Snowlines: Skiing off into the sunset

By COLIN MOORE

There can be no better way to end a ski season than to ski off Paretetaitonga and down the Whakapapa Glacier on Mt Ruapehu.

The slopes are deliciously long and clean, all the way into the heart of the Whakapapa ski area.

Back in those bumper snow years of the early 1990s, I cramponed up to the 2751m summit of Pare Peak and didn't take my skis off for the last time that season until the bottom carpark, well below the start of the Iwikau loop road.

That is a vertical drop of more than 1200m and a run of 7 or 8 km.

This season the snow cover at Mt Ruapehu has been good but not down to the bottom carpark at this time of the year.

Yet, skinning up the Whakapapa Glacier on touring skis remains as rewarding as ever and perhaps even more so when spring has well and truly arrived.

In this near-summer weather there is a brief window of opportunity each morning when the snow has a perfect consistency.

We skied off the top of Whakapapa's Far West T-bar at around 10 am and away from the lift line found a slope of textbook spring corn.

"This is what Mt Ruapehu spring skiing is all about," I remarked to my daughter as we carved through sugar crystals as firm as a packed powder slope at the height of the season.

So we went back for another run and when we hit the same slope about 15 minutes later it was already soft and past its best.

Snowboarders seem to come into their own in such soft snow conditions. They also seem to make up about 90 per cent of those who leave the softening snow and T-bar queue and trudge upwards in brilliant sunshine towards the mountain's crater lake. It is part of the culture of snowboarding to be adventurous and seek out untamed terrain. Good on them.

Many carry their boards on special backpacks and they have the advantage of soft boots that are relatively easy to walk in. My son and daughter strap their skis to a backpack and, at my suggestion, climb in tramping boots. It means carrying ski boots in the pack but it is certainly much easier walking.

I have the advantage of touring skis with climbing skins which means all I need carry is my lunch and some mandatory safety equipment. It may be a beautiful day but that can quickly change at these heights. Carrying such items as a snow shovel so as to be able to dig a shelter if need be, and a bivvy sack to crawl into, is as wise as putting on a car seat belt.

We reach the edge of the crater lake in just over an hour. Its gunmetal waters are much lower than when I last saw it before the 1990s eruptions. But the water is rising and a secondary crater that has developed is the cause of some concern.

A smell of sulphur wafts in the breeze to remind us that this is a live volcano.

Lunch is had on a ledge just below Pare Peak. Across the Col is the Dome and a sastrugi-covered Dome Shelter. The south facing slope to the Dome is covered in lumpy ice too but the lee slopes of Paretetaitonga and the broad expanse of the Whakapapa Glacier are in delightful ski condition.

We are back in the Whakapapa skifield boundaries all too soon and the lower we ski the softer and heavier the snow. By the time we reach the Knoll Ridge cafe we are glad to take our skis off and take a chairlift down.

The season has been a bit like our last day - a mixture of excellent and average.

Dave Mazey, general manager of Ruapehu Alpine Lifts, says the Mt Ruapehu fields have had the best snow cover since 1995 but it was still below the average for the last 10 years.

He says the first year of running Whakapapa and Turoa under the one umbrella has gone well and many skiers and boarders have taken advantage of the seamless lift tickets and used whichever field has the best weather on the day.

That advantage and the cheap season tickets have encouraged many people back into skiing.

Plans for next season include an increase in snowmaking capacity so that beginner slopes can open at Queens Birthday weekend.

The skifields are to close on November 4 but the chairlifts at Whakapapa will run throughout the summer for sightseeing.

* This is the final Snowlines for this season. Throughout the summer, Shorelines, a fortnightly column devoted to news and activities around our coastal and inland waterways, will alternate with Outdoors.

* colinmoore@xtra.co.nz