30° degrees - Winter 2012 - English

thirthy degrees collector winter 2012-2013

COLLECTOR 2012-2013

Alpina

LE SPÉCIALISTE DE LA MONTAGNE DEPUIS 1974 NOUVEAU À LAUSANNE À deux pas de la gare de Lausanne : Le plus grand choix d’articles de montagne de Suisse, un service innovant, des conseils sportifs et des prix sympas – voici la philosophie de Bächli Sports de Montagne.

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Impressum 30° Degrees COLLECTOR ISSUE (since 2002)

N°41, winter 2012-2013 / Cover photo: Daisy Gilardini

Editing & administration CB Communication sàrl Rue du Simplon 20 – Case Postale 386 1001 Lausanne - Switzerland info@cbcommunication.com / www.cbcommunication.com Tel.: +41 21/ 312 41 41, Fax : +41 21/ 312 41 11 Editor-in-chief christian.bugnon@cbcommunication.com Deputy Editor-in-chief frederic.rein@cbcommunication.com Editorial assistant severine.cherix@cbcommunication.com Writers (in order of appearance) Christian Bugnon, Jean-Pierre Grandjean, Frédéric Rein, Stéfanie Waltenspül/Mammut Sports Group AG, Jean-Marc Sueur, François Perraudin, Jaqueline Dentan & Raphaël Berse, Didier Bonvin, Claude-Hervé Bazin, Serge Greter.

Photographers (in order of appearance) Daisy Gilardini, Photo Orée DR, Photo Aerofex, Photo PlanetSolar, Jean-Pierre Grandjean, SeaOrbiter/Jacques Rogerie, Alexander Khokhlov, Michal Bonikowski, Thomas Senf, Yves Garneau, Jean-Marc Sueur, François Perraudin, Freeride World Tour, Mario Colonel, Keystone, Office National du Tourisme Thailandais, Thomas Bradford, Hôtel BLC Design.

Graphic design: alexandra.binczyk@cbcommunication.com (AD) christian.bugnon@cbcommunication.com German translation: Sabine Dröschel English translation: Simon Till, Paul Subrenat Photo-offset printing: Images 3 Printing: Irl + Lausanne SA 30° available in Swiss newsagents from Naville & Valora, one issue for CHF 8.Collector issue CHF 15.Subscriptions to 30°: info@30degrees.ch Subscriptions in Switzerland: March / May / June / September / December 1 year (4 editions + 1 Collector issue ) for CHF 57.– –25% for 18-24 year olds and over age 65 2 years (8 editions + 2 Collector issue ) for CHF 99.– –25% for 18-24 year olds and over age 65 Advertising for French-speaking Switzerland + English version (Internet & iPad) www.30degres.tv www.30degrees.tv christian.bugnon@cbcommunication.com Advertising for German-speaking Switzerland www.30grad.tv Blueorange Media GmbH Sonja Kupper 062/ 772 21 56 sk@blueorange-media.ch Copyright : © 2012-2013 30°degrees magazine All rights reserved.

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30° magazine, an official media partner of the Swiss Alpine Club CAS-SAC for competition sports This issue is also available on the iPad. You can also find us on Facebook and Twitter.

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EdEdito ito

With winter now upon us, 30° invites you on an amazing trip to a dreamlike land filled with fantasy. Reality proves elusive in this, our very first collector’s issue. Offering 32 extra pages, it depicts utterly enchanting destinations at the edge of the world, sublime settings enveloped in ethereal snow. Double-page spreads filled with head-spinning beauty and excitement are the order of the day: lofty peaks brushing the skies of Patagonia and the vast magnificence of the ice floes at their most divine, where we come nose to nose with polar bears, penguins and nature at its purest. This is our gift to you in this festive period, a souvenir offering that newly commemorates the ten years we have shared with our readers. What better time to succumb to the magic, the pleasure and the sheer whim of happenstance? So snuggle up by the fire, leaf through the pages and immerse yourself in this world of wonder, one imbued with the spirit of Christmas itself.

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Happy Christmas

Christian Bugnon | Editor-in-chief

All gilt-edged and cinnamon-scented, Christmas is very much present in a luxury special issue devoted to wonderful Verbier and Val de Bagne. Seen here by 30°, the grand old lady of the Valais winter sports scene richly deserves this special edition. Pick one up free of charge at the resort or check it out on our website. Non-subscribers can also order a print copy, available in French and English, and feel the beauty for themselves. The iPad version comes complete with bonus features, including an essential visit to some luxury chalets, giving you something to dream about as you wait for the next five-star special issue.

Yosemite

Contents Collector Issue n°41 Winter 2012-2013 SPORT

Last act of Stephan Siegrist’s

Patagonian Trilogy

A different kind of skiing… in Verbier

Estelle Balet, a new hope for women’s

freeriding

A new dimension for the GiantXtour

and Freeride World Tour

Ski-mountaineering: Ecoeur ready

to fly high again

LIFESTYLE News

Portfolio: Japan

Photography: Faces with a second read

Daisy Gilardini: Beauty as a tool for conservation

Yves Garneau: Images of beauty

Swiss Alpine Club SAC: 150 years of history

Vertigo in the Vallée Blanche

Thaïlande: Basking beneath Thai palms

SOCIeTy

SeaOrbiter: Taking off for the final frontiers of the undersea world!

An electric snow bike that beats the cold Choosing the right skis The latest thing: binary watches Latest trends in design Watch trends Sport trends Hotel feature: A haven of light in the City of Light

38 96 100 102 104

8 14 28 60 78 86 109 122

22 34 106 115 117 119 121 130

A magical view of KongĹ?bu-ji temple, the traditional and official home of the Shingon esoteric school, where a form of tantric Buddhism is practised which is close to that found in Tibet.

PORTFOLIO KōYA-SAN Text and photos°°° Jean-Pierre Grandjean

A popular destination in summer thanks to its cool climate, Mount Koya, located in the heart of the Kii peninsula south of Osaka, is covered with snow in winter. For over a thousand years, the Buddhist monks of the esoteric Shingon school have made it their bastion. Responsible for looking after the dead as well as the living, they worship the Buddha Vairocana and practice rituals such as goma, a fire ceremony symbolising the combustion of passions. Fires, which are frequent in these forests of ancient cedar trees still populated by bears, have destroyed many of the monasteries. Of the two thousand temples built over the centuries, around one hundred remain today, and enjoy UNESCO world heritage status. They receive around a million pilgrims every year. From Osaka, leaving from Namba station, Gokurakubashi can be reached in 1 hour 30 minutes, the starting point for the funicular railway which climbs the sacred mountain.

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Image of Jizō-san dressed in a traditional monk’s straw hat. He also wears a bib around his neck (yodare kake) symbolising his role as protector of small children.

SeaOrbiter: taking off to conquer thEfinal frontiers oF THe

undersea world!

The construction of the SeaOrbiter, an amazing floating laboratory, will begin in early 2013, with its first mission scheduled for the second half of 2014, in the Mediterranean Sea.

Faces

with a second

Russian photographer Alexander Khokhlov has created an unusual and startling series of black and white portraits, each of which carries an invitation to a second read.

The work of a true illusionist.

read

p“It’s the result of a last minute idea. Initially, the plan was for the model’s neck to show part of the billiard cue.

But since the neck turned out to be too thick, we decided to place it to the side,” explains photographer Alexander Khokhlov.

An

electric

snow bike that beats thE cold An enclosed cockpit protects the driver of Michal Bonikowski’s prototype snow bike from the cold.

The beginning of Stephan Siegrist’s winter trilogy in Patagonia dates back to 1999, with the end of the quest finally reached in 2012 when he scaled the peak of Cerro Standhardt.

Mission complete! After scaling Cerro Standhardt as part of Mammut’s “Biggest Peak Project in History,” Swiss athlete Stephan Siegrist, a member of the Mammut Pro Team, has become the first mountain climber to reach the three main summits in the Cerro Torre group during the Patagonian winter.

A Polar Bear is patiently waiting for the ice to form in Hudson Bay. By mid November they are usually out on the pack ice hunting seals.

Wapusk National Park - Manitoba - Canada

Daisy Gilardini Beauty as a tool for conservation

After a wonderful day’s skiing in Zermatt, Ilir Osmani takes in the magic of the clouds as seen from Theodulpass.

YVES GARNEAU images

of beauty

Text°°° frédéric rein Photos°°°YVES GARNEAU

Flip through the photographs of Yves Garneau, a Canadian who has lived in Verbier for 15 years, and you’ll discover an eclectic life tinged with enthusiasm. Here’s a close-up of his work.

He’s snapped action shots of extreme sports, captured mountain landscapes and backdrops bordering on the sublime, and gone above and beyond in his exceptional photographs of interiors and haute cuisine. The œuvre of photographer Yves Garneau spans a wide variety of subjects, forging a multi-faceted mosaic – just like their creator, a 36-year-old globally-minded Canadian who has lived in Verbier since 1997.

“Since I love freeride, one of my friends told me about the Alps,” said Garneau.

With a plane ticket in hand, he landed in Europe and set off on a tour of resorts, immediately choosing Verbier, which gave him “good vibes.” After working in the food industry, he managed to make a career of photography.

“I had to diversify my subjects, since focusing solely on the mountains was impossible” noted the young man.

Curious by nature, he opened his eyes to new horizons without losing sight of the snow-capped peaks. His eye for detail and composition ensure tremendously beautiful results.

“I started working before digital cameras came along, a time where you only got one chance to get your shot right. That taught me to constantly search for intense light, explosive colours and perfect lines,” said Garneau.

This purist welcomes us into his world as if we were gliding over a mountain clad in powdery snow: with desire and delight!

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www.g1photo.com

Diavolezza, Bernina area, Engadin, Graub端nden, Switzerland, at the back: Piz Pal端, Piz Bernina