Splitboard Trips > Arctic > Splitboard Greenland

Greenland Split and Sail

Splitboard Greenland is perhaps one of the most extraordinary snowboarding experiences on the planet. This unique splitboard trip combines remote Arctic touring with a once in a lifetime sailing expedition. Our Greenland Split and Sail trips are guided by two UIAGM splitboard professionals giving you access to areas that few splitboarders will ever see.

You sail aboard La Louise, a two masted Arctic schooner designed specifically for long voyages in polar environments. The boat becomes your moving basecamp navigating through quiet fjords and open water in search of the pristine powder descents hidden behind remote coastlines and on arctic islands.

Our client to guide ratio of three to one allows us to explore complex terrain more safely, opening up bigger lines to ride. This is true adventure splitboarding in one of the most dramatic and unspoiled Arctic regions in the world.

Join us on a very special private boat captained by a legend and experience touring in some truly incredible terrain led by our UIAGM guiding team.

When’s the best time to come?

Contact us if you want an exhilarating and completely bespoke experience in remote arctic terrain with a small client guide ratio of 3:1 on a unique arctic icebreaking schooner.

10-Day SW Coast Expedition

16th – 27th April 2027, €7295
8-Day Nuuk Island Explorer

29th – 8th May 2027, €6495

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Programme
Fitness & Ability
What's Included
What's Not Included
Terms & Conditions

Programme: 10 Day Trip. Southwest Coast Expedition 11 Nights onboard

Day 1. Arrival in Greenland. Transfer by taxi to the boat. Spend first night on the boat.

Day 2 – 11. Set sail. Splitboard Greenland (up to 10 days of splitboarding)

Day 12. Leave the boat after breakfast and transfer to the airport and our onward journey.

Programme: 8 Day Trip. Nuuk Island Explorer 9 Nights onboard

Day 1. Arrival in Greenland. Transfer by taxi to boat. Spend first night on boat

Day 2- 9. Set Sail. Splitboard Greenland (up to 8 days of splitboarding)

Day 10. Leave the boat after breakfast and transfer to the airport and our onward journey

Fitness & Ability

We will look to make minimum vertical ascents of 1200m per day so your fitness level will allow you to do this over consecutive days. You will most likely also have been on a Rider Social trip before, if you haven’t we will need to talk with you to assess the general group fit and ability level.

What’s Included

8 or 10 days of UIAGM splitboard only guiding with Paul Verdier & Laurent Bibollet (depending on the trip)
9 or 11 nights’ accommodation on La Louise (depending on the trip)
Dinner on each nights (inc wine)
Lunch on every days
Breakfast on each morning

What’s Not Included

Flights to Nuuk, Greenland
Personal Insurance
Splitboard equipment
Backcountry safety equipment
Any hotel nights required

Payment Policy: A deposit of €2000 is required immediately upon booking your session with The Rider Social. The balance of your trip costs are due 8 weeks before the course start date. Failure to meet the payment deadline 8 weeks before the start date will forfeit your place on that session without refund.

Cancellation policy: For cancellations made up to 8 weeks before the course start date, 0% of the ‘deposit’ amount paid will be refunded. For cancellations occurring within 6 weeks of the course start date no refund payments will be made. If cancelling a course within 6 weeks of the course start date, payments made cannot be refunded, carried forward or moved to another course.

Refund policy: The Rider Social is not liable for refunds or compensation due to late arrival, failure to attend or complete a course due to injury or illness, travel restrictions, resort closure, adverse weather conditions, force majeure or any other causes or conditions outside the control of The Rider Social

Covid-19: In the event that you can’t attend your session due to Covid-19 associated travel and holiday disruptions including (but not exclusive to) resort closure, FCO imposed travel restrictions, airline train or ferry travel bans imposed by International or local governments, a total refund of the balance paid, minus the non refundable deposit amount, will be refunded to you (the client).

In the event that you can’t attend your course due to you, (the client) being personally affected by illness, inability to travel due to illness or any other personal restrictions affecting your travel The Rider Social will not be liable to refund any monies (as stated in the refund policy above). It is strongly recommended that you have adequate personal insurance for illness, personal cancellation and personal travel disruption.

Upon booking any advertised session of any duration with The Rider Social you are in agreement of the Payment & Cancellations policies listed above.

Grey Seas, White Mountains and Blue Icebergs

We fly into the capital of Greenland, Nuuk, which is situated on its south-west corner. A short taxi ride from the airport takes us to Nuuk Port and Harbour.

Once here, we head to the inner marina where our boat, flying under the French flag, awaits us. After lowering the luggage down onto the deck, we climb down ourselves to embark on ‘La Louise’ where her owner and captain, Thierry Dubois (and his skipper) will welcome us onboard.

A 3-hour sail from the harbour in a north easterly direction, passing by the colourful houses of Nuuk, leads us towards a group of islands which will be our splitboarding zones for the week. All of these islands have been personally scouted and mapped by Thierry as to their suitability for ski and splitboard touring, and, crucially, he knows exactly where the best places to drop us off and pick us up from each day are located

Combined with his knowledge of the local weather systems, this gives us a major guiding advantage as he understands how the itineraries might have been affected and as to their suitability for touring on each day

We’re taken to the shore each day in a semi-rigid 4m dinghy fitted with a 20 Hp HB engine, and picked up at the end of each tour to take us back to La Louise, which is anchored up in the next bay.

These really are secret spots, and as such, they are very closely guarded. We’ll genuinely ask you not to share any touring routes on Strava or similar apps for this very reason.

One of a Kind. “La Louise”

There are already a lot of boats operating in the ‘ski and sail’ space throughout the Arctic, and Greenland is no exception, but 95% of these boats are production line, factory models that have been retrofitted to accommodate ski-tour groups. These do work, but can compromise on comfort. To our knowledge, there is only one boat out there that was designed from the outset to deliver this specific service.

Passenger comfort was at the forefront of the La Louises’ design and she features waterproof partitions, heated drying rooms for boot liners and clothing, survival suits, a high quality boiler system for hot showers, comfortable seating areas with a library and music and the capacity to make long, self sufficient, arctic voyages. All of this sets her apart from anything else currently on offer.

La Louise is an elegant and robust 19 m arctic schooner which took Thierry six years and 23,000 hours of work to design and build, to a very elaborate specification. She has 2 carbon masts, 4 sails, a 235HP John Deere engine and a stainless steel icebreaker bow. Every single aspect of this craft has been thought through and designed to work flawlessly in both open arctic waters and ice filled fjords whilst carrying passengers and skis/splitboards in comfort.

There is room for 8 (including the guides) on this boat (the captain and skipper have their own private quarters) and even though sleeping berths are compact it’s very comfortable ( the more organised you are with your things the better the experience will be for you). The main living room/ dining area is where you’ll spend most of your time when not on the deck.

The boat has a network of radiators powered by the boat’s engine (and stove) and an electric heating system powered by a generator. The constant ambient temperature onboard is very pleasant and at night it is around 15 / 16 degrees. An oil-burning stove is fitted to pump out heat on the colder days.

Eating & Drinking. Fine French food

Thierry is a passionate cook, he prepares and serves food made with love. Mealtimes are important here, and with generally zero phone signal available on this trip, it is a chance to disconnect and enjoy time at the table in good company.

After breakfast (with great coffee) each morning, we go splitboarding. On our return to the boat, we’re served a late lunch of fresh, homemade soups, salad’s and cheeses with home baked bread and cured meats. Thierry buys well over 50kg of good French cheese to serve up over the course of just a few weeks. You’ll not go hungry here.

A late dinner follows (after showers and some downtime). Expect to eat cod and other fish caught off the side of the boat that day along with some insanely good desserts to follow. Sailing with a French captain on a boat flying under the French flag, you’d expect a good wine too, and that’s exactly what you get.

Thierry will join us at dinner, and it’s a great chance to talk to him about his career as an off-shore and round the world yachtsman. It has been a fascinating life, and the story of his being capsized for 4 days in 1997 during a solo round-the-world race is captivating. Thierry is often approached to consult on safety procedures for various navy operations globally.

What’s the touring / riding like?

This is Norway. On steroids.

It really is quite hard to paint the complete picture of this arctic experience for you. The terrain is huge, it’s very remote, and it is stunningly beautiful. We will sail you to a new zone each evening and anchor the boat, the next morning, when we’ll climb down into the motorboat (wearing arctic life preserving equipment) and shuttle run to the shore.

From here, we’ll make a tour and look for the best conditions ( expect to split a minimum of 1200m vertical per day) and ride down in what is usually untouched powder to the opposite side of the island, where we’ll be picked up from the shore by Thierry, who has sailed around to meet us.

The lines to ride are really quite varied – we rode big steeps of nearly 40 degrees, raced through an incredible winding canyon run and surfed down one of the enormous couloirs, all of them with a sea view leading us back down to shore.

Every day you’ll be wearing your harness and be carrying your boot crampons and axes, and it’s not uncommon to have to fashion an exit to the beach after riding – on some days it was a bushwhack and on others it was a full-on abseil back down to the shore.

Why two UIAGM guides?

Paul (Polo) Verdier and Laurent (Bibs) Bibollet will be the UIAGM splitboard guides on this trip. Most of you will already know Polo from going on splitboard trips with us in the past. Laurent is from the same Compagnie des Guides, Saint Gervais as Polo.

They have been friends for a long time and we’re thrilled to have him onboard here at The Rider Social.

Laurent’s splitboarding and UIAGM work in Chamonix & Les Contamines has seen him become appointed as a Jones Snowboards Ambassador Guide – a coverted acolade awarded to those who have dedicated their lives to offering unique guided experiences and educating about snow safety.

He recently filmed an episode of Arctic Lines with Antti Autti (due for release Autumn 2025). His most recent movie part was in The Octopus alongside Pica Herry and Nick Russel.

With both Polo and Laurent working together we can better manage some of the trickier conditions that Greenland can present you with. From organising abseils to navigating glaciated bootpacks and everything in-between.

It is very, very likely that will be riding in some incredibly remote places on this Greenland trip and your safety is at the top of our list. With both Polo and Laurent in charge we can be doubly sure it stay’s there…

Who else is going?

Every person in this session will likely have been on a Rider Social trip before, so you’ll find yourself in the company of a very chilled splitboard crew that understands how to move in the mountains with us. The boat has room for 6 clients, giving us a 3:1 client-to-guide ratio.

When is the next Splitboarding trip to Greenland?

We are scheduled to go back in April / May 2027. Exact dates TBC. Click here to contact us and be the first to know.

Contact us if you want an exhilarating and completely bespoke experience in remote arctic terrain with a small client guide ratio of 3:1 on a unique arctic icebreaking schooner.

FAQs

What is a Ski and Sail trip?

A Ski and Sail trip is when a group of ski-tourers use a boat in the Arctic to access islands and shorelines that otherwise can’t be reached. They will climb from the shore to a summit, ski back down, return to the boat and sail to the next objective.

In Greenland we do exactly the same but it is for splitboarders with UIAGM splitboard guides. We call it a Split and Sail trip.
Where can you go splitboarding in Greenland?

The best splitboarding and ski-touring in Greenland can be found on the East, West and Southwest coasts. Popular destinations include Maniitsoq in Western Greenland, Tasiilaq in East Greenland and the Nuuk region on the Southwest coast.

Each location is different: Maniistoq has some very steep terrain and Tasiilaq is very remote. While you can splitboard tour in these two amazing areas the main guiding operations run

mostly heli based ski trips due to difficult access. Nuuk hits a sweet spot, it is slightly easier to get to and has a vast amount of remote islands to explore.
What is the snow & terrain in Greenland like?

In Greenland you will find powder, corn, and windpack conditions. It is likely that you will encounter all three types of snow. We will find you north facing, protected lines holding cold powder and perfect spring / corn snow on other aspects to ride.

The terrain in Greenland offers a huge variety of splitboard objectives. On a Split and Sail trip we can choose from almost an unlimited range of couloirs running down to the sea, high summits, traverses and snowboarding on glaciers.