Diarmuid Collins

Etape du Tour 2008 Stage Map

Diarmuid — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 07:58:47 +0000

Saturday Sufferfest

Diarmuid — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 19:00:59 +0000

Went on a bike ride with Damo today. It was long and tough. 80km from sea level to 1000m. My heart was in the 80-90% zone (zone 4) more than any other zone

Still it was good fun and good exercise.

Weather forecast for the Alps looks good for the start of the week. A relatively large dump is due until Tuesday with the freezing line quite low. Looking good for next weekend

More snow forecast, not for Alps Maritime

Diarmuid — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 08:21:42 +0000

So Isola2000 and Auron are supposed to be opening this weekend, however no snow has fallen in over 2 weeks. On the website they have removed a number of webcams, I guess to hide the true state of the conditions. In any case I think I will be skipping it this year, unlike last year when we made the opening day on the 14th of December (midweek!)

Isola today:

The good news is that the Haute Alps are forecast to get another big dump Sunday
La Thuile Snow Forecast

Chamonix Snow Forecast

Good snow dump on the way

Diarmuid — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 16:27:04 +0000

Looks good for the Alps on Monday & Tuesday. Very substantial dump predicted. The only potential downer is the high winds

clipped from www.snow-forecast.com

La Thuile

Weather Forecast :: www.snow-forecast.com
::

Forecast
elevation: (2046 m altitude)
6 Day Forecast Issued: 12 am
Sun 02 Dec�

Motionbased logging of activities…

Diarmuid — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 16:19:37 +0000

I started using a new website for logging my runs and cycles. Motionbased is a Garmin supported website that allows you to directly upload data from Garmin GPS units for analysis. Here are some recent outings

Heart rate info is logged along with distance, time, speed and elevation, thanks to the Garmin Forerunner 305

Raining in Nice …. raining in Isola2000

Diarmuid — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 08:40:44 +0000

Pouring rain in Nice this morning and probably a lot of last night judging by the amount of rain on the road. Unfortunately it’s raining in Isola2000 also, washing away the bit of snow that is there.

Forecast is for more rain tomorrow and clearing for the weekend.

The good news is that Cervinia is looking a lot better

Paris & Wedding

Diarmuid — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 18:16:22 +0000

Spent a weekend in Paris last month and got some pics:

And finally the pictures from Caitriona & Brian’s wedding:

Cime du Diable & Cime du Mont Clapier

Diarmuid — Thu, 09 Aug 2007 06:43:25 +0000

Pictures from hikes on Cime du Diable and Cime du Mont Claiper uploaded.

Galleries from Italy and St Agnes added

Diarmuid — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 22:14:34 +0000

Added a gallery from an easy Sunday hike to St Agnes, overlooking Menton

And from the weekend in Apricale:

Weekend of hiking and climbing

Diarmuid — Sun, 15 Jul 2007 20:30:45 +0000

Wrecked after a weekend of hiking. On Saturday did a hike from La Madone de Fenestre to Col de Fenestre and across to Lac de Trecolpas. The hike took about 6 hours (970m climbed) and was not too stressful

On Sunday I went back to La Madone de Fenestre to do a “classic” AD mountaineering route. Pierre Axel left Nice at 9am to begin our climb at 10:50. The approach took about 1hour 20mins to climb the 500m to the base of the climb.

For the next 7 hours we climbed the 7 pitches to the summit. We were quite slow as it was my first mountaineering route and PA’s first in 3 years. We summited at 7:45 and were back at the car at 22:10. The climb was quite “airy” but not too difficult. However the exposure added a lot to the climbing.

Allalinhorn

Diarmuid — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 20:22:58 +0000

Completed my first unguided 4000m climb in the Alps. Tamas and I set off on Friday from Nice on the 500km drive to Saas Fee. On arrival we got the last cable car to 3000m and short 1 hour hike to the Britannica hut. After a few hours sleep we awoke at 2:45 and started the hike at 3:45. The start was a steady climb on the glacier with no route finding issues.

On reaching the ridge we followed a well worn path up to the rock step. This was a long steep slog (upto 40 degrees at times). The step was snowed over and due to the congestion we climbed together on the one rope with some protection. We summited at 11:30.

Tamas made a video of the climb:

WPvideo 1.10

Climbing the Allalinhorn

Download!

Climbing at La Turbie

Diarmuid — Sun, 06 May 2007 21:27:49 +0000

Tamas, Judit, Pierre Axel and I spent the day climbing at La Turbie. Topo here