythm. A continuous pace of putting one ski in front of
the other with a break for hot tea or a muesli bar every hour or so. Lunch consisted of a
wonderful picnic. Everyone offered their tuck boxes around, and splendid array of English
Cheddar Cheese, German Leberwürst, dark brown corn bread and plenty of hot tea was
consumed against a background of snow-capped mountains. This is what Touring was all
about!
© 2004 :Recollections.doc by Miranda Bellchambers Page 3 of 10