Rauth Hutte

Hans has been here just one night when we got him out on his first ski tour up to the Rauth hutte on the flank of the Hohe Munde. The snow was great and we got some pretty deep powder turns with the dogs! Here are some pictures of the day!

-Owen

Stuiben Kopf ski tour with variations Dec 16

Yesterday Alex and I got out on a ski tour to the Stuiben Kopf, a ski tour that during the normal season is a short tour that I use as an excuse to go drink beer in a beautifull alpine setting but when no lifts are open turns into a longer tour with real route finding and an overall good time. This is the only time i have ever been on this tour and not seen more than 10 people skinning up at the same time. We broke the trail teh whole time which was an added bonus (I'm weird)

We met at the Kreuzeck bahn in a rainstorm before setting off up the Kreuzeck and on to the Langenfelder lift that we were pleasently suprised to find was above the snow line. From the top of this lift we skied some powder down to the Hochalm Bahn which is not yet. At that point I was going throw the skins on and start skinning up the run to the Y that you usually drop into the Bernidein but Alex  reminded me that there is a hiking path in summer that goes directly from the kreuzeck to the Bernedein so instead of putting on the skins we skied below the Hochalm bahn traversing right and eventually found the summer hiking path before putting the skins on. After skinning for 25 minutes we were skinning accross the Bernedein run and on to where the normal start of the tour when the lift is running.

After 30 minutes on the normal skin track we made our way right as if we were going to head to the Alpspitze but instead made our way to the edge of the cliff that the Stuiben hutte sits on went to a small klettersteig through a small gash in the cliff side that had been pointed out to me last winter but I had never tried. We put the skis on the pack and made our way up and over the rock band putting us 200 or 300 meters above the hut were the usual skin track is that goes from the hut. After making it up and over the ridge we kept on skinning up until we reached the top of the Stuiben kopf...or Stuiben Spitze, I get the two mixed up but they are 100 meters apart so it doesn't really matter!



After a quick meal and stripping the skins we made our way down the opposite side of the ridge to the valley skiing a small couloir with some bare spots at the top that ended up having much better snow the further we got down into the valley. Once in the bottom of the valley we straight pointed the skis and made our way back to the winding skin stack through the trees and out to the Bernedein run where we put the skins back on and climbed are way out of the unopened area and back to the Kreuzeck bahn for the long, wet ski back to the valley. Overall fun day and first day of ski touring this year that was not just straight up and straight down that that added some spice to the day as well as some fun route finding. Great day!

-Owen

Short tour of the Langenfelder

I made a short ski tour of an unopened ski run and had a great time making my way back down the small slope before being back the resort. Here's a small clip of that run. The steeper stuff starts at around 3 minutes. Enjoy!
-Owen

Dawn Patrol Hausberg, Dec 10

A little biit of snow

This morning was the best Dawn Patrol I have ever gotten to experience. My alarm went off at around 4:25 and with one look out of the window I was rushing around trying to get my clothes on and heading toward the door with skis and skins already attached in hand. One quick text later to make sure Jeremy was awake and functioning because pulling into the parking lot to find out your partner is still tucked away in bed is a tragedy I try to avoid I ate some breakfast and stepped out into the cold air.
Walking around the garage I was a little disheartened to find my car barrakaded into my parking spot due to a snowplow that had pushed 2ft of packed snow all the way around my car. I swept the 8 or 9 inches of light snow off my car and put in the Suby in gear. Not wanting to waste anytime digging out my car I decided to try just backing up right over the berm a chance and it worked out perfectly. My Subaru surprises me everyday I drive it in the snow.

Skinning past a little cabin

Driving through the town it looked like the snowplows were out in full force but for some reason had yet to plow the entrance road to the hausberg so  the snow got thrown up and over my front bumper like I was snowmobiling all the way into the parking lot. Arriving in the parking lot there was one plow going back and forth as I waited five minutes for Jeremy to arrive and for the tour to get going.
The start of the tour was well groomed until we got to the first major rise and after that it was like braking trail on a powder day but luckily the snow was quite light allowing us to move reasonably fast. We made our way up toward the horn, a run that in the daytime goes right off the top gondola station at the hausberg. We made it just up to the point where the last serious rise started to happened and decided to turn around because Jeremy had work and still needed to take a shower and get some other stuff ready for his day.

Nice turns in anyones book



Just about to the knee

The first turns were just over my boot top and very light. I missed the effortlessness of the turns and really enjoyed each one as we made out way down the nice easy gradient. I haven't skied this good of snow in a long time and was just happy to make any turns at all considering the resort had only been open for 3 days and all of the days have been powder days. After making ten turns we decided to break out the camera just to make the friends jealous and to capture a great time.


Milking all the skiing we could out of the steeper base section we made nice short radius turns all the way to the groomers where we straight lined out and back to the cars that had both gained another two inches on their hoods. Overall this was the best Dawn Patrol I have ever done and so far this year definitely makes the top spot for fun days even though we really only got one run in the turns made it well worth it. Looking out the window right now to see it snowing more and more make me think we might have to do another Dawn Patrol tomorrow morning as well...stay posted!

Ski touring Ehrwald Alm

I got out today with the parents on a nice little tour of some sidecountry that hasn't been opened yet to the public and had a good time skiing some tracked out powder. Hopefully another video coming soon as it is dumping hard outside right now! I got a few shots with the gopro so here is one of the runs!
-Owen

Mittenwald bike ride

It was a beautiful weekend with clear skies so we decided to take a bike ride to Mittenwald as it might be the last warm weekend of the year (lets hope!) We got a later start because I had worked until 2:30 but still had a great half day of cycling. Here are some photos I took from the day.
-Owen

On the trail to Mittenwald

Lunch near the German mountain troops base

Heading home

Getting back into Garmisch 

Hintertux weekend

I got out this weekend to Hintertux because ski patrol is headed there so I just tagged along to hit up some early season park. Really lucky was the chance to meet up with some old friends Fabian and Felix from Munich that I haven't skied with in a long time but it looks like we will be seeing each other on the mountain a lot this winter skiing some park in Ehrwald between big storms and ski tours. A lot of pros were up this weekend because of some event in Innsbruck as well as freestyle.ch going on in Zurich so it was cool to seen Henrik Harlaut and a few other riding around enjoying the early season kickers that were perfectly shaped. Here is a picture of the park from this weekend.
-Owen

Climbing near Oberammergau

Just had a fun day climbing with Jeremy, Carina and the kids up near Oberammergau on some nice rock. I just got two pitches of climbing in when Carina and I headed up a two pitch route while Jeremy watched Imil. After that Jeremy got a pitch of climbing in and Jacob got a pitch on climbing in before we belayed Imil up a slab that he did surpassingly good on. After that we took off across some super marshy fields because Carina was looking for adventure. After two stream crossing we ended up wading in ankle deep water mixed with cow shit before we hopped a fence and waded through the wide river in the coldest water ever. Walking through the fields felt like Vietnam and for some reason the one that was hating it the most was Imil who was on the back of Jeremy. Here are some pictures.
-Owen

Jumping a creek, I got a little wet on this one!

Walking through a field 

Helicopter training for bergwacht

A bushwhack

Final river crossing

Summer kayaking edit!

This summer has been one of the best ones in my memory. I got into kayaking and now feel completely comfortable on class 3 whitewater and can roll up almost every time I flip which makes life a lot easier out on the river. I've met new friends that have helped me get out on the river at least 2 times during the week and almost every weekend. I had my go-pro on my helmet for a lot of the outing I went on so here's little glimpse of what I've been up to. Enjoy!
-Owen

Kochel climbing

I got and and got some climbing at Kochel with Jeremy and Carina. The first route that was a 6+ was horrible for me and I ended up not even being able to lead it all the way getting stuck in a funky corner. I waited for a top rope and climbing it all the way through on top rope. After getting roughed up on a 6+ I felt like I had to redeem myself so I got on a 7+ and sent it with only 2 hangs which is good for me because I haven't been strength training or climbing any in the past week or two. Here are some pictures from throughout the day.

-Owen 

Rissbach kayak

Had a great day on Sunday kayaking the Rissbach just outside of Garmisch. This is a class 3 river with two class 4 sections. The first class 4 I rolled but when we went back for round two I got it without rolling. The second class 4 I got through both times without any trouble. Great day of kayaking! Here is a little edit of the day from my gopro.

-Owen

Dogs first hike and tram ride

My dad and I got out of the house yesterday to give the dogs there first gondola and tram ride experiences and they did great. We first went up the Kreuzeck and did a moderate hike over to the Osterfelder bahn.

We got to the base of the Osterfelder bahn right as the rain moved in so we quickly hopped on the tram and headed to the top where we ate some food before going down all the way to the valley on the Alpspitze bahn. The dogs got more and more comfortable at getting on and off of the trams and by the end of the day Brenner and DJ were both laying down in the tram as it was going over the towers. Good day and fun hike!

July Update

It's been a while since my last blog posting so here is a little update on how life is around here...

The dogs have settled in very nicely to life around here and are seen daily going out for walks in the field and checking out the backyard. We got Brenner potty trained without too much damage to the white rug in the entryway.


My friend Jimmy and I did the Alpspitze Kletterstieg which was pretty fun. The highlight was sliding down the snowfields with hordes of tourist watching in amazement. Here's some washed out gopro from that...



A day after the Alpspitze I headed to the Upper Ammer to kayak a new river with Jake and Reinier. It turned out to be super scenic but a little flat for my liking. There was once part of the river that you pass a huge cliff covered in moss with a waterfall going over it. Very cool and very green!

Nice shot Jake took of me

Last week I went down to Munich with Jimmy and his girlfriend who is visiting from the states, to hit up a Mac Miller concert which turned out to be pretty good but a little short. We didn't really get into the opening band that  turned out to be an asian guy rapping in German but I guess that makes sense... We met up with three more friends from Garmisch when we got there which turned out really nice.

Mack Miller

I have gotten a lot more into kayaking and it seems like it will continue to be more and more my summer sport of choice. I have gone out at least three times a week with Quirin to the Loisach and got out to check out the Obere Isar last week which turned out to be a little bit boring and the taxi to get to the put in cost €35 because you can't drive your personal car on the road. In the pictures I saw on the Internet of the it looked like the canyon part of the river was a very long narrow winding canyon but it turned out be 200 or 300 meters of canyon which was a little bit of a let down.

I got out climbing with my friend Robert Mraz from Vilseck on the Alpspitze for what we thought would be a relaxing multi pitch route that turned into hellish loose and wet rock route.  I thought we could rappel down but it turned out we had to walk down the frontside using the kletterstieg. We hauled ass down the kletterstieg and the snow patches in climbing shoes to get back to our packs to be able to catch the last tram making it by less than five minutes.
I think that climb was the worst climb I have done it quite a few years. Climbing on shale is not very fun!

A day after the Alpspitze epic Robert, Olivia, and I headed to the Eibsee to relax by the lake and take in a nice sunny day which might have been the only day of true summer in Garmisch! Jake Doherty brought out two kayaks and I brought mine to work on my roll so we had a great time drinking beer and chilling by the lake. Such a nice day!




I've been making the point to take more photos with my DSLR because a lot of times I'll bring my camera but fail to take many pictures with it. Most days I try to make a point to go and shoot some photos even if all I do it take some pictures of the dogs.

Thats life around here for the most part
-Owen

New dogs in the family!

DJ and I first meeting

Yesterday the family and I headed out to finally pick up our two new golden retrievers in a town just south of Augsburg called Oberach. The breeders name is fittingly "The Golden Angels of Oberach" and can me found at goldenangels.de.

Mom, Brenner, and Doris the breeder 

Before we left the breeder gave us the dogs passports and a little binder about the mother and father of our dogs and where they originated from. It looks like our dogs mother is named Music and their Father is named Condor.
We didn't get to meet Condor but judging that he had just gotten back from a dog show in Salzburg (no big deal) where he got 4th place out of 27 dogs I can already judge for myself that he is a we behaved dog that all the lady dogs are chasing. We did get the chance to meet Music and she seems like a very nice mother who has already taught her pups a lot about being nice to one another.

The ride home was uneventful for DJ who was sound asleep in the back of the car for most  of the ride while Brenner had a little bit of car sickness but soon enough we had made it to the house and their new stomping grounds.

The car ride home

Upon arrival Brenner was the first one to do laps in the backyard but soon enough DJ joined him and they both began getting comfortable with their new surroundings. After a day of running around the yard and an uneventful night of sleep they are both settling in nicely to our family and I think are both going to enjoy life around here a lot! I have more pictures to come but as of now they are both fast asleep in their beds.
-Owen

DJ checking everything out

Brenner catching his breath

Upper Loisach Kayak

Got out on the river Sunday afternoon and had a fun run of the upper Loisach. I got one roll after a pretty steep drop and had to wet exit once because it was hard for me to keep my cool under the water after a drop but I'm getting stronger every time I go out. Here are the helmet cam shots... The roll is at 3:08 and the wet exit is at 4:38. Enjoy!

Josh and Friends in Garmisch

My friend Josh from CO and three of his friends decided to make a stop in Garmisch before heading back to Italy for the rest of their trip. It was nice to have people my age at the house and showing people around Garmisch was fun as well so here is how their stop went and a few pictures.

Hollental Gorge

First day started with the plan that we were going to go on a relaxing bike ride around Garmisch but with one bike in need of a new tube we scrapped that plan and went on a hike that was suppose to be relaxing (sorry girls!). I miss judged how far it was up to the Hollental hutte through the gorge and it ended up being a lot longer and there were a few snow patches that my sister (wearing sandals) and I were not expecting. I think everyone loved the gorge itself but the hike got a little extensive. It was a good wake up anyways though!

The second day of their trip we walked through the haupstrasse in
the center of town checking out shops along the way and a small
farmers market that was just starting to close up as we got there.
After an hour or so on the hauptstrasse we continued over to the ski stadium to see where the Olympics were held and to hit up the luge run which is always a good time.  We kept on going into the Partenkirchen old city after the luge to see the old roman road that goes straight through the city and to check out some shops. On our way back to Garmisch I caught the train home to get my bike before heading to work leaving my sister and the group to walk into Garmisch.

At the Ski Stadium

I had work until 2400 and kept getting text messages throughout the night letting me know which bar the group was headed which was kinda scary because my sister was the one showing everyone the bars and she is not the best at directions but in the end it all worked out when we met on the hauptstrasse and headed into peaches around 1230. Three jagermeister- red bulls, a little dancing, and a creepy guy hitting on the girls and it started to be a good night! We left at closing around 3 and didn't get to sleep until quite a bit later. I don't have any pictures of this night but I do remember someone taking pictures. I'll have to get those!

The last days of their stay with us was a blur because I was always having to work and getting back to the house late. All and all I loved being able to just sit on the couch at night and talk with people who are my age and love to travel. When I get back to CO (sooner or later) I think it will be easy to connect back up with this group and feel like it was yesterday that this trip happened. I hope the rest of their trip goes great and hopefully they will come back and feel right at home here again!
-Owen

Olivia is in Garmisch!

Olivia has finally arrived in Garmisch after two very long rides in a pressurized capsule over the ocean and has arrived in Garmisch unscathed. On her first day in Garmisch I took her on a bike ride along the Loisach river where we found a place to lay down and sleep in the sun. After that we also found out that even city bike tires are burly enough to do creek crossings and that bike paths seem to go on for forever when your jet-legged from over 16 hours of travel. Good times were had and now she is asleep!
-Owen

Olivia with the Zugspitze behind

Kayaking the Loisach

I finally got out on the river with my new boat and had a great time! I met two guys at the takeout that were planning to paddle the upper Loisach and asked if I could join and they said that it would be okay. At the put in I was feeling a little tipsy in my new boat but after the first half of the river, two wet exits, and a lot of tips from the other kayakers I was feeling very good and flew through the class 4 part easier than the starting class 3 sections. It was a great day and I'm very happy with how my boat feels when on the river. I need to work on catching eddies faster and making deeper paddle strokes but that will come with time. Great day!
-Owen

The view from my boat on the Loisach

May update

May started with me getting hooked on kayaking due to a whitewater kayak course that was held here on the Loisach that I went to with Jeremy and a few other friends. After that I got a boat and all the gear for the sport which added up to a little bit of money but in the long run well worth it because after the initial purchase you don't need anything to get out on the river. Another deciding factor is that the Loisach is literally 20 minutes from my house (on a bike) so I think I will get tons of time on the water this summer!

Days after making that large purchase I decided that it would be hard for me to find another car for the price of putting a new engine in my old Subaru so I decided to drop the money to make my old car drivable again. Making the decision easier was the fact that the guy who is working on the car already has an engine that will fit into my car sitting on his lot so in a week or so I will have a car again! All and all I think these purchases are both good and well help me out in future adventures.

The car that will soon live on!

The new job is great and I like the people I'm working with and the hours couldn't be better if I had asked for them. I work 20 hours a week which is what I was working in Graf but here I work two 8 hour days and one 4 hour day instead of working 4 hours a day everyday of the week. This schedule is going to keep me free to do lots of stuff during the week and when ski season hits...you can only imagine!!

A little project that I'm working on right now is making a kids bike trailer into a bicycle trailer that I could put my kayak behind if I don't want to drive my car. I think that in the end it will become a cargo trailer for whatever we want to carry.

What I have so far

 I have seen many examples of what people have done to make these trailers great and I can't wait to see how mine turns out! Right now all I have is the frame so I'm currently searching for two 16in wheels and a hitch. After I get those two things I will have fun making it as creative as possible, maybe add some ski attachments for winter!!

-Owen

1st day shooting skiing with the T2i!

So I finally got around to taking my new DSLR up skiing with me and took some nice shots of guys skiing some fresh snow that was dropped here on the Zugspitze last Wednesday. There will be more to come but chances are more park skiing and riding because it looks like the powder season is over. Enjoy!

 -Owen

Hohe Munde Attempt

The day started with my mom and I driving out of Garmisch in the direction of Mittenwald so we could make our turnoff to Leatasch and on to our final destination of Moos, a small town with a big mountain right beside it called the Hohe Munde.

After making the drive on small mountain road we finally pulled into the parking lot around 8:45 and were on the trail by 9:00. The coverage was pretty good on the bottom half of the skin going up an cat track that was in use back when the ski area was functioning. We got to the Rauth hutte around 45min after leaving the car and began the real tour which goes to the left of the hutte and up the shoulder of the Hohe Munde. After climbing for 20 minutes I put on some sunscreen and took off up the mountain with mom following the skin track behind. At this point I got pretty far out ahead and wished I would have picked up the Motorola radios at home but as they say,"hindsight is 20/20" so I kept on moving getting little peeks of her slowly making her way up the skin track before I headed out on to the face to the left.

Zoom in to see many wet slides. This was shot from the
Rauth Hutte

At this point the snow was getting a little unfavorable for my taste due to a hard crust just underneath a very slushy layer that was getting more and more slushy every minute. I toured for 20 minutes more and decided to turn around within 200ft of the top. It was a bit angering to turn around this far from the top but with the snow getting wetter and wetter I could tell it was the right plan. After skiing down to mom and helping her change from skinning to skiing we started making turns down the face and back to the Rauth Hutte. After 20 turns we got to a small convex roll where we went skiers right and as we were turning all the snow that we had just skied on started to slowly roll passed us. Even after we had stopped to turn around (5 or 6 seconds) the snow was still rolling passed where we had just skied and had accumulated into a sizable mass of snow. The slide itself was nothing that would have hurt anyone because it was moving so slow but my mind was put to rest as to whether turning around on the much larger upper face was put to rest.

Dirt!

After making it down to the Rauth Hutte we eat our food, drank some water, and took a small rest before heading back to the car on the old ski run. On the ski run we were amazed to find that the terrain that we had toured up just three hours earlier was nothing but dirt now.We had to take our skis off for a 30 foot bare section before enjoying the slushy ski all the way to the car where some cold waters were waiting.
Overall this was a great day that tested me mentally and physically. I'm happy that my intuition in the mountains is strong and I can tell when it is time to head down or when it is time to head to the top.
I think for my mom this was a new experience because she has toured a few times with me but never in a place that getting a late start can mean the difference between safety or danger and because of our fairly late start we were close to that line.
If I had to redo today I would say that being in the parking lot at 5:30-6 would be top priority to make this tour as safe as possible before the spring conditions loosen up the snow.

-Owen

MTR 1-Lauterbrunnen Day 3

After finishing up glacier travel and rescue yesterday we moved on to avalanche rescue. For this we had Daniel and Chuck go ahead of the group and set up a scenario.

After the scenario was made we got radioed and skinned up into the scenario where we found a guy (chuck) who had lost his buddy in an avalanche. He said that his buddy was skiing without a transceiver on and there were two backpacks with transceivers in them because his buddy had left his in his pack. We quickly located the two backpacks and got started on a probe-line and found the buried victim.
All and all it took the group something like 12 minutes from the time we came upon the avalanche scene to the time we found the buried victim with the probe pole. Chuck said that it was the fastest he's seen and from my experiences in other avalanche classes and scenarios I have to agree.
From this exercise I learned more than anything how important communication is in a fast moving rescue environment.
-Owen