I bought an Igloo building kit (an Ice-Box) from Grand Shelters in the States. I used it for the first time today. It’s a genius bit of kit. I’ve struggled with building decent snow shelters in the Alps. The snow depth is often not sufficient and the snow too dry to form into a cave. This solves the problem. Highly recommended.

that’s very interesting, what kind of weight and price is that? and where did you get it?

I bought it from Grand Shelters in the States, they charged $179 and they shipped it for $25, I haven’t been charged any import (yet?). It took 10 days to arrive. The entire kit weighs 2.3kg an it packs up fairly neatly. You can buy it online in Switzerland and Sweden but assuming I don’t get charged import duty it is a lot more expensive, even at the current exchange rate.

PS, I live in France.

thanks, I’ll look at that, just looked at your website, I see you’re an IML, I’m an aspirant hence the interest.

Are you coming along to the AGM next weekend? I’ll be taking the kit, you can have a look at it.

no I’m not going, something I’d not really thought about actually although several people had mentioned it. I suppose being based in CH I should be supporting having the conferences on the continent though

I went to Aviemore last year and it was certainly worthwhile. I renewed my FA cert at no extra cost! I’m not sure if there will be another outside of the UK. This one has caused some fairly major moans. I’m not sure how many people are for/against doing it outside of the UK, maybe I’ll found out on the weekend.

In Alaska we build Igloos with a snow saw and a shovel, they work well

buy the kit if you’d like, but they aren’t really necessary

Nice Igloo’s in a nice spot! I’m afraid the traditional building method does not work well in shallow snow packs! The first Igloo was built on 4” of snow. We built another yesterday. This time in about 18” of snow. The pictures are from Les Contamines in France.

yea, that’s true, the real key is to find wind affected snow that cuts into nice blocks.  The real secret to the traditional method is keeping your blocks from getting too thick so you can taper them in quicker.

> ea, that’s true, the real key is to find wind affected snow that cuts into nice blocks. 

Scotland is the place for that!

Check out this 10 minute film. All you need to know about building an igloo.