Early Season in Austria
Known for weird styles and steep mountains, Europe also harbors quite a couple of Glacier Resorts, that open up early in the season, mainly to give home to hundreds of ski teams in eager preparation for race season.
Switzerland with Zermatt and Saas Fee has the bigger glaciers, better snow, and steeper terrain - but also has the Swiss Franc, its hard-to-afford currency.
Austria has a very good cost/benefit ratio for the snowboarder - you can easily find room, lift ticket, and food for the day for less than 100 bucks.
Vera JanssenHintertux, Stubai, Kaunertal, and Dachstein are the HotSpots on the Austrian Map. All equipped with a good-sized park, this is the spot for many pro riders to warm up in the early season - and to hopefully get the season's first powder day…
The first Demo I had planned to attend was Kaunertal Glacier Opening on October 10th. I hopped into my friend's rep van in between all the demo gear, we cranked the tunes and drove off on our first trip of the year. We DO check the weather forecast but it had seemed too good to be true - now that we turned into the long valley and the flakes started getting bigger and bigger, it finally became real - Winter is here!
By the time we looked out the window in the morning, there were 40cm of the fluffy white on the ground. The glacier is still a one-hour drive from town, over a windy, steep road, and it was quiet obvious this was gonna stay closed today. My friend happily left her demo equipment in the van and we headed out to explore the town on our boards.
Kaunertal Edit - featuring Mary Luggen, Klaus Lotto:
Sore and tired from not only riding at the Demo Tour Craziness, it was time to mellow it out a bit. This always calls for a good session at Dachstein Glacier.
Because the glacier is so small, there are no ski race teams. There really aren't very many people at all and the park is always in great shape with a big pro line and a beginner park. By late October, they have basically any rail you could think of set up.
The same people ride here every early and late season - November and May. You just take the gondola up and enter the little Shred-World that is "D-Stone". The Chill-Area always has good tunes, sun chairs, and a lovely sweet smell - and of course the view over the one run that is the park. You can watch your buddy bail at the top rail and he can almost hear you laugh it's so small.
So we got together for a day or two to film some tricks and this is what came out,
Dachstein Edit - featuring Ana Rumiha, Urska Pribosic, Julia Baumgartner, Tove Holmgren:
