Bivouac des périades: The coolest hut in the world.

It's not the largest hut in the world, it's definitely not the most luxurious is the world, it's not even the highest hut in the alps, even though is located at a pretty good altitude.
The coolest hut in the world might be a big statement, but nonetheless I think it the coolest - at the very least in the Chamonix area.

In the weekend before Easter I enjoyed a super short trip to Chamonix to visit my old fried Kim, who had spent the season in Cham. We had three days to get a ski tour in before Kim was heading back to Denmark.

Because of the crappy snow (or lack thereof) this season, we had to go somewhere high, we'd like to visit new huts and ski new glaciers. A quick plan was made: Ski down the good part of Vallée Blanche break left up the Leschaux glacier, climb to the winter room of the Leschaux hut and spend the first night there. Next day climb back down to the glacier and skin up to the foot of the Mont Mallet glacier, skin the height of the glacier to the couloir giving access to the final rock scramble to the Bivouac des Périades. 

(Rare) Dynafit Failure.

Upon disassembling my Vertical ST bindings for the first time i noticed a small crack in the side of the compensation plate. After taking the binding apart, the compensation plate was indeed in two pieces.
The bindings are from april 2009, has seen probably between 40 and 50 days of use. The use they have seen have been everything from regular back-country touring to icy in bound skiing to expedition use involving multiple plane and mule rides.
In other words, they've been banged around quite a bit.
I didn't notice anything unusual skiing the binding a couple of days ago, so I don't really know how long it's been broken.
I will of course be replacing the broken part, even though the binding seems to be skiable.
Have anybody else seen or heard of this mode of failure.
I should state that I haven't disassembled the binding before, hence I don't think over tightening the top plate screws (at least not by me) could be the reason for the failure.
Enjoy the spring.

Klippeklatrekursus Kullen 2-3 april

Jeg havde fornøjelsen af at være kursusleder på Dansk Klatreforbunds Klippeklatrekursus i weekenden, årets første kursus.
Tak til alle deltagene for et godt kursus.
Vejret var jo som lovet, der var både perioder med 15 grader, sol og let vind.

Et par billeder af et par dygtige kursister der fører deres første rute:

Adam i den skarpe ende.

Martin finder glæden ved en velplaceret 10'er kile.