I'm flying in to France with a group of people who have kindly agreed to let me use half their baggage allowance for my climbing gear. However they're all coming back before I do so I'm going to be stuck in France with a ton of gear and a 31kg baggage allowance for the return trip. It's $10/kg to bring it home with me on the plane. Anyone have any other (cheaper please!!) suggestions? I don't care if it takes a while to get back.

I'm in Canada but I can have stuff shipped to Washington and pick it up there.

I suppose another option is to just sell everything before we come back. Gear is more expensive in Europe, isn't it? Might be cheaper to just sell my rack & other heavy stuff and buy new stuff when I get home at this rate.

what's your return date? my friend is flying to seattle from paris in late june, and i think he's packing light since he's taking his skis (which are here) back to norway with him on his return...

just brain storming...

whatever you do about the shipping, the rest of the trip sounds fun!

I'm coming home on July 12th.

Should be super fun. I'm heading over June 12th to do some touristy stuff then my climbing partner is meeting me on the 26th. Its a little early for the high alpine stuff but we're hoping to get lucky with conditions. That said, I want to be prepared for anything so we're heading over with the alpine rock gear, glacier gear, cragging gear, ice gear, etc. Hopefully I can send a bunch of it back with my boyfriend at the end of the month when we have a better handle on conditions but by my calculations my climbing partner and I will only be able to bring back 110lbs of stuff without penalty and that's not much stuff for a 2 week climbing trip

Sorry, just saw this now.

Fred's flying back with his kids on July 8th. Unfortunately he will be loading them up with all his stuff, so I'm not sure that they'll have any room to spare. Worth looking into though.

You should definitely hook up with him while you are there!!! He leaves on Tuesday & will be there for 6 weeks. He's teaching some mountaineering courses in Les Ecrins, and looking for other stuff to do. Ask him about his friend Crystelle. She speaks English and would be super fun to get out with.

Just had another thought....

Get Fred to help you sell your gear to his students before you come back.

Peak Freak wrote:Just had another thought....

Get Fred to help you sell your gear to his students before you come back.

SWEET idea! Most of our heavy stuff is brand new or damn close to new so it would probably be a good deal for everyone.

Will have to get his contact info from you before we go.