Pure Journal

Training for Ski Touring Ski touring can be seen as a combination of cross country skiing and alpine skiing. Fundamentally, these two forms place very different physical demands on the body, where cross country skiing requires mainly cardiovascular conditioning and alpine skiing requires muscular strength and lactic acid tolerance. If you come at this with […]

Skäckerfjällen, complete wilderness Skäckerfjällen consists of 16 summits in a small, self-contained region. For Sweden, the summits are in unusually close vicinity of each other. All of them are situated in complete wilderness where the annual precipitation is an impressive 1,500mm. This makes Skäckerfjällen a peerless destination for ski touring. As the summits are close […]

No matter what we do, our actions have impacts on the climate. This is true for skiing, too. The skiing itself is largely unproblematic, but the connected activities often create a climatic imprint, not least in the cases where we fly or drive a petrol-fuelled car to our destination. With this said one can ponder […]

Photography is a love affair with the mountains There are several aspects that contribute to making ski touring something extraordinary. Nature, the challenge and the sense of freedom are some of them. Shadows traipsing across beautiful mountain faces. Clouds creating drama in the big sky. The winds injecting dynamism into the otherwise placid landscape. These […]

Mountain Guide is a certified profession A certified mountain guide’s competencies and fields of expertise can be found within all disciplines of alpinism and mountaineering. Mountain guides lead, educate and coach their clients, and examples of engagements can involve trekking, mountaineering, glaciated travel, ice climbing, rock climbing, off-piste skiing, ski touring, avalanche training, expeditions at […]

How dangerous is off-piste skiing, really? With off-piste skiing we can refer to both lift-served off-piste runs and proper ski tours. We don’t know for sure how dangerous an activity this is as we don’t have reliable data on how many skiers actually ski off-piste. However, a good estimate of the risk is the number […]

There has been something of a ski boot revolution over the last four-five seasons. Almost every available freeride-oriented boot today comes with a walk mode and tech inserts. One major contributing factor for this is the rando trend. There is no longer any reason to compromise on your boots, and given the wide selection available, […]

Christmas is approaching. A cosy period, hopefully involving time off, wintery outdoor activities, spending time with your loved ones, candles, plenty of good food, mulled wine and sweets. For some, Christmas also implies a degree of stress. Christmas is a time where consumerism is rife, and this gives some of us pause for thought as […]

When ski touring, you walk uphill for several hours, only to ski down again in a fraction of that time. It follows that the larger part of your training should involve improving your ability to walk uphill. But how should you best train to prepare for your ski touring winter? Here are some tips! Train […]