Store Lakselvtindane

Hans, Angus, Sheila and I ascended Store Lakeselvtindane.

Lakselvtindane, the tallest peak of the small mountain outcropping, pictured centred, thomas couloir running up the lookers right flank (out of view).

The access to which is via the Thomas Couloir, a long, steep but very wide couloir that runs up to the top of a small glacier below the central couloir of Lakselvtindane.

Hans and Sheila ascending up the Thomas Couloir

From there, we ascended the Central couloir, which is a steep south facing couloir that goes straight to the summit of the mountain.

Ascending the central couloir of Lakeselvtindane with Crampons and Axes
Ascending the summit of Lakselvtindane
Angus ascending the final ridge to the summit of lakeselvtindane
Group shot on the summit of Lakselvtindane
Hans on the summit looking down the couloir

We left the descent of the summit a little late and the couloir started to harden up. Some skiing was obtained before we resorted to down climbing the crux. All up we had five pitches of 30m (60m doubled) – two with snow stakes as anchors and three with webbing around rock outcrops.

Angus jump turning in the central couloir of Lakselvtindane
Angus jump turning in the central couloir of Lakselvtindane
Angus looking back up the upper portion of the central couloir, the crux and steepest portion is below.
Sheila rappelling down pitches of the Central Couloir
Sheila rappelling down pitches of the Central Couloir

Once we all had safely descended the Central Couloir, we still had 1200 vertical metres of skiing down the Thomas Couloir back to the car. This was some of the better skiing of the day, despite there being lots of tracks through the couloir.

Joel skiing Thomas Couloir

It was a very long day, over 11 hours. However, a large chunk of that was safely managing the descent of the Central Couloir. Great experience of more technical ski mountaineering.

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