Zugspitze

Sport Conrad's Snow Safety Days are aimed at budding freeride and ski touring enthusiasts and are a first introduction to lifelong learning about avalanche danger. The theory was first crammed into the head office in Penzberg and then put into practice the next day on the Zugspitze. The program was spiced up with the best advice on avalanche safety equipment.

Sport Conrad is a partner of PowderGuide and has almost everything we would still need in our equipment cupboard. But Sport Conrad also cares about safety and invites us to the Snow Safety Days. On Friday in Penzberg, you can inspect new avalanche safety equipment with advice and in the evening, experts will give talks on tour preparation, risk management and weather forecasts. On Saturday, we'll then head up to the Zugspitze with mountain guides to put theory into practice.

Permafrost - permanently and continuously frozen ground. Direct associations: the vast expanses of tundra in Siberia, where houses stand on "stilts" because of this, the northern Canadian wilderness or the freezing cold Arctic - all really far away. But what the Kitzsteinhorn, Zugspitze, Gemsstock or Aiguille du Midi have to do with it and why a 40° steep north-facing slope is not just about tour planning and avalanche conditions, you can find out in this issue of "Snow of Tomorrow".

There has been virtually nothing new since last week, at least as far as the weather is concerned. One cloudless day follows the next. Temperatures have risen a little at higher altitudes, but in many valleys it's still very chilly under the tough inversion. There is no change in sight for the time being.

Given the normality with which people from all over Europe enjoy winter sports in the Alps today, it is always surprising that this movement only began around 100 years ago. In a very interesting two-part documentary, Katharina Schickling presents the eventful history of skiing in Bavaria, which is representative of the dramatically changed approach to the winter mountains.

Isn't this just another pointless gadget for the kitchen that jumps on the 'mountains are totally in' trend? My initial skepticism fades with every snack I make. The more often I prepare my ham in slices and cut my slices of bread with millimeter precision, the more I like the PanoramaKnife. And every time I think of this ridge tour on the Blassen...

The past few days in the northern Alps have been characterized by sunshine and foehn winds. Low pressure system Yvan slowly moved from the Iberian Peninsula to the Mediterranean and provided the southerly flow that brought us gale-force gusts last weekend. Wind speeds of 140 km/h were measured on the Patscherkofel on Saturday (12.3), 115 km/h on the Zugspitze and an impressive 104 km/h in Innsbruck city center (station at the university).