Submitted by Ean Jackson on 15 July, 2011 - 23:21.
It's a lot easier to drop down into the Seymour valley at Vicar Lakes than to run back to the Seymour parking lot.
A thought: ride bikes up to the Search and Rescue trail near Paton Creek then run back to civilization at Seymour. This would require running back to the bikes another fine day, but I know a good stash spot where nobody would find them. One would also need a car ride home from Seymour, but that's a piece of cake to arrange.
I still have to wonder about how much snow is up there? It would be a tough slog if all of the trails are covered in it. Might be wise to wait a couple more weeks...
... yea, you just keep waiting for prefect conditions as the bagger clock ticks away and the rest of us exercise.
With the right equipment, the snow conditions are quite manageable. During KK training everyone thought the course would be really slow this year but in fact the result times disproved that. Overall, they weren't noticeably slower than last year's relatively dry finish times.
My experience is that once you cross the snow line (near 1100m), the snow is either firm on north facing slopes or soft in the upper 2" and firm underneath. Care needs to be taken as you're transitioning from dry trails into the snow zone because it's easy to posthole and the edges of snowfields can easily collapse under you.
Doing loops is elegant, and certainly more aesthetic but my experience is that overall they take more time, organization, and cover greater distances.
If we start running short on time on the Seymour sweep I'd shorten the distance and do fewer peaks. The ridge north of Elsay is quite flat to Vicar peak so I'm estimating 1 hour out and back from the base of Elsay.
Hope the clouds are high tomorrow. The biggest impediment to success will be poor visibility.
I plan to do them in a separate sweep from the Vicar Lakes trail.
It's kind of the same thing as the Lynn/Needles sweep is to the Cathedral sweep. When the distances get too big you just have to break them into more manageable sizes. I want to end up back at the starting point on the same day. It's not a "clean sweep" if you have to go collect bikes/cars/people the next day because you've left them stranded. :-)
Comments
BTW
It's a lot easier to drop down into the Seymour valley at Vicar Lakes than to run back to the Seymour parking lot.
A thought: ride bikes up to the Search and Rescue trail near Paton Creek then run back to civilization at Seymour. This would require running back to the bikes another fine day, but I know a good stash spot where nobody would find them. One would also need a car ride home from Seymour, but that's a piece of cake to arrange.
I still have to wonder about how much snow is up there? It would be a tough slog if all of the trails are covered in it. Might be wise to wait a couple more weeks...
Waiting
... yea, you just keep waiting for prefect conditions as the bagger clock ticks away and the rest of us exercise.
With the right equipment, the snow conditions are quite manageable. During KK training everyone thought the course would be really slow this year but in fact the result times disproved that. Overall, they weren't noticeably slower than last year's relatively dry finish times.
My experience is that once you cross the snow line (near 1100m), the snow is either firm on north facing slopes or soft in the upper 2" and firm underneath. Care needs to be taken as you're transitioning from dry trails into the snow zone because it's easy to posthole and the edges of snowfields can easily collapse under you.
Doing loops is elegant, and certainly more aesthetic but my experience is that overall they take more time, organization, and cover greater distances.
If we start running short on time on the Seymour sweep I'd shorten the distance and do fewer peaks. The ridge north of Elsay is quite flat to Vicar peak so I'm estimating 1 hour out and back from the base of Elsay.
Hope the clouds are high tomorrow. The biggest impediment to success will be poor visibility.
Cheers,
Bill
On training wheels
Nice try, Bill,
You appear to be missing Bishop, Dickens and Brokeback on your route plan. I seem to recall them being destinations on a true Seymour sweep
Bishop Sweep
I plan to do them in a separate sweep from the Vicar Lakes trail.
It's kind of the same thing as the Lynn/Needles sweep is to the Cathedral sweep. When the distances get too big you just have to break them into more manageable sizes. I want to end up back at the starting point on the same day. It's not a "clean sweep" if you have to go collect bikes/cars/people the next day because you've left them stranded. :-)