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Advanced Alpine Skills Course | Summer 2011/12
The Advanced Alpine Course has two objectives:
1. Provide technical instruction for people with high-alpine mountaineering experience. The course will update, or increase knowledge of modern climbing techniques and self-rescue systems.
2. As a “follow-up” to our Technical Mountaineering Course - especially where participants have spent time in the mountains after the initial grounding of the TMC.
Aircraft access is used to optimise the time available. This lets us gain exceptionally good instructional venues and to reduce heavy load carrying.
The Advanced Alpine Skills course is conducted at a low maximum of 3 participants per guide. This means we can get on to some fairly serious routes...
What You Will Learn
Topics covered on your course will include:
- Equipment, what to bring and how to use it
- Trip planning and preparation
- Mountain weather and forecasting
- Glacier travel and crevasse rescue including several different systems for crevasse extraction
- Snow and ice climbing: a workshop on steep ice climbing
- Techniques Alternatives for snow, ice and rock anchors
- Rock self-rescue: a day spent looking at escaping the system, abseiling with an injured partner, hauling systems
- Alpine rock climbing
- Advanced rope techniques, such as ridge travel and running belays
- Avalanche hazard evaluation
- Mountain navigation including white-out navigation
- Emergency shelters and procedures, including camping and bivvying in the mountains
- Hut management
Price and Inclusions | Summer 2011/12
Cost: NZ$3325 per person
Course fees includes:
- Guiding fees
- Alpine Guides Technical Manual (92 pages)
- All meals (including snacks and energy bars)
- Aircraft access
- Hut fees
- Local transport
- A range of technical equipment
- Local accommodation for any nights necessary during the course
Maximum and Minimum Bookings
All Advanced Alpine Courses are limited to a maximum of 6 participants. The maximum guide to participant ratio is 1:3.
Minimum bookings
We guarantee to run the course you are booked on, with the following modification:
- One person only: We shorten the course to 6 days
Reporting Details
All courses begin at 13:30 and finish at 12:00 midday on the final day. These times fit with scheduled bus services.
Please report to Alpine Guides shop in Mt Cook Village ›
Private Courses
If the course format, or the dates do not work for you - contact us about arranging a private course.
Private Advanced Alpine courses can be arranged at any time over the summer months (November - April) for groups of 2 or more people.
See the "Private Instruction" package for details ›
Experience Required
Previous experience on snow and ice, and mountaineering in glaciated terrain is essential.
We expect all participants to have previous alpine climbing experience and a background in rock climbing before attending this course. Some skills will be revised early in the course, but it is important that you have requisite experience. Equally important is a high level of fitness.
Prior to the course you must be able to:
- Build simple anchors on rock, snow and ice, and operate a belay
- Abseil with confidence
- Lead climb to AU rock grade 16
- Rope-up for glacier travel
- Be familiar with self-rescue from a crevasse
- Move with crampons and ice-axe over a variety of terrain
- Comfortably climb on sustained 40º to 50º ice - with two tools
Grades Climbed
The AAS course is about learning while climbing. This means that much more emphasis is placed on instruction taking place on the mountain.
We aim to get you on to routes and peaks that will challenge you, but also allow you to learn new skills and hone your technique. Routes climbed will normally be NZ Alpine grade 2 to 3+.
Course Mountain Venues
The specific location chosen will depend on climbing conditions, and the weather forecast at the time the course begins. Mount Cook and Westland regions give us a number of excellent venues for the course.
If you know the area and want to visit a particular venue, please let us know and we will do our best to make this happen.
Check our Mt Cook Area Map for the following locations ›
Plateau Hut
Based on the massif of Aoraki/Mount Cook itself. This venue is ideal as the walk out from Plateau Hut is a challenging 8-hour experience in its own right. Peaks include The Anzacs (2,528 metres) and Mount Dixon (3,004 metres).
Pioneer Hut
At the head of the fox glacier, peaks include Mount Haidinger (3,070 metres), Douglas Peak (3,077 metres) Mount Lendenfeld (3,194 metres) and many others.
Tasman Saddle
A classic venue at the head of NZ’s longest glacier. Peaks include Mount Green (2,837 metres), Mount Walter (2,905 metres), Elie de Beaumont (3,109 metres), and others.
Course Daily Organisation
When dealing with such a dynamic environment it is not realistic to plan fixed day to day schedules. Instead we work around prevailing weather and snow conditions to provide the most comprehensive coverage of all the course topics.
The first afternoon involves an outline of the course, and an equipment check. If there is time some initial revision in roping-up for glacier travel may be done. The first evening is usually spent in Mount Cook village. The next morning we will fly into the mountains at the first possible opportunity.
Instructional days will begin at around 07:00. When climbing on good weather days you may start as early as 03:00, if some of the longer ascents are to be successful. Most days activities will have you out and about for 8 to10 hours.
During any poor weather you will be busy with rope skills, theory, and practical, using instruction venues located close to the hut. We aim to have you back in Mount Cook village by late afternoon on the final full day.
Egress from the mountains
Two options are available at the end of the course: walking or flying out.
1. Flying out at course end
This is the more common choice, as it maximises time spent on climbing and instruction. The cost of flying out is additional to the course fees. Please budget for a flight out.
- Range of costs possible: NZ$160 to NZ$320 per-person
- Typical average cost: NZ$190 to NZ$210 per-person
Read more about air transport ›
2. Walking out at course end
Walking out can be the most physically demanding part of a course, and must be done inside course time. In some situations it may not always be possible to walk out.
Equipment and Clothing | Advanced Alpine
Download the equipment checklist for the Advanced Alpine Skills (.pdf 200 Kb) ›
Please let us know what gear you need to rent - including any equipment supplied free of charge.
Choosing your Clothing | Seasonal Variation
Our gear lists cater for all eventualities. Sometimes you may not require everything on the equipment list. Weather and conditions when your trip starts will help determine what is needed.
Temperatures, weather, and snow conditions will vary. The program is designed to work around these changes. Read about Weather & Snow Conditions, Summer and Winter ›
