Expeditions

Skiing UP to Warde as part of our training for La Patrouille Des Cedres
(the first Back Country Ski Race in Lebanon)

At first it all looked like another beautiful and appealing day in sunny Lebanon......

Then clouds stared forming in the valley of Baskenta an ominous and foreboding message from God........


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But nothing would stop us we where set on going all the way to what is known here as The French Room.....


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The French room is a sort of construction on top of the highest peak of the Sanine mountain range once occupied by french soldiers.......

Six courageous skiers and snow boarders bent on skiing down one of the most exciting slopes of mount Lebanon, named by a french ski instructor as La Grande Coulee.....

There they were, Alex, Karim, Elias, Maissa, and Mark accompanied by and old man called Camille who should have known better than to keep on strutting to the top........


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Finally we reached the Cross under a heavy fog.......


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Things were looking bleaker by the minute.....

Our only window of opportunity to go down as originally planned was fading away in the clouds......

It got colder and colder and our only hope was to track back the way we came but this time with Zero visibility.....


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When we finally made it back after 8 hours of solid walking we were happy to be alive.....


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ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TO the ELK

tags: lebanon, mountains, snow, skiing, mzaar, faraya, lost, alive, fog, baskinta, beirut, expedition

-finkployd- Expeditions on BloggingBeirut.com

(click here for Part 1)

So here we are waiting for the water to boil in -4 degrees weather…

In the meantime we discussed and reviewed our march, where we went wrong, how we could have done it better etc… I had a couple of avocados I had brought with me, to everyone’s amusement. Hey avocados are just as much food as tuna and corn (without lemon in the occurrence). Also it’s an energy rich food filled with all sorts of good oils and liposoluble vitamins, fiber and lutein etc etc I could go on but that’s another story.

Anyways two hours in we realize the water is nowhere close to boiling, we leave the burners on and go to bed…

Expedition to 2ornet El Saoudah
(the black horn or summit, the highest summit in the whole of the middle east and north africa).
Expedition carried out by the Speleoclub du Liban
(4 members from the main branch, and 5 from the northern branch)
Planning by Isam Sbat
(northern branch of the Speleoclub du Liban)

Date: saturday the 24'th 9 am to sunday the 25'th of february at 1 pm
Trip: Begin at 2800m altitude, up to 3088m, then back down to 1000m altitude in sir el dennieh.

Weather: Clear skies day one, snowstorm on day two down to 1500 meters, and rain below
Equipment: Snow racquets, sleeping bags, quickcovers (thermal blankets), high energy content foods and drinks (dried fruit and nuts, chocolates red bull milk) water (4l per person), tents, thermally isolating clothes, various foodstuffs (tuna corn spaghetti tea), headlamps handheld lamps. Maps obtained from the army, laminated for waterproofing, compasses, GPS navigation systems, Camera and camera equipment. A book (Mon Dieu, Pourquoi? By the late Abbe Pierre).
On average 15 Kilos of weight per person.









We started out in Beirut at 6:30 am in order to rendez vous with the team members from the north at the base of the cedars ski slopes at 9. We were ready to go by 9:30.
At first, the army (who operate a ski lift at the cedars ski resort) was hesitant to let us go, as this is obviously a risky endeavour, especially that we would not be coming back untill the following day, and that we would end the trip at a location other than that of departure, so there would be no way for the army to verify that we made it back safely. So we avoided disclosing the full extent of the plan. They eventually let us go.
At the top, we put on our snow racquets, and basically that's when we started having problems: