Nineteen club members spent a week at Temple Basin Ski Lodge exploring the surrounding peaks and basins. We had pretty average weather (significant precipitation and gale force winds) but the lodge facilities (cooked meals, hot showers and drying room) more than made up for it. We were a mix of novice and intermediate climbers with a few ski tourers and wise heads thrown in for good measure and teamed up in various groups to have some alpine fun.
We arrived, survived and thrived:
And we left the way we came, in the pouring rain:
Our plans:
Andy’s Story
This is the first time I have travelled to the mountains in the luxury coach 🚍, the first time I have seen a fire dancer 🔥 perform above 1300m and the first time I have seen djs perform in a ski lodge. The Alpine Meet is special.
This year I got to ski a few new lines. Temple col into the Minga was magic ⛷️. Looking at the map the Devils Punchbowl looked promising. Cheers to Shaun for joining me for an adventure into some new country and skiing a couple of intimidating chutes.
It was great fun sharing our daily missions over good food and a cold beer 🍺
Looking forward to next year 😀
Stephen’s Story
The first Temple Basin trip in 2021 aimed to give some high-mountain consolidation to those who had recently completed Snowcraft 1 and 2, so this was the third year of helping the new alpinists cut loose in the awesome and varied Temple Basin terrain.
After a bit of a reminder of Snowcraft techniques the ‘23 team was off and running, exploring the gullies, ridges, bowls and peaks in confidence.
During our wet days we also ran a few random technical training sessions in the lodge for skills such as navigation, rope work and prussicking. The whole team was very competent and a lot of sharing of knowledge and experience was the hallmark of this close-knit team.
Brandon, Matt and Jon’s Story
The first day we were lucky to have a calm and eventually clear enough day to have an attempt at the southwest route up Mount Phipps. An early start in low cloud, we made our way to the lower flanks of the face and had a couple practice pitches before settling into the first narrow gulley of our self-sketched route. Switching up the sharp end across the trio, we ran the full length of the 70 metre rope out a few times up the face, practising good placements and anchors along the way.
Photos: Mount Phipps southwest route
In a few hours and after many quips over the radio and stops for photos, Mathew crested the last pitch and brought Brandon and Jon up to top of the fine southwest ridge. Climbing over the last steep hurdle onto the ridge, we were warmed in a welcome afternoon sun and given a perfect panorama of peaks around the region — Rolleston, Philistine, and Avalanche peak shining across Arthur’s Pass in waning, partly occluded golden light in the late afternoon scattered cloud.
Photos: Southwest ridge panorama
After some slow progress along the narrow and chossy ridge, we decided to turn around short of Phipps peak and made our way down the west col. A couple hours of downclimbing and plodding through soft snow capped off the ten and some hour mission and made refreshments back at the lodge very well-deserved.
Choked Gut Gully, Mt Temple
Another highlight of the trip occurred a number of days later, after the worst of the weather had passed. Brandon and Mathew tackled Choked Gut Gully as a Grade 4 route up Mt Temple. The beginning of the gully was bare rock, so we started slightly further up, using another small gut to get up and over into the main gully. Mathew led the first pitch, following a seam of ice barely wide enough for one boot. It required a bit of dry tooling, a bit of dangling on tools, and if smearing is possible in crampons, he was doing that. Brandon led the main pitch up the gully, which becomes narrower and narrower — some would say choked — until you end up under an overhang. Fortunately there was some water ice which could be followed up and around, taking us up to a gentler slope, perfect for a bomber anchor.
Topping out on the ridge less than fifty metres from the summit of Temple, we were welcomed by the inside of a cloud. This continuously came and went, providing us with some decent glimpses of the surrounding peaks. We ventured further along the ridge towards Phipps, hoping to rappel down Chronic Freeing Syndrome, but got sketched out by the ridge in the gusting winds, so turned around and rappelled down Tres Amigos instead. This was unnecessary as it is right next to a solid descent route, but I guess we had just been looking forward to a rappel all day.
Luke and Giuls’ Story
Giuls
Fresh out of Alp 1, and with only a couple of alpine trips under my belt, I went to Temple Basin with the specific intent to practice some basic skills and find out how much I’m comfortable pushing my limits.
After a day of exploring in beautiful weather, I was already feeling more confident using crampons, self-arresting, and reading the terrain.
I loved going out with Julia and Louise on Saturday, trying to conquer Blimit (which we didn’t, as the weather took a turn for the worst). I returned feeling empowered and happy we’d made the right decision to turn back.
After a couple of days of torrential rain and strong winds, I was feeling a bit disheartened — but I’m glad I did get to go out again once more.
I grew up skiing in the Dolomites, and ski touring is something I would love to learn down the line. It was exciting to try that on a smaller level, walking up a hill with snowshoes and skiing down with my snowblades a few times. Plus I got to take the club’s snowshoes out for the very first time!
Temple Basin is a big playground with something for everyone to have fun. Alpine stuff is still out of my comfort zone, and I felt unequipped for what the majority of people were doing, but I still had heaps of fun. I loved spending time with a bunch of incredible humans who shared super interesting, hilarious and inspiring stories.
My take-home lesson is that you can still have fun in the snow even if you’re a newbie, and I’ve learned what I do and don’t want to do going forward. Thank you for the amazing experience!
Luke
This was my first time to Temple Basin, and it was perfect to refine skills, explore a new area with easy access, all within easy reach of the mountain lodge.
We spent the first day heading to Temple Col, practising skills along the way and learning some new ones. My highlights came later in the week heading up Mt Temple via Tres Amigos with Matthew, and again via Smith / Glystra with Owen a few days later. Though the conditions throughout the week were mixed we were still afforded some fantastic views through periodic breaks in the clouds.
Another funny highlight was making the most of lousy conditions to go for a tour around the fields with the club’s new snowshoes. Despite some rain it was great to get out and spend the last of our time warming up in the hut.
Tom and Owen’s Story
We wanted to pick up from where we left off at Temple Basin last year, by climbing a few routes on our own. And so we did. We climbed a couple of Grade 3 routes on Mount Temple over several days in various conditions. Epic!