Winter Trips 2024 – Taranaki Alpine Club

Buddy Walks

Are you new to winter mountaineering and don’t quite know how to gain some winter experience? The Club’s buddy walks can help you!

Our buddy walks help fill two key gaps for those who are pretty new to winter mountaineering, namely acquiring skills and being able to safely climb and walk on Taranaki’s winter white stuff, as well as getting to know others to be out there with. The buddy walks are informal, friendly and typically aimed at those wishing to improve their beginner/basic snow travel skills (ice axe, crampons, weather/snow conditions assessment, different terrain/slopes, maybe simple pitching) with a more experienced person.

The emphasis is on ‘buddy’, i.e. the buddy does not take complete responsibility for participant’s safety. The buddy is there to pass on knowledge and help participants make mutually agreed reasoned risk judgements. Participants are required to have the necessary equipment. Need equipment? You can hire from the club. Contact the Equipment Officer with at least 3 days’ notice to pick up gear in the week prior.

Participants are required to have done a Snowcraft One course or have mountaineering skills at least to that level, i.e. know how to use an ice axe and crampons. These walks are (obviously) weather and snow condition dependent. If the weather is bad on Saturday the trip could be changed to Sunday. The walk duration, the skills level required (novice or intermediate), and fitness required for a walk will be advertised in the week prior to the walk. Please let us know your skill level etc. so we can tailor the walks to suit. We will endeavour to run walks that suit the participants.

Communications with participants will be done using WhatsApp. If you are interested in going on a Buddy Walk this season, please contact Stephen Miller on 027 244 2753 well before the walk and you will be added to the Buddy Walk WhatsApp group.

Experienced leaders required! Please consider helping as we can do with some extra helpers and leaders.

July Saturday 20th, backup day Sunday 21st.
August Saturday 17th backup day Sunday 18th.
September Saturday 21st backup day Sunday 22nd.
October Saturday 19th backup date Sunday 20th.
November If there is still snow, Saturday 16th backup Sunday 17th.

Contacts:

Buddy walk key contact Steve: 027 244 2753
Equipment Officer Clarissa for gear hire: committee2.tac@outlook.com / 0272662330 (please contact at least 2 days’ prior to ensure availability)

National Parks Experience

6th to 8th September 2024

We are requesting expressions of interest for this trip from this year’s and last year’s Snowcraft 1 participants. When applying you will be required to advise what you have done on the snow since your snowcraft training. This will assist our leaders with their planning.

Please send your expression of interest to Stephen Miller’s email: smiller@xtra.co.nz

This club trip has limited spaces, so if you would like go and further your snow/crampon experience don’t muck around, as this will fill up quickly.

General Info

Weather Forecast

For your information here are some good weather forecast mobile-friendly websites you can use to start reviewing the upcoming weather forecast & conditions: the first 2 links are specific to Mt Taranaki and you can view different elevations; the 4th link is NZ-wide and requires a little more time to explore the views and information available – it is excellent to understand the upcoming weather patterns:

And finally, please also ensure you read and understand the following, which applies to all our club trips:

Our club trips aim to give you the opportunity to practice your alpine & mountaineering skills, get to know Mt Taranaki (and in some cases other awesome NZ mountains), meet other like-minded people and have some laughs!

It is important to note that our club trips are not instruction courses or formal guided events. Our Trip Leads are experienced club members who kindly volunteer their time to share a route they know reasonably well and meet the above trip aims.

Each trip participant is expected to be self-sufficient on the mountain, have the skills to undertake the trip, know the gear to bring, and participate under their own risk and responsibility.

Any queries, please feel free to contact me.

Glenys Grant – Trips Co-Ordinator

Committee4.tac@outlook.com

(027) 367-0612