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New Zealand Ski Beta

by Beau Fredlund August 27, 2019
written by Beau Fredlund August 27, 2019
The Mueller Hut, highly recommended.  Easy access, spectacular views, and great skiing.  Photo:  B. Fredlund

The Mueller Hut, highly recommended. Easy access, spectacular views, and great skiing. Photo: B. Fredlund

Insider tips for your first, or next, New Zealand ski trip

It is always snowing somewhere, and if it’s snowing, somebody is skiing.

I recently caught up with my friend Michael Gottino who had just returned from his first ski trip to New Zealand where winter is full-on. His mind was blown. He found the shear vertical relief of those mountains rising at times almost 10,000 feet above the valley floor to be the most dramatic. “Driving around the country, the valleys could have been taken from many places in Colorado. Then BOOM! There is a huge range of jagged peaks thousands of feet above you.”

On his trip, he found weather and snow conditions to be the biggest obstacles.

“New Zealand had a slow start to the winter and the costal snowpack really threw me for a loop,” he reported. “Bulletproof conditions would give way to huge storms, wind and then a nasty rhyme ice cycle.”

However, the conditions weren’t always trying and Michael was stoked that even on big lift service days he would ski dozens of runs of untracked cold winter snow. All told, tens of thousands of vertical feet of powder were skied. He says he basically treated the whole trip as reconnaissance for bigger future missions when he inevitably returns to New Zealand.

Get in the know
Thinking about starting your season early with a trip to The Land of the Long White Cloud? WildSnow contributor Beau Fredlund has some clutch tips for cutting it in the NZ mountains and, as tip #2 tells us, the best months are still ahead. Here’s some advice to save you some reconnaissance, or inform your next New Zealand ski touring adventure.

1. Make good use of the hut system. New Zealand has over 950 backcountry huts, which are an incredible resource for skiing and other multiday adventures. This means you can go light and leave the tent and sleeping pad at home. Just bring a sleeping bag and some wine (and your ski crampons).

2. Whenever the weather and conditions are ‘fine’, get after it. October is possibly the best month for coverage, stability and skiing bigger routes.

3. Join an alpine club for hut fee discounts. The New Zealand Department of Conservation honors American Alpine Club memberships for hut discounts, and the NZ Alpine Club is definitely cool too. Or if you are in the know, it’s the Canterbury Mountaineering Club.

4. Listen to some good local tunes while you are there. ‘Fat Freddy’s Drop’, and ‘Salmanilla Dub’ are a couple of good Kiwi bands worth a listen.

5. Sharpen your ski edges. It’s common to find bulletproof ice, rock hard névé, water ice rime, you name it. You’ll run the gamut of conditions in New Zealand, so if you are there for ski mountaineering, sharp ski edges will go a long way for safety and efficiency (fewer transitions). We suggest going with skinnier skis than you would typically ski in North America or Europe. 90-105mm underfoot is about right. Voile Vectors were our tool of choice.

Adam Fabrikant carefully checking out the conditions on the south face of Mt. Green.  Photo:  B. Fredlund

Adam Fabrikant carefully checking out the conditions on the south face of Mt. Green. Photo: B. Fredlund

6. Consider buying (instead of renting) a car if you are traveling around New Zealand for a month or longer. Christchurch has a couple of great resources for this approach: Turner’s Car Auction and the Backpacker’s Car Market. Toyota vans are common, as are Subaru wagons. Both have high resale value, so you might even be able to make some coin off the car when it’s all said and done. Just remember to drive on the left side of the road! And honk often.

7. Freshen up on your glacier travel skills. Much of the alpine in New Zealand is glaciated and broken. While there, plan to wear a harness, carry a rope, have your rescue systems dialed, and route-find carefully around and over crevasses and bergschrunds.

Skiing the Tasman Glacier.  Photo:  B. Fredlund

Skiing the Tasman Glacier. Photo: B. Fredlund

8. Make sure to book your trip during good weather so you can ski huge peaks and big lines instead of sitting in Queenstown drinking Pino Noir.

9. Don’t feed the kea. New Zealand’s native, alpine parrot is an endangered species that needs all the help it can get. And that means not becoming habituated to human handouts (think of them as bears).

The super smart alpine parrot of New Zealand, the kea.  Photo:  B. Fredlund.

The super smart alpine parrot of New Zealand, the kea. Photo: B. Fredlund.

9. Steel crampons and technical ice tools are advised. You can get away with aluminum spikes, but if you plan to ski and climb a bunch in the higher glaciated peaks, steel is definitely the way to go.

10. Hit the stairclimber before you go. All that front pointing can murder your calf muscles if you’re not prepared.

11. Ski crampons, ski crampons, ski crampons. I asked one local if he skied with them often, and he said ‘religiously.’

12. Eat heaps of pies (shepherds pies). They’ll get you up the mountain, and it’s what the locals eat. Recommended pie shops are to be found in the towns of Fairlie and Shefield.

13. Walk up and/or down the Tasman Glacier at least once. It’s a great lesson in geology/glaciology, and a way to scout conditions for a number of nice routes.

14. Consider having a go at Mt. Aspiring. The approach up West Matukituki and the French Ridge is a rich overall experience, well worth your time.

 Mt. Aspiring.  Photo:  B. Fredlund

Mt. Aspiring. Photo: B. Fredlund

15. Buy a SIM card at the airport. They’ll insert it into your smart phone to save you from paying hefty international rates. Also, pick up a plug adapter so you can keep your phones and cameras topped off.

16. Befriend the local hut wardens and guides. You’ll end up with gourmet meals, movie screenings, and more beta than you know what to do with.

17. Don’t be afraid to get your feet wet. Seriously. Get used to fording in your tennies. This applies for the both the braided river scene in the east, and the West Coast bush.

Don't try this.  Noah Howell is a professional yogi.  Photo:  B. Fredlund

Don’t try this. Noah Howell is a professional yogi. Photo: B. Fredlund

18. When in Wanaka: go to the Kai Whakapai for beers, and Red Star Burger for the blue or the mofo.

19. Pick highly motivated and like-minded individuals to ski and travel with.

Noah Howell, Billy Haas and Adam Fabrikant, very good ski company.  Photo:  B. Fredlund

Noah Howell, Billy Haas and Adam Fabrikant, very good ski company. Photo: B. Fredlund

16 comments
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16 comments

ZB December 2, 2015 - 3:17 pm

That’s Salmonella Dub!

Beau Fredlund December 2, 2015 - 3:38 pm

Good catch ZB! Any reggae tunes of theirs to recommend?

Lisa Dawson December 2, 2015 - 5:53 pm

Congratulations on a successful trip. I admire your impressive style of getting after it and good judgement calls. Beautiful!

noah howell December 2, 2015 - 9:05 pm

We really got lucky! Glad we had some good lines and times to share knowing it can be really hit or miss.

Lou Dawson 2 December 3, 2015 - 7:11 am

These trip reports were way beyond anything we could have hoped for in publishing WildSnow. I thank these guys from the bottom of my heart. They’ll endure forever as one of the all-time “dream trips.” Lou

Rich December 3, 2015 - 7:35 am

There is a guide book, now out of print (if you can find a copy)
https://alpineclub.org.nz/product/new-zealand-backcountry-skiing/

Also. topo maps are basically available to download for free from Land Info NZ (LINZ). Good fro trip planning
http://www.linz.govt.nz/land/maps/topographic-maps

Music wise:
Fat Freddy’s
Salmonella Dub
the Black Seeds
Goldenhorse

And if you want to get rocky
Head like a hole
Shihad

As well as PIES. Try cream donuts and custard squares. Beau and Noah also failed to mention the propensity of awesome coffee stops around the country. Don’t go, without your Joe!

Frame December 3, 2015 - 10:19 am

Beau,
Killer vision by Salmonella Dub would be a good album to start with. For the love of it, for a headline song.

The uncle of one of the guys in Fat Freddy’s drop has a song named after his crayfish stall near the town of Kaikoura. If anyone is driving along the coast around Kaikoura, and needs a break from the pies, call in for freshly caught crays, just cooked and sit on the coast watching the waves (… try to sit up wind from any seals). Kai = food, Koura = crayfish and it’s divine.

Witold December 3, 2015 - 11:44 am

And as per #9 -DO NOT FEED KEAS! – or you will be deported from NZ

Jeremy C December 4, 2015 - 8:36 am

20. Watch out for ice falls?

http://www.climbing.com/video/watch-devastating-glacial-collapse-in-new-zealand/

There are a couple of sections where I tour in Switzerland that pass close to areas where glaciers push over cliffs casing ice falls. They are definitely non-stop zones, and you often have to skis round ice blocks. But I have never seen anything like this one, fortunately.

eben December 5, 2015 - 1:01 pm

sheit, wish i had seen #8 before going. Really sweet pics and good tips, way more into this style of TR then satellite live blogs of what was for breakfast in the tent.

Kaj December 6, 2015 - 1:35 am

Underline and italics on the ski crampons! (especially for any forays onto the North Island volcanoes).

Also, as a post ski drink on a warm day try mixing L&P with Speight’s (40:60) for a refreshing NZ style radler.

DavidH August 27, 2019 - 9:48 am

The club fields Craigieburn, Cheeseman, Broken River, and Mt Olympus all have inexpensive lodging and food plus a non commercial vibe. For easy access to high country You can purchase single ride tickets to take the rope tows to the top, leave your nutcracker belt behind and tour in the high alpine. There is even a “Haute Route” trip between club fields that is a great trip.
The USD to NZD exchange rate gives you approx 35 % discount.

Doug August 27, 2019 - 11:07 am

Thanks David! Great beta. I can’t wait to get down there myself.

Rob August 29, 2019 - 4:21 am

totally 2nd this David – the “Clubbies” are such good fun, totally unpretentious, chilled and some bloody good skiing. Especially if your not into ski mountaineering. Olympus even has an outside hot tub and cold beer.
For beta check out skitouring.co.nz, its got some great trip reports, and is on facebook. If you haven’t bought all your gear from Cripplecreek then Small Planet sports in Queenstown and Gnomes up near the Clubbies are the shops for any gear.
Also I cannot recommend beers or coffee at the Kai whakapai enough!!

Frame August 29, 2019 - 6:11 am

Spring weather forecast
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/115383879/six-weeks-of-unsettled-weather-with-sharp-cold-snaps-to-welcome-spring

Unsettled weather on a small bunch of islands, surrounded by large amounts of ocean. Who woulda thought.

DavidB August 29, 2019 - 4:23 pm

Good wrap. I just returned from NZ myself. I ski there every season. Love the place but easier for me travelling from Australia.

Good call on the clubbies well worth a go.

Here’s a couple of websites worth checking out:
https://mountainguides.org.nz/
https://www.avalanche.net.nz/

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