December 31st, 2009 | 
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Today we headed up to Ceillac to get some skis for Ollie to rent for the season. It turned out that the slope next to the rental shop was just perfect for Ollie to learn how to ski.
Ollie getting the hang of skiing
This was the first day skiing of the season for both Ollie and me. Evie didn’t have a go, but she did ask to have a go next time so we will have to sort out some mini ski’s for her. Read the rest of this entry »
We drive in and out of this car park twice a day and have seen quite a lot of this guy. Then I was reading a paper and it mentioned this YouTube clip of him.
I am spending a month out in Bahrain doing a roof survey in the Wahooo water park in Bahrain. We got roped into (excuse the pun) doing a spot of cleaning as well in our first week here as they were about to open and there was very obvious dust on the big brown pillars that hold up the roof.
Finally after 10 weeks of messing around driving from one end to the other of the Hautes Alpes seeing doctors, radiologists, physiotherapists and surgeons I have finally had my broken collarbone pinned back together.
I was knocked back a bit when the surgeon came to chat to me before the op, he said that he would be taking some bone off my hip to help the bones heal together properly. I had read other peoples experience of this hip graft and they all seemed to say it hurt more than the collarbone.
Happily when I woke up there was no bandage on my hip and the surgeon said that because of the shape of the break it hadn’t been necessary after all. Thankfully.
Pinned back together
Back on the 28th of May I broke my collarbone. It was after finishing a gnarly technical ride, I was back on a forestry track and was cruising back to my car when my front wheel shot under me and I did a big superman into a tree.
Initial Collarbone X-Ray
Back on the Eissassa Rog and I spotted some likely lines over on the Peouvou. Rog was most keen on the left hand line, but we didn’t know if it went through the cleft in the rocks. I was after the right hand couloir with the S at the top.
I had seen this couloir from Ceillac back at the beginning of January and have been keen to ski it ever since. I can’t find any record of it having been skied, neither in the guidebook, nor on any ski topo websites, nor asking around here, so it is probably a first descent.
Pointe des Marcelettes is a great ski tour, right in the middle of the Queyras, with fantastic views and a real mountain feel to the summit. There are a few different descent possibilities, the north east and North West slopes tend to hold the snow well, but have a reputation for fatal avalanches. The south west slopes are not that steep and are great if you get the spring snow in just the right conditions.
The couloir that I had intended to ski with Hubert on Sunday was still un-skied. Alex and Dave had had a few days warming up in the area so I managed to convince them to have a go at it.
