Second Self-Guided group of the season: Gustav, Johan, Claes, and Hans, from Sweden. Impressive how quickly these guys pulled the trigger on this trip! Tickets were booked not far off from Christmas and just over 2 weeks later they were here in Kyrgyzstan for 4 days of ski touring from the yurt and 4 days of cat skiing with Kalibek over in the Suusamyr Valley (http://suusamyr.kg).

Gustav connected with a local guide, Misha, who would accompany them for the trip. He hadn’t before skied the 40 Tribes yurt zone, nor Kalibek’s zone in Suusamyr, but was without a doubt a strong and experienced guide having trained for the past 5 years through the Kyrgyzstan Mountain Guides Association, a project sponsored by the Swiss company, Mammut, in partnership with IFMGA, the Swiss Mountain Guides Association, and the Association of British Mountain Guides. It was a very cool way to reconnect with Mammut’s project here. We first met with Adolf Schlunegger, one of Mammut’s primary trainers, at the end of our second year scouting – March 2010 – in Bishkek. We introduced the goals of the 40 Tribes project, learned about Mammut’s efforts to initiate KMGA, knew all along there would be an opportunity to interweave initiatives, and then here it finally happened…in a yurt…with a Russian guide…and Swedish clients.

The Skiing:

The Swedes brought the snow – for better or for worse. Flakes began to fall no more than an hour after their arrival to the yurt on the 15th, and continued falling until an hour or so after they skied out on the 18th.

Avalanches from the roof of the yurt lulled us to sleep pretty much every night, releasing with every couple cm of accumulation. We awoke to 15cm fresh on the morning of the 15th, 5cm or so on the 16th, another 5cm on the 17th, and 2-3cm to top it off on the 18th. Not exactly an epic storm by most skiers’ standards, but it’s a rarity for a storm to persist here for more than 2-3 days.

With Misha along as their guide…and given the persistent snowfall and conditions outside!…I spent the days at the yurt hanging with our local yurt guides, Kas and Anarbek. They were stoked on the jumps they had built and the new snowfall that had filled out the landings. I was stoked on taking pics of them airing it like there was no tomorrow.

It was quite cool to have Misha in the full-on ski guide position. Unfortunately it was quite difficult to recommend tours as I had no idea how even the 15cm the first night had affected conditions. Through breaks in the clouds, however, we could see that the new snow was releasing like crazy. After 3 or so weeks of no snow, a variety of sliding surfaces had developed. Safe skiing was great on days 1 and 2, but deep and slabby by days 3 and 4…not to mention cold! Temps dropped from positive readings on the morning of the 16th to -10-15C, maybe even colder, by the morning of the 17th. Winds picked up – not so much at the yurt site, but you could hear it howling through the surrounding spruce forests and up high as the storm moved out.

Thus, the Swedes, who packed with them a mighty storm, were at the mercy of undesirable weather and avy conditions for pretty much their entire stay. A half ascent of Tushku Tamak was the first tour on the afternoon of day 1. Eggs and Bacon skied quite well the morning of day 2, but the exploratory afternoon tour to check out the lower faces to the W of the yurt was aborted due to avy activity. On what was easily the coldest day – day 3 – they ascended to the Alpai Tur saddle to see what was happening up high. From the yurt we could see they were getting blasted by winds. Good decisions were made regarding conditions of all drop zones up high, so they skied the ridgeline from the saddle back to Tushku Tamak and took a deep, slow, but safer way home. Day 4 it was snowing…still. The 20-25cm of pow we were skiing with the Frenchies the first week in January had become 50+cm! Unfortunately it needed time to settle down and wouldn’t happen before they split from the yurt. But man, it was beautiful once it finally cleared!

Conditions/Avy Summary:

By the morning of the 18th we had seen 25+cm of new snow at the yurt site – not a monster storm by any means, but sizable for the Karakol region. It was the first big storm to hit after more than 3 weeks of sun, cold temps, and some wind. The 15cm from the first night was the trigger for most natural avalanches witnessed, most of which released on NE/E aspects, both point release and small slab. Avy conditions jumped to considerable almost immediately with the arrival of the storm and jumped to considerable-high by the 3rd day. Temps that accompanied the first dump were quite warm. Felt good, but surely didn’t help stability. Neither did the wind that chased the storm out. In the end we were all stoked on the snow – less skiing, sure, but there’s nothing quite like weathering a storm in a yurt…and even the Swedes agreed that the yurt experience was unique and awesome enough to ease the pain of getting shut down by Mother Nature.

From The Guestbook:

“The Swedes without much expectations showed up in this beautiful country and what a success so far! Despite some inexperience of ski touring we have had some great ascents, a few PERFECT runs, avalanche awareness and snowy clouds for four days. We hope we’ve brought lots of snow to be settled for stellar February conditions.

When it comes to the organization and accommodation in the yurt we just want to say thank you – a perfect blend of comfort and coziness, great service, and super great people.”

-Johan, Gustav, Claes, Hans; Sweden

Up Next:

10 Kiwis. Actually, they’ve already come and gone. Trip report coming soon! Follow them at http://skiingthesilkroad.com.

Our first official Self-Guided group: Friends of friends from France, one of whom, Nico, skied with us here in Kyrgyzstan last winter not long after the yurt site was first established. Nico contacted me back in the summer to say there wasn’t any other way they would rather start the New Year than skiing from the yurt. He was writing from Congo, where he lives and works as a photojournalist. I knew he was seriously stoked to get back into the mountains, and knew it would be an epic week as the starter to our 2012 season, so I had to join. Manu and Vince arrived with Nico on Jan 2 as his partners in crime – equally amped on the adventure ahead. It was their first time in Kyrgyzstan. Vince brought his speed riding sail. He had only flown 2 times previously, and was planning to set flight for his 3rd time for a first speed riding descent in our zone. Anarbek and Kasidin, our local yurt guides, joined us to host for the week and fill the positions of Iron Chef and Firemaster respectively…which they do well.

France to Karakol and on to Ichke-Jergez village in a day – definitely an impressive start to the trip. No hitches aside from a shitty layover in the Moscow airport. I later filled them in on Terminal D. Public transport was smooth from Bishkek to Karakol, and after loading up on goodies from the local bazaar we hopped into “Schumacher’s” infamous UAZ Soviet military bus for onward transport to the village. A big dinner with our partner family in the fire-warmed kitchen, plus the mighty travels of the day, sent everyone to bed by 9. The next morning, a 2-hour tour landed us in our paradise basecamp, where we ate incredibly well, laughed hard, and played Yahtzee even harder for the next 5 nights.

The Skiing:

First speed riding descent of the trip on the same afternoon as arriving the yurt? Why not. The guys stopped in to the yurt for a warm bowl of soup and then continued on for the hour-long ascent to “Tushku Tamak” at 3100m. Slivers of afternoon light cut across the slope. Short flight. Fresh tracks.

We were blessed with perfect weather for the next 4 days – zero wind, blue skies with high clouds, comfortable temps. We went for the summits: “Alpai Tur” E Summit at 3500m and the newly named “Have Some Tea” at 3450m.

The upper W face which drops into the Alpai Tur basin seemed the perfect first descent for us up high. Safe and straightforward, short but super sweet. In the afternoon sun it felt like early spring.

“Eggs and Bacon,” also newly named, was a great alternate option for returning to the yurt instead of the typical, but always great, return from Tushku Tamak. Both the upper W face of Alpai Tur and Eggs and Bacon would serve as runways later in the week for Vince with his sail.

Have Some Tea: It’s a mind-blowing tour no matter how you approach it, and the view from the summit offers an incredible perspective on the always enticing E face which drops from the Alpai Tur saddle. On top of that, the huge W face always holds the afternoon sun so you can hang up high late and score Golden Hour turns while the mercury is beginning to drop back at the yurt.

On our last full day we decided to go for the gold: Up to the Alpai Tur saddle, drop the E face, up to the summit of Have Some Tea, drop the E face, long tour back to the yurt via an alternate pass that provides a spectacular view of every summit above. Nico was the first to drop the E face from the saddle. Conditions were prime. We had been a bit skeptical of steeper E/NE faces all week as the only natural releases around were on similar aspects. This face wasn’t the same though. It was more due E facing, caught the late morning and midday sun perfectly, and the snow was fast, supportive, and silent. “Easy Rider” it became.

The scene from the bottom was as unreal as the ski: The mighty “Gamburger Stand” N face to the south, our clean pow tracks on Easy Rider to the W, and our tracks from the summit of Have Some Tea from 2 days earlier to the E. From there it was a 45-minute tour through an untracked paradise zone via an alternate approach to Have Some Tea.

As tends to be the case, the planned descent on the E side of Have Some Tea looked amazing. But there’s just something about the Golden Hour that makes the drop to the W irresistible come late day. Plus clouds were building over the high peaks and it seemed as if weather was rolling in. So we dropped W again, this time a bit further towards the Gamburger Stand…exactly what we had been staring at from our lunch point following Easy Rider. It was our last decent for the week and it fit with the fast, big and ridiculously fun theme of the trip. We triggered 3 sizable slough avys which scratched through our tracks after we reached our safety spot, as if to chase us out of there. Fine by us – we had done our damage for the week and had our fill. Actually there’s no doubt we would have kept chasing lines for days to come, but time was up! For the Frenchies it was back to Karakol the next morning, and then back to Bishkek and flight home to France the following day. C’est la vie!

Conditions/Avy Summary:

We haven’t seen much new snow in 2012 aside from the 2-4cm that fell Jan 1. Clearly that didn’t matter much up high. Conditions this past week were better than I’ve ever seen them in terms of coverage, supportive layers, and avy danger.

A couple of natural releases let go the morning after the Jan 1 storm on the N/NE faces directly behind the yurt. Hard to say the exact scope of these releases as we avoided that zone entirely, but the seemed to run no more than 30cm deep, stepping down to the baselayer in isolated pockets only. They were a variety of point-releases, especially from the rocks of “Kyzyl Tash,” and one bigger natural fracture that seems to have carried up to 300-400m.

As mentioned above, the snow we rode this week was mostly silent – not even any whumphing or settling of the snowpack while touring, which is something we have heard and seen a lot of over the past few years. It’s the same trademark ultra-cold continental faceted snowpack, but with some supportive layers underneath. This could be due to the deeper-than-average snowpack, or more consistent snowfall throughout the late fall/early winter, less extreme temperature gradients, a number of things.

The W faces, especially that from the Alpai Tur saddle, seemed bomber. I say seemed because the W face of Have Some Tea did release 4 slough avys over the course of the week. They were all skier/rider-triggered and they were slow moving. We were always to our safety spot by the time the avys reached full bore.

We were a bit hesitant of the steep N/NE faces, which stay super cold and tend to have a more consistently faceted snowpack. In the end, we didn’t drop anything N/NE with a slope angle above 35 or so degrees. The closest thing to N/NE was Easy Rider, but it was more due E…and it was fast, silent and deep!

From The Guestbook:

“DA YURT is so awesome, mountains so nice, powerful, amazing! We just spend an awesome trip like will never hope to have it. It was just perfect for the ski, for the vibes, just a mega THANKS!!”

-Emmanuel Kerinec, Montpellier, France

“Ryan, you had a very great idea coming here and doing this! Congratulation! Now I will always drink my vodka thinking about Kyrgyzstan, Kasidin – the fire master, Anarbek – the real chef, and all of the great and amazing virgin powder line we ski this week…PERFECT!”

-Nicolas Guyot, Les Avanchers, France/Congo

“We were making as amazing dreams in the day than in the night! I’ll never forget a so awesome experience. In the yurt with really good meal and powerful fire. In the mountain with incredible snow. Ryan…thank you for the weather “

-Vincent Metz, La Franqui, France

Next Up:

Next up for Jan 15-18 is a group of 4 from Sweden. After that Jan 19-23 with a group of 10 from New Zealand (www.skiingthesilkroad.com).

http://snow-forecast.com/
Snow-forecast.com’s Himalayas Snow Conditions and Weather Maps cover Kyrgyzstan, so study up on your geography in order to place the country and accurately read the snowfall accumulation maps. Snow-forecast.com also generates a resort forecast for Kyrgyzstan’s largest resort, Karakol, which is in the same forecast zone as the 40 Tribes yurt. From experience we can say that the forecast tends to be correct in terms of timing of storms, but don’t pay as much attention to “snow (cm)” as it seems like it’s almost always under-forecasted. Still, if you want a heads-up whenever it is snowing in the Karakol region, we definitely recommend that you sign up for Karakol Mountain Ski Base “Snow Alerts” via the link below.
Himalayas Snowfall Accumulation Maps – Static
Himalayas Snowfall Accumulation Maps – Dynamic (Karakol Coordinates Marked)
Karakol Mountain Ski Base 6-Day Detailed Forecast (Top)
Sign up for Karakol Mountain Ski Base Snow Alerts

http://meteo-gid.ru/
Surprisingly accurate forecasting from Moscow. Meteo-gid.ru generates long-term (5 to 7-day) forecasts for both Karakol and Suusamyr, another great backcountry zone. This site was recently updated and now features a sliding 5-day forecast window with all of the information you need, including weather and temperature summaries for 4 different times of the day (night, morning, afternoon, evening), wind direction/speed, humidity, and pressure. We’ve found that the temp and precip chart beneath the sliding window is at times accurate, and other times over-forecasted, but in general, offers good insight into expected snowfall. General rule of thumb to translate mm precip (the blue bars) into expected snowfall is to multiply by 10.
Bishkek 5-Day Forecast
Bishkek 7-Day Forecast
Karakol 5-Day Forecast
Karakol 7-Day Forecast
Suusamyr 5-Day Forecast
Suusamyr 7-Day Forecast

http://hmn.ru/
Also from Moscow, but in English! Now that Meteo-gid.ru has received a facelift, Hmn.ru seems a bit drab, but still provides good back-up forecasts to check against the others. Hmn.ru additionally provides an 11-day extended forecast on top of 3 and 5-day detailed forecasts. The weather station used to generate Hmn.ru’s “Tian-Shan” forecast is actually 30+ miles to the west/southwest of Karakol, meaning that it’s a good 50 or so miles as the crow flies from the 40 Tribes yurt. Not the most accurate, but still helpful. We are pretty sure that the station Hmn.ru uses for the Tian-Shan forecast is also used by Snow-forecast.com to generate the Karakol Mountain Ski Base Forecast. Be sure to check out the interesting Station Synopsis link below.
Bishkek 5-Day Forecast
Bishkek 11-Day Forecast
Karakol 5-Day Forecast
Karakol 11-Day Forecast
Tian-Shan 5-Day Forecast
Tian-Shan 11-Day Forecast
Tian-Shan Station Synopsis