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Ruapehu 2014

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  • #16
    Originally posted by crocos View Post
    One Line Lodge Review: Comfortable, warm, friendly folks, and when there's this much snow, what a slog to get to! Skiing to the chairlift is a myth though.

    Aka: I need to get a whole lot fitter

    Waldo: Main trails are fairly typical Ruapehu-style icy, but there's actually a bit of powder from up the mountain blown down. I'm here until Tuesday morning. With the wind predicted for tomorrow, I'm seriously considering spending the whole day in Happy Valley, lol
    So the location of the lodge is not as ideal as imagined? Had a look at the photo from the parking on the website - thats a bit of a hike. What is the lodges location in relation to the slope? Can u try to mark it on a map?

    I'll try to make a prayer to the snow gods on your behalf!

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    • #17
      Actually it's not too bad now; Myself and three others ended up digging out a walkway on Saturday and now it's actually just a pleasant walk servicing 6 lodges (and partially servicing 4 others).

      Pretty sure that we've done our dash as far as good amounts of snow is concerned. 2m snow-base makes Whakapapa quite skiable, but it definitely lives up to it's nickname of "Rockapapa". To be able to ski to/from the lodge you'd need a minimum 4m base. Actually that's not entirely fair: You can ski TO the lodge, but not back to the chair. You just need to know which valley to ski down - It's one currently marked as "Outside patrolled ski area boundary" according to the Custodian of the lodge. I kinda wish she told me that before I avoided that valley, lol.

      I'll see if I can dig out a decently high-res map that'll have enough detail to be meaningful.

      Meanwhile conditions for the last two days have been absolutely mint! Saturday was mint too, but for some reason they only opened the Centennial and Rock Garden chairs, then the Quad Express at about 2:30pm. When that opened there was pretty much an instant swarm, 40+ minute queues and the lift wasn't going at it's usual "express" speed. This combined with Saturday crowds made for a VERY packed few slopes and the quad queues were getting super-grumpy, snowball fights with the lifties started, kids got hit with snowballs, that sort of carry-on. That's why I had time to dig a path as couldn't be bothered dealing with crowds like that, lol

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      • #18
        Thanks for the update on the conditions!

        Found a cheap campervan relocation deal, so will now be bumming my way up from the south island next week, skiboards in tow, in search of some good snow!

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        • #19


          Sherpas at treble cone...

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          • #20
            wow where did all the snow go

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            • #21
              Still decent spring snow in the back saddle, but down low its all slush. On the plus side, with this weather I didnt have to hitch a ride up and just drove up in the campervan!
              Down in the catlins now, starting back up north. Whakapapa this coming sunday anyone?

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              • #22
                Decision time, whakapapa or turoa?

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                • #23


                  Turoa. Wet, cold, icy AND slushy, but the sherpas destroy all!

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