The 1-day Introduction to Backcountry Skiing and Splitboard Touring Course is usually the start of people’s backcountry learning. For those who haven’t yet committed to buying their own equipment, it is possible hire it for the course. This way they can learn about what works and doesn’t work in order to make good decisions on what to buy themselves down the track.

Combined with the 1.5 day Avalanche Skills Course 1 this would be the minimum for heading out on simple local adventures. It is also useful to get introduced to some of the local terrain and build on the knowledge and practice of the touring skills. This can be a good pathway for working locals as the days can be spread out over a number of weeks.

The 3-day Backcountry Ski and Splitboard Touring Course covers the same topics as the Introduction to Backcountry Course above and includes the Avalanche Skills Course.

The longer format courses include more travel days to explore the local area so provide more opportunity to put into practice the newly acquired touring and avalanche skills before embarking on your own adventures.

The Glacier Ski and Splitboard Touring Course takes place on the glaciers of the Aoraki / Mount Cook or Westland National Parks. This is the next step up from the previous 2 courses and introduces the additional safety skills to undertake glacier ski trips including basic ice axe and crampon use, glacier travel, route finding, and crevasse rescue. There is also an opportunity to develop trip planning and avalanche knowledge for bigger glaciated objectives.

The short local Glacier Travel and Crevasse Rescue Course prepare trekkers, mountaineers, or ski or splitboard tourers for carrying out travel over glaciers. It covers all the skills required for safely tackling glacier objectives including crevasse rescue skills.

This makes it a good progression for those looking to get started with glacier ski touring or looking to increase their rope skills for future objectives.

The Ski Mountaineering Course course is also based on the glaciers of Aoraki / Mount Cook or Westland National Parks and is our most advanced ski course. The focus is the climbing and mountaineering skills required to ascend New Zealand’s classic snow and glacier peaks for the purposes of ski and snowboard descents and utilising skis or splitboard to access more remote objectives. Some experience in mountaineering or rock climbing and with basic snowcraft is useful prior to undertaking this course.

Finally, the 4-day Avalanche Skills Course 2 is the highest level of recreational avalanche education available and focuses on developing avalanche skills for the identification and assessment of avalanche danger whilst on multi-day tours away from the public avalanche advisory. To undertake this course, participants must have already done the Avalanche Skills Course 1 and consolidated their skills on a number of self-led backcountry tours.