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Index
Additional Dates Always Welcome ! (please contact Julian to add more
calendar entries, Mostly dates are arranged to try to conform
with "Ski Season's Planning
Criteria" below.
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Notes On Columns
-
Type:
- Down=Down hill,
- Tour=Ski Tour,
- Lang=Langlauf=Cross
Country.
- All=All types of skier
welcome.
- Where more than one type, main emphasis is listed
first.
-
Skill:
- Beg=Beginners (ie including
absolute beginners),
- Exp=Experienced.
- Any=Any level of experience
or lack thereof.
- Organiser: Name of
organiser. Click on it for more info.
- Destination: Ski Organisers please tell me web
references(URL) for your Destination Resort, for Ski Map info
etc, & I'll make it click-able from the table.
- Free/ Commercial club
trips are organised free (but you still have to pay various
lifts & accommodation & petrol etc), but we also list
some Semi Commercial Trips: Most of Ken's trips are marked
"Semi Commercial". on those the organiser's prime aim is to
teach people skiing, for which he offers a commercial
package, charges money, & bundles in equipment provision,
tuition, accommodation & (I think) lift pass) A few
experienced club skiers sometimes join those groups without
taking the package.
- Comment: Odd extra
info.
Notes On Rows
- A row of dashes '-' (or empty boxes) is a date available
for an Ski Organiser (unless
below a preceeding multi day trip).
- Trips such as Ken's commercial trips & Peter's
Private trip maybe shown in {{brackets}}.
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We also organise short notice trips via our mail list .
Where you may also latch on to private trips too.
Our Ski Organisers also have a
2nd mail list just for the Ski
Organisers, not for normal skiers who don't organise.
Subscribe Ski
Email List(s) here
You might want to also look at Munich Ski Club Web They have an entry fee
of 10 Euro, & Annual Membership of 30 Euro (when last I
looked) (by contrast: We are Free ! Email
Maybe Munich branch of the Deutsch Alpen- verein might also
organise trips. (Use a search engine. & mail me a URL).
( Web refs to some random resorts. Just random web refs so far.
)
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We already list Fackel Wanderung, as well as all forms of
skiing, but we would be delighted if someone wanted to organise
eg: snow shoe walking, sledging, rodel, ice skating on canal,
lake or frozen tennis court by a ski lift
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It was suggested I prepare outline How-To notes to encourage
new Ski Organisers, & noted
that organising the accommodation is perhaps the most
interesting area of advice for an inexperienced/ new ski
organiser. Paul has also asked me. Emails/tips from other
experienced Ski Organisers to
fill out this section are welcome, if not received, I may
eventually get round to it myself. Meantime, if you read the
briefing notes for attenders of my annual down hill
for Beginners & Experienced - Mayrhofen trip, you'll
have a good idea of what to do & what to avoid.
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We have a web based ski booking form available for some trips.
Most other trips are still booked direct with Ski Organiser. (When time is found by Julian he will do more
work automating the back end behind the booking form, for
detail processing, & then offer an extended version to any
others Ski Organisers who may
want it.)
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There's lots of conventions us regular club skiers are used to,
for most just ask the regular club skiers, or the Ski Organiser, Here's a couple of
examples:
- We very rarely go to hotels that accept credit cards -
bring Cash ! - All the other passengers in the car haven't
got any interest in going to a more expensive hotel or
restaurant, & all paying a lot more, just so's you can
use your credit card, (even if we could find somewhere to
take a card) so Bring Enough Cash.
- Petrol money: we normally aim to fill standard cars with
4 people, & leave the 3 passengers to pay all petrol,
leaving driver to incur depreciation (think salt water
corrosion & heavy engine wear on mountains etc), that way
we help encourage sufficient drivers to suffer the corrosive
salted & gritted winter roads, & increased risk of
collision etc. If the driver has not bought rack &
chains, passengers sometimes deduct the price of a beer from
petrol money, & buy a beer over the weekend for the
driver who was kind enough to synchronise his vehicle &
squeeze their skis onto his rack etc, thus encouraging more
drivers to invest in rack & chains.
- We pretty much always stop for a drink after skiing &
don't rush off. The drivers don't booze it up though.
- Passengers should synchronise with Drivers travel plans,
be back on time from skiing, & not order meals when rest
are planning to leave.
- Drivers co-ordinate plans with their fellow drivers.
- Passengers are normally head counted after skiing by
their own driver. Drivers make mutual check arrangements
among each other. Passengers of a missing /late driver should
report the missing skier to other drivers.
- We don't come back early to unlock vehicles for non
skiers.
- A meal on the way back to Munich is optional, subject to
driver - depends if stomach demanding food to digest, plus
aching muscles demanding blood to rebuild, may deprive brain
of blood supply to concentrate on driving.
- We probably have other conventions too, which are easier
remembered in the snow fields than typing here in Munich
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- The annual ski planning meal enables us to
optimise/maximise the amount of ski trips available during
the ski season. It was started after we had a dry January one
year: the snow was good, but we fumbled the planning, &
had no down hill weekend for 3 weeks.
- We try to maximise the number of full weekends available
but get lower turnout if we have adjacent full weekends, so
we try to alternate full weekends & day trips on
successive weekends.
- We get fewer weekends if we first ad hoc book the easy to
organise single day trips on any random weekend Ski Organisers bid for; so instead it's
better to try to schedule the 2 day full weekends trips
first, on alternate weekends, & then add the one day
trips in between.
- We try when possible to avoid a full weekend on
Fasching's party weekend; we often do a one day trip then,
Sunday usually.
- The timetable needs to account for Christmas & Easter. EG 1
day trips on weekends when accommodation is hard to find, 2
days (or more) when easy.
- We sometime run 2 trips the same day, EG Langlauf &
down hill, but a few Ski
Organisers do more than one form of skiing, & don't
want to miss out, so sometime we do EG langlauf on Saturday
& down hill on Sunday (or vice versa), rather than 2 1
day & none the other day same weekend.
- Langlauf dates: try: Munich International Ski Club
- We usually (but not always) manage to avoid EG a 1 day
down hill in one resort on the same weekend a 2 day down hill
trip in a different resort.
- There used to be a private trip to France (Peter's), that
involves a number of regulars, so it's as well to be aware of
private trip dates that may affect numbers on public
trips.
- One of our regulars ha a mini bus, takes maybe 6 or 7
roughly. Drink with the winterised beer gardeners,
& you may discover who & possibly get offered a trip
in the van or a car :-)
- We also arrange small groups not on the official
programme, these are often arranged at short notice among the
winterised beer
gardeners, the stammtisch goers occasionally, & the
Skiers
List ).
- This
Hanenkamm date in 2006 clashed with Mayrhofen
trip so might be Traffic jams?.
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- The schedule used to be organised with identical papers
with dates in front of each Ski
Organiser at the ski planning meal, for bids for dates
& then collated, discussed & dates shuffled to
optimise use of weekends. As that was best typed, & as we
usually know a few requests in advance, it's helpful to list
those too, & as the info will be published on web email
& printed programme later anyway, it's convenient to list
early tentative plans on the web too. Some years Julian just provides a giant
sheet, & all trips are marked up, that system works well
with smaller numbers, but problems of wet table & dark
restaurants. Torch useful ! In 2004 Julian also had a laptop
loaded & ready with the planning table, (which would have
made inserting extra mid week trips in particular, rather
easier, but then paper was used as more easily review-able by
all the group (passing a laptop around among glasses of beer,
& plates of food is problematic, compared with
paper.
- Details can be registered on this list by emailing or
phoning Julian.
- These dates are NOT fixed, they're just some initial
wishes of some individual Ski
Organisers & will likely be changed somewhat when Ski Organisers together at &
after the annual Ski Organisers
planning meal, when we optimise the season's schedule.
-
First Come First Served ? - No It's Not That Simple
!
- It is not necessarily first come first served for
this timetable, neither by email bids nor on the planning
night.
- it seems best to optimise the ski timetable to
maximise ski enjoyment & safety etc, for the skiers,
not simply to satisfy whichever Ski Organiser managed to bid first
by email, or managed to arrive on time for the ski
meal.
- Full weekend ski trips in prime snow time (Jan to
mid/late Feb) are considered valuable, not to be messed
up by less than experienced Ski
Organisers, so it's appreciated if newer Ski Organisers to the group first
do one day trips, & smaller 2 day trips out of prime
time, until they've shown the group they have the proven
organisational ability to extend to reliably &
successfully organise large groups in prime snow time.
(There's a lot to get right, or wrong, in a full weekend,
& only a few optimal dates in a short season, so we
can't afford to waste any).
- "First come" might (or might not) be OK for langlauf,
which generally is low death/serious injury risk compared
to down hill or ski tour.
- When you get to be standing on a steep mountain,
perhaps teaching down hill beginners how to crash
properly & avoid broken arm/legs etc, or teaching
tourer-s avalanche danger assessment etc, then competence
is more important than who made first claim.
- There's other criteria, equally doubtless skiers will
think of & understand them better than non skiers,
& be more affected by the decisions than non skiers,
so such decisions are best left to skiers !
- It's optimal if we first try to work out from other
constraints, which weekends are best for 1 or 2 day trips,
then Ski Organisers choose
dates available ?
- Like to do a trip yourself? - Pick a free date above & get advice from other Ski Organisers.
- Date Arbitration/decision etc is by the body of Ski Organisers.
-
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Each time there's a skiing problem, one receives a few
un-solicited & usually un-informed comments from non
skiers who seem to all too often make the ignorant assumption
(subconscious or conscious) that organising a ski trip should
be based on similar principles to those used to organise
other events most of which are of a far more trivial nature,
EG trip to a city restaurant. Non skiers often don't bother
asking nearly enough questions before issuing their
frequently un-informed opinions, & it gets tedious trying
to politely explain the many things they hadn't realised or
bothered to ask. It's of course quite possible for non
skiers, & skiers of limited experience to have useful
ideas, & for those we're grateful, but please ask _lots_
of questions before you allow an idea to grow to an opinion
formed in ignorance, that could likely cause annoyance if
thrust unasked on Ski
Organisers.
-
For True Experience:-
- Learn to ski (any type of ski) ! - Your perceptions
may change.
- If you've tried Langlauf & weren't scared
...
- Try down hill, its faster & more
dangerous,
- Try Ski Tour. - sometime slower than down hill, can
be more dangerous though.
- Organise some one day or more Ski Trips, (if you
haven't already)
- Organise beginners trips,
- Organise complete club ski weekends
- Keep doing it for 10 to 20 years for a club.
Remember Ski Organisers
mistakes (yours & others), logistical contingencies
& accidents & problems your skiers have been
caught out by in the mountains, & learn from them,
& try to plan to avoid them etc.
- Encourage other Skiers to both help out on big
trips & organise trips of their own too
- ... And now the hard bit ... ;-)
- Sigh when non skiers dump unsolicited opinions on
you about ski matters !
- A few of us are experienced Ski Organisers who have done most or
all the above list.
-
Non skiers & perhaps those who haven't done down
hill, tour, or full weekend skiing might like to consider
the following list of a few of the many problems that Ski Organisers have dealt
with, & that they try to plan around &/or to
avoid or deal with where possible, (events that have
helped make us `experienced') :
- Road closure from avalanche danger, skiers stranded
in ski boots in bar now closing, no hotels left, no
money & passports for hotels either, cars blocked
by locked barrier from driving through avalanche
endangered road to reach rooms containing normal shoes,
clothes, passports, money & beds for the
night.
- Ski drivers & passengers separated, lost from
each other, now on different mountains/valley stations,
after having been separated by lack of visibility,
piste closed by avalanche danger, different
speed/ability etc. Lost skiers & missing drivers,
cant always stick notes to wind screens 'cos the snow
ice wind sleet rain & dark defeat you, & it's
slow walking in ski boots, & the last bus has gone,
& taxis are expensive, or no racks, or just not
available
- Injury
- Mugging (Robbery) of party member.
- Broken rib, broken arm reported to you at
breakfast, before 1st coffee, with some fool
threatening to beat you up, because you somehow didn't
know, though you were skiing a different mountain with
a different group yesterday, & this is the first
you've heard, no one having reported it yesterday.
- Lack of cars, or passengers for booked cars, lack
of snow chains for glaciers, winter tyres, ski racks,
inadequate anti-freeze, cars doors locked solid, car
break downs,
- Rush to leave car park before dead end glacier
tunnel is locked for the night.
- The odd blizzard perhaps with a group of you on a
snow slope of 45 degrees, a few miles from human
habitation, (skiers car groups are never sorted by ski
ability, so ski groups comprise assorted passengers
& drivers belonging to car groups of skiers
elsewhere on same or loosely adjacent mountains.
- Skiers stuck in dead end valleys, night closing in,
hours of hard work ahead: either walking up mountain
back to piste at top of mountain (to reach piste to
valley) or the same but hours skiing in increasing dark
through raw forest.
- Lack of hotel rooms
- Can't book pensions often for 1 night.
- Can't find where booked pensions are.
- Cant drive to hotel cos too steep narrow & icy
!
- Hotel rooms stolen by club members not booked on
the trip.
- Stuck without chains, can't get up
- Driver stuck up top without chains, he &
passengers can't get down icy road
- Broken/stolen skis boots sticks
- People who forget equipment money & passports
to rent equipment,
- People who tell drivers they `must' be driven back
up mountain fast to return gear before shop closes, or
`must' return early to Munich (no chance!)
- Driver turned back at the border, 'cos of no
passport, & passenger left with no driver.
- Car impounded by border police, sudden extra
passenger & skis to squeeze into whichever cars if
any remain behind the impounded one.
- Passengers claiming Sunday morning to have no money
to pay hotel or driver's petrol money.
Non ski organisers should realise Ski Events,
particularly down hill/tour & full weekend trips are
potentially much more dangerous & complex & need
much more forward planning than most other simple events,
& are immensely more complex, than the truly trivial
booking of a meal in a Munich Restaurant, that many
experience as a club `Event' & unconsciously draw
parallels with when forming opinions on how club events
should be done, & who has supposed rights to do
whatever, etc.
Conclusion: non skiers would be wiser to ask a lot more
questions before venturing un-informed unsolicited opinions
on ski issues to experienced ski Organisers !
- Contact Ski Organisers
well in advance for weekend trips (deposits often
required).
- All routes & destinations subject to snow
conditions and car seats available, snow & road
conditions, & Ski
Organisers decisions.
- Events can be relocated, postponed or cancelled if
necessary without notice, for instance due to snow or
traffic conditions, lack of enough participants or
transport, or indisposition of Ski Organisers.
- Check your e-mail, pay attention to announcements at
the Friday. Stammtisch, and always confirm booking with the
Ski Organiser
beforehand.
- Don't just turn up (unless the Ski Organiser specifically advertises
that is acceptable), as there may well be no space for
you.
- If you must cancel, formally cancel direct with the Ski Organiser so he/she knows.
No-shows who muck up our car & or hotel sharing plans
are usually not welcome on subsequent trips, Ski Organisers usually mention names
of no shows to fellow Ski
Organisers.
- Weekend trips often require advance booking and
deposits, which we drink to celebrate you not coming, if
you fail to show up.
- Events are organised by volunteers. Participation is
entirely at your own risk and on your own responsibility,
we (organisers, fellow participants etc) disclaim All
responsibility !
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Another Group: Richard
Gipps' Ski Tourers group
Another Group: Dead link though group
still live http://www.geocities.com/parallel_ski_munich : Ken
Lawler's Short Ski Beginners Group
Ken's group isn't part of our group, but a seperate Verein.
There's numerous of our people there & vice versa. Many
good recommendations too, & he does one open trip, no
tuition or charges etc for us too. Ken's group provides
equipment, beginners training, accommodation & (I
think) lift tickets, for a fee.
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Paraski, a Yahoo group run by HanZi Field, who took Ken's beginner course in
'02. HanZi goes skiing nearly every weekend and is always
looking for passengers and drivers to go along. Email List . Hanzi
also does barbecues in summer, & overlaps with club
circles.
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One day trips, weekend, long weekend and week long trips.
Email
subscription request to Donna Peavey Day trip cost per
person '04: Members - Eur. 35, Non-members - Eur. 45, Long
trips: February 20 - 24 Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, Italy at
Easter. 3 - 10 April. Madesima resort.
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Railway, bus companies and sport shops offer day trips with
transport maybe breakfast and lift pass built in. They leave
very early in the morning (typically German !) and leave the
resort too early as well, even more typically German ! I've
never tried them, as I aim to arrive at top of mountain with
last lift, maybe admire the view or have a drink, wait for
the crowd to clear off, then ski down & have another
drink & a cake in a cafe/bar. Forget that relaxed idea if
you'r on a commercial German bus.
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- Format & Content in whole & in parts, Copyright
Julian Stacey,
Munich 2001.
- Permission granted to make links to this & other
pages.
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