"use common sense and you can then pretty much go anywhere"

While the term might not exist in law, there is a right to roam (small letters)

bluebunnet,your spot on !!!!! if you lot dont like the gorm why do you still go????

alan, are you indirectly admitting that you may have been wrong/too quick to condemn the people who are employed and trained to help us? I feel that you are dodging the point slightly...

During the 2009 Season I skied the White Lady several times on Friday afternoon. On the Saturday morning first thing I got one run down it, came back up after getting some breakfast, to find two patrollers putting a rope across the top with 'Closed' and 'Keep Out' signs on both the Lady and the M1.

So I inquired about why they were closing them, the answer was "Because it's the weekend." I asked if they were jesting the reply was "No, its to keep the punters off them".

This kind of nonsense just leads to the scenario where people simply do not heed any warnings.

Are you trying to say that a ski patrol close runs to the public so they can ski the slopes themselves?

i see they're charging full prices from now on, even though full mountains not open.

Technically that isnt true, technically. Anyone with a First Aid qualification (so ski instructors, mountain leaders, etc.) will be able to assist you, in fact the first people on the scene are unllikely to be ski patrol (and its these peoples actions that will determine wither you live or die (if it comes to that)). From thereon mountain rescue can get you to the nearest hospital. But anyway thats a meaningless point.

Ski Patrols primary task is to prevent accidents from happening, which is why they will be the first ones up lifts and down runs in the morning and is why they have ultimate control over what is open. We know that.

Yes I am greatful for having them. But closing runs (or the whole mountain in this case) for little reason is, to be honest, a bit patronising. I know when Im skiing at my limit, I can deal with difficult terrain. THat is what you get when youv been skiing your whole life. Why cant they just give us the information we need to make our own assesment? Instead of being sheepish about it.

I think the only times I recall Glenshee ever closing a run/area when they have been perfectly skiable is due to significnt avalanche risk.

Its funny; most of the folk I spoke to on the Cairnwell T-bar the other day were complaining about Cairngorm and tax payers money, and commenting on Glenshee in comparison. Just thought Id add that

cammyammy - I appreciate your point. But surely if you are relying on mountain rescue or a rescue helicopter then THAT is a waste of taxpayers money. But that too, is beside the point.

What i am trying to ascertain is: does alan actually think that the ski patrol on Cairngorm Mountain would close a piste to the public so that they could enjoy it themselves?

I'm still waiting to hear back...

There seems to be something fishy going on... you have deleted half of my posts and your own...

come on alan, what gives?

No, they were posting runs closed to discourage inexperienced skiers from going down them and getting into difficulty, with a full expectation expressed that those who knew the mountain would ski them anyway.

Cammy's point about Ski Patrol being primarily about preventing accidents is true to a point - but where is that point?

The problem on CairnGorm steams from finding people didn't heed 'No Beginners' signs or thought they were good enough not to be beginners, so 'Experts Only' signs were put regularly on terrain that did not warrant them. Thus people would ski the Gunbarrel and think that was OK, it said experts only, OK West Wall next!! You get the idea.

The response to that seems to have been to just post things closed. If the White Lady is posted closed when it is skiable, and CML try to enforce it by ticket removal, people will vote with their feet.

The terrain profile of CairnGorm means this is primarily a 'Gorm problem and not one that is anywhere near so prevalent at the other Scottish Snowsport Areas. This 'problem' in some regards is actually CairnGorm's biggest strength, there is top to bottom riding for just about all ability levels from more confident snow plough turners up.

The more poles, ropes, signs and nets that go up on the mountain, the more controlled CML make it seem, the more people expect every thing to be controlled - every hazard to be marked. More and more clutter on the mountain has not solved the problem of people straying from easier upper mountain terrain onto terrain in which they find themselves in bother on.

Perhaps it's time to go in the other direction and have much of the mountain less controlled, perhaps then people will be less confident about venturing onto terrain their unfamiliar with?

I've deleted several posts, by various people, because this was heading for a s**tstorm, not a discussion, it was also starting to get personal.

#

cant you just remove the offensive words if you must do that, then we can decide how it's going for ourselves while leaving the basic jist of the post intact, you have issues with cgm that you like to air and removing posts just makes you appear more biased in my opinion.



Edited 1 times. Last edit at 20.45hrs Thu 15 Dec 11 by geeo.

none of my posts were personal alan, i certainly did not use any profanity. I am keen to have a discussion about this as i can see that it gets many people backs up...

However, 'discussion is defined as an 'earnest conversation'. There is nothing earnest about deleting posts and doctoring conversations. Call me old fashioned, but you are discussing the 'right to roam act... what happened to 'right of free speech'?






are you trying to say that the ski patrol at Cairngorm were closing runs to the public so they could enjoy it themselves? If that was not what you were implying by that post then could you please enlighten me as to what it was that you were implying?

People were complaining about posts not being deleted a couple of days ago when they were clearly flaming/trolling .

You've repeated this three times, have you read the post above?