Located only a few miles from Ottawa, the first ski trails at Camp Fortune were cut in the early Twenties. Much has changed in almost one century and the access is much easier now. Camp Fortune is one of the oldest ski areas in Canada, it was the first ski area in Eastern Canada to have a double chairlift, first in Quebec with snowmaking and one of the first in the province to offer night skiing.
The Ottawa Ski Club celebrated its centennial in 2010 and were fundamental in starting the ski area. This short video presentation was made for Gatineau Valley Historical Society by Charles Hodgson.
One of the premier classic resorts of Eastern North America is celebrating it’s 75th anniversary this season.
Many things have changed since Joe Ryan opened Mont Tremblant Lodge on February 12, 1939. Many things have changed since I started skiing at Tremblant 40 years ago. The video I choose for this month is a wonderful piece done for Tremblant’s marketing of the event. It’s entitled “Be Part of the Tremblant Story”.
This video present the evolution of the resort : from the snowtrains to direct flight at Tremblant’s airport; sleighs from the train station to buses and cars; quiet rural setting to a modern active nightlife with shows and casino.
In 75 years, a lot has changed at Tremblant. But the pleasure of skiing remains the same. We all want the good times to last forever. So, in honour of it’s 75th anniversary, Tremblant invites you to share your memories, photos and videos. It’s your turn to carry the torch and be a part of the Tremblant story.
Tremblant has such a huge part in MadPat’s ski history. It might not be the place where I started skiing, but it was my first home mountain. It was the first mountain where I would ski on a regular basic in the years of my youth. It is the place where my grandfather used to groomed trails with snowshoes in the 1940s, it was the huge mountain that shadowed my mom’s childhood home, it is the place where my father gave ski lessons in the 1950s is the place where I’ve spent so many years of my youth. The place has changed much since that time.
“Ski For Two” was the 12th Woody Woodpecker Cartoon released in November 1944 by Walter Lantz Productions and Universal Pictures put the spotlight on skiing prior to the season. Three years after Disney’s Goofy presented to the sport of skiing to movie screen; now Woody was doing it.
They are a few puns in this cartoon as Woody takes the train to Sunstroke Valley in Idaho, that is strangely resembles United States’s first destination resort called Sun Valley which was developed by Averell Harriman of the Union Pacific Railroad.
Wally Walrus is wearing a lederhosen as many resorts with Austrian influence did at that time. At one point Woody suits up into Santa in order to trick Wally, although it is only October : an October with deep snow.
Woody also does a wonderful rendition The Sleigh (à la Russe) from Tchervanow and Kountz with ski related lyrics.
Pierre Tardivel was born 50 years ago on November 26, 1963 in Annecy, Haute-Savoie, France. Influences by the movies and the first tracks of greats like Patrick Vallençant and Sylvain Saudan, Tardivel became part of a small group of French Extreme skiers to have made his marks with an impressive 100 first descents in 1980 and still accomplishing first descents. Although most of his first descents are in the Alps, he accomplished in 1992 a first descent on Mont Everest southern summit; also an altitude record at that time of 8770m.
Pierre Tardivel has spent 20 years…. 20 years skiing the steeps. A well-known figure in the (tiny) extreme skiing community, he is the undeniable godfather of this elite discipline, and at almost 50 years old continues to put down first descents.
A monument built one turn after the other, Pierre represents the epitome of alpine skiing applied to the high-mountains, descending lines that any mortal skier would simply consider unskiable. In fact, his motto is, “no slope is impossible to ski.”
I couldn’t select just one video for this month. So here are three absolutely impressive homemade clips plus one interview for the local TV after that last video posted. The music is also pretty awesome.
Comments (in French) were written by/and Tardivel’s partners.
1987 Pointe Percée – Face Ouest – 5.3 E3 AD
Posted by Jean-Christophe Roumailhac
Pierre Tardivel et Jean-Christophe Roumailhac lors d’une des toutes premières descentes de la face Ouest de la Pointe Percée dans le massif des Aravis. Une belle voie réalisée avec le matériel de l’époque, skis droits de 2 m et chaussures de slalom.
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2008 : Pointe Perçée 2752m-Massif des Aravis – Pierre Tardivel et Jérémy Janody
Posted by Yadugaz
Itinéraire ouvert par S.Meyet et E.Guilhot. Raide et gazeux 5.4 E4 250m avec 1 rappel de 40 m. Avec Pierrot on y retourne pour voir si y a moyen de passer sans rappel et voir de prolonger… 3 tentatives et 2 échecs pour finalement éviter le rappel par la Variante Yadugaz. Pas déçu du voyage l’itinéraire est soutenu. Bravo les ouvreurs!
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2012 : Pierre Tardivel et Laurent Leemans, face Nord de la Tour “Les Grands Barjots”
Posted by Laurent Leemans and Piolet15
1ère descente à skis de la face N de la Tour, le 15 janvier 2012, par Pierre Tardivel et Laurent Leemans, accompagné par Rodolphe Popier , itinéraire baptisé “Les Grands Barjots”, dans le massif du Bargy, une ligne repérée par Pierre Tardivel quelques temps auparavant. Une ligne rendue très difficile par les mauvaises conditions de neige, dans les passages clé les plus exposés et raides. Des pentes allant de 45° à 50°, Cotation proposée 5.4/E4 ,avec la présence de barres rocheuses. Les parties les moins raides, en poudreuse tassée, très agréable à skier . Une ligne se terminant par un couloir encaissé, pour enfin déboucher sur le vallon du Bronze.
Retrouvez toutes les photos sur www.piolet15.com
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Interview with Tardivel after his first descent of the Northface of la Tour “Les Grands Barjots”
Posted by TV8MontBlanc Pierre Tardivel : un vrai grand barjot (Bargy)
You’ll find below some great interviews and great pictures plus various website information on Pierre Tardivel. All of the information is in French, except the last one.
“Skiing a new couloir in the Mont-Blanc massif, without abseiling or rock skiing is still possible today! You merely have to leave the ski lifts far behind, open you eyes and wait for the right conditions”
Bonne fête Pierre. Que tu puisses encore de trouver de nombreuses premières descentes!!!
White Grass received a couple inches of snow last night. Of course it wasn’t like one year ago when Hurricane Sandy devastated the East Coast and dumped a record snowfall in West Virginia.
The proof that you don’t necessarily need to go skiing on Baffin Island to make it a memorable adventure.
As a geographer, I’d always been fascinated about skiing locations. People generally don’t realize that you can ski at many places in the World which aren’t associated with snow. Although Baffin Island is cold and white, the last thing they think about is skiing steeps couloirs.
For summer reading I picked up at the library Mark Synnott’s Climbing, Trekking & Skiing Baffin Island Guide book. I had seen beautiful pictures of the Baffin Island’s Auyuittuq National Park and know friends that have been, it just shows what is possible. There is also incredible skiing on the north part of the island near Clyde River.
Part of the ski descents sections are written by ski mountaineer Andrew McLean. McLean and his partner Brad Barlage did the many first descents and named them including Polar Star Couloir in April 2002. He defines the couloir off the Beluga Spin as
possibly the best skiing couloir on earth (…) long narrow, turnable, steep, sheltered, straight and stunning 1100 m (3,640′) of 45-50 degrees.
Since then McLean has returned to Baffin Island. This month I featured an episode from “A Skier’s Journey”. Getting there is part of the adventure. Jamie Bond, Chad Sayers, Tobin Seagel, Marcus Waring and Chad & Jordan Manley collaborate to ski, film, narrate and edited in this excellent episode on Baffin Island. You get a glimpse of the PSC neat the 2 minute mark and see the descent at 8:15.
High in the Canadian Arctic, five friends venture to the frozen fjords of Northwest Baffin Island during spring time. Ancient and colossal, these branching hallways of rock are the domain of seals and polar bears, and relied upon by local Inuit hunters. For visiting skiers, the fjords are nothing short of a dream. In every direction, giant couloirs ascend thousands of feet above the sea ice, weaving in between some of the tallest and cliffs on the planet.
Two Czech skiers going head-to-head to ski down Slovakia’s Lomnický štít, second highest peak in High Tatras mountains. The 2,634 meters summit can be accessed by cable car since 1940. Skiing down is another story.
Robin Kaleta (born 1980) is a freerider, base jumper and ski base jumper. Tomáš Kraus (born 1974) is a former World Cup racer that moved into skier cross. Both skiers challenged each other to ski down Lomnický peak, however Kraus said that he could do it in the Summer.
Nike ACG sponsored this video a few years ago:
Here is the long version with further background information.
Les Bronzés movies are cult classics in France. The 3 comedies were directed by Patrice Lecompte. The English title is French Fried Vacation.
The first movie of Les Bronzés was at a Beach Resort; the sequel was based at a Ski Resort.
Wikipedia quote :
The film satirizes life at holiday resorts such as Club Med. It is one of many films by the French troupe Le Splendid. Michel Blanc, Marie-Anne Chazel, Gérard Jugnot, Thierry Lhermitte, Josiane Balasko and Christian Clavier wrote and created together the play “Amours, Coquillages et Crustacés”, and drew the scenario for Les Bronzés from this café-théâtre piece. The film has achieved cult status in France, where it sold 2.2 million tickets during its initial theatrical release.It was followed by two sequels, also directed by Patrice Leconte Les Bronzés font du ski (1979) and Les Bronzés 3 : Amis pour la vie (2006).
The sequel, Les Bronzés font du ski, is set in the French resort of Val d’Isère where a group of friends meet up again. The relationship between the ski resort and the movie’s producers is difficult and the name of Val d’Isère doesn’t appear anywhere in the movie or the credits.
Foreign Titles:
Hungary : A bronzbarnák síelni mennek
Poland : Slalom niespecjalny
Portugal : Barracas na Neve
Slovenia : Vsi gremo na smucanje
West Germany (video title) : Die Ski-Flitzer
West Germany : Sonne, Sex und Schneegestöber
Friday Night Video isn’t about presenting just ski videos: it is the presence of the sport in popular culture. When I was a kid I loved watching re-runs of the Japanese Television series called Ultraman. The series featured the Science Patrol fighting Godzillas sized monsters every week. One episode featured a Giant Yeti called Woo attacking a ski resort. This week’s clip is from the 1966 episode called “Phantom of the Snow Mountain”
James Bond movies like On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, The Spy who Loved Me and A View to a Kill; the last two were also the work of Willy Bogner and John Eaves. Take two motorcycles chasing Bond on skis through a bunch of skiers, trees and a bobsleigh run is probably why this often called the best ski chase sequence ever.
Ski Mad World 