Touring Gear | Skis, Boots, and Snowboards

With alpine ski touring gear (AT or randonée) you can free your heel for ascending and traversing, and lock in your heel for the descent. Skins grip the snow surface helping prevent backwards travel.

Ski Mountaineering Boots

Modern plastic shell touring boots are best for AT bindings. We mainly use Scarpa Denali's in our rental gear stock.

Touring Skis

Choose "all mountain" skis, or skis designed for specifically touring. A "mid-fat" ski that measures 80-90 mm wide under foot gives good flotation in powder, and reasonable edging on hard snow.

Bindings

Daimir, Dynafit, Marker, and Tyrolia all produce good touring bindings. Your bindings should include ski brakes and ski crampons.

Skins

Must be cut fit the shape of the ski - trimmed in about 2mm from each edge.

Snowboards & split-boards

Voile make good split-boards, but most snowboarders use a standard board with soft boots and lightweight snow shoes.

Telemark

Telemark skiers are welcome on Alpine Guides trips, but you need to bring their own equipment. Due to the variable NZ snowpack ,we recommend that telemark skiers are very competent.

Pre-trip Information

The details to help you prepare for your Alpine Guides mountain adventure.

Topics Include:

How "hard" will the course be?

Are you ready? How does Mt Cook compare to Mount Aspiring? Read about Trip Difficulty ›