With the last dump of fresh snow being almost two weeks ago in the European Alps a powdertrip throughout Austria perhaps wasn’t the brightest of ideas. But, hey! The snow must go on and we just went a bit higher to get to those last bits of untracked freshness. Luckily a cold spell kept those tiny heavenly spaces a bit better than expected.

Anyway, since a photo says more than a thousand words, and I’m to lazy to write down a full report I thought a photostory might be in order. Please enjoy!

Silvretta Nova

First shot of the day, not a bad way to start out in the overtracked Silvretta Nova region. Bit of scary-ass hiking from Bas Elhorst was all it took.

A bit of black and white freshness, Bas Elhorst again.

A long easy hike, a few relaxing turns and finally: a nasty hike out of the bow. Anne-Fleur Eiff and Martine Veldhoen don’t mind at all. This was perhaps the last bit of untracked snow for miles around. Not any more!

Silvretta Nova actually has quite a good park for Euro standards. The wallride is particularly nice at the end of the day. Bas rocks to fakie.

St.Anton am Arlberg

The drive from Silvretta to Arlberg is a supernice, and not too long, one. Especially when the mountain pass is open (it hadn’t snowed for a while, remember!) you can enjoy some crazy views.

It’s extra fun by the way when the Volvo dealership lends you the new C30 T5, a small (not very practical with tons of snowgear but who cares) 250 horsepowered piece of metal that will set you back about 40.000 euro’s but manages to do a decent 230km/h on the highway with roofcarriers on it and three people and their bags in it…

Timo Hermeler and his girlfriend Irene Bauer live in this mountain paradise and managed to squeeze out some minute pieces of powder. Perhaps it wasn’t that smart to visit this place in the highest of high season…

Expensive resorts have expensive lifts… this whole thing lifts up the gondolas so you don’t have to take some stairs… whatever, it looks cool though!

Scary rocks don’t scare Timo.

I love backlight!

Anne-Fleur

Perhaps the smallest lift in Austria? It holds six people… just barely.

But the view is worth the cramped ride to the top of the Valluga. Normally a great place to find the last bits of fresh snow…

Some of those last bits…

Tijs Goossens in action on the Valluga.

And so is Timo.

So the day ends.

Mayrhofen
This place needs no introduction bus just as our luck had it: the pro-line was closed for some massive building action for the Ästhetiker Wängl Tängl in two weeks. Bummer!

Fortunately rookie Steef van de Meer doesn’t mind using the massive rail instead.

Ahhh… Mayerhofen park pizza.

Too much stuff and Gin&Tonic. It’s nice being a photographer!

No animals were harmed during the making of this Austrian funtrip, some snowboarders didn’t get away that easy… it’s nice having weird layers underneath powder!

Don’t you just love it when a season starts like this… arriving in snowy conditions with a new Landrover Freelander 2. Set on wintermode… no chains necessary while some dumbass 4×4 just slides off the road in front of you because he has shitty traction control and way too much speed.

Then, you wake up to a day of grey which is great for a decent to sleep in. Nothing beats that after a day’s drive from Holland when you just returned from an alomst continuous trip in 35 degree weather in Thailand and Egypt the weeks before. Coffee and croissant, one can survive on a diet like that!

But we all know that after grey come blue and we hit it right on in a surprisingly quiet Les 2 Alpes, France. A resort mostly know for it’s incredibly shitty lift system and long walks because crucial parts of the area go uphill instead of down.

Anyway, the Dutch opening has landed here so we have to make the best of it… not that hard with about 40cm fresh and a bluebird. You just forget the stress we had making these (a quiet Les 2 Alpes is still busy as hell so the good bits are tracked in nanoseconds) and enjoy. Hope we all have plenty of this in 2008, it’s looking good already!

Everybody, all the best wishes!
Rutger

And to see something completely different… this is what my newyears day was like at noon: being charged by 9.500 crazy Dutch!