The photos and short video tell the story of 2,500 vertical feet of amazing snow.
Short 1:20 video. Music by Tetrix.
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Jeff rented a splitboard years ago and had a bad experience. They can be a finicky setup when it's your own stick, so I can only imagine what a rental board would have been like. He's been on the fence about getting a splitter for a while, but I think Saturday will be the tipping point. Mother nature threw down a late season storm that made Spring seem like mid-winter. Blower snow. Snowshoes were better than bootpacking, and he was keeping up with Adam and I on splits, but he was working a lot harder to do it.
The photos and short video tell the story of 2,500 vertical feet of amazing snow.
Short 1:20 video. Music by Tetrix.
The photos and short video tell the story of 2,500 vertical feet of amazing snow.
Short 1:20 video. Music by Tetrix.
On Saturday I took the sled out for the 3rd time in 2 seasons. It marked the first time it'd actually come in handy, but things are looking better for next year as Adam has seen first hand the benefits the sled offers. I'd been reluctant to take the sled out without another sled just in case something happened. For the Saturday trip, we stuck close to the staging area so that we could skin out if needed. With only a bit of exploring we found a perfect slope for shuttling on and also found ourselves at the base of a line we'd spied from the parking lot of Castle.
It was a fairly short day, 3 runs each on a 1,000 foot shuttle run. Untracked powder snow on top of a pretty hard crust layer. Great fun as you'll see in the video. We finished it off with a long skin up to the chute. It was about a 1,750 feet climb to where we stopped. The weather had been getting worse and daylight was starting to dwindle, so we aborted the climb about 2-300 feet shy of the goal of the base of the rocks. The climb was worth it though, the snow was blower.
One really interesting thing was the snowfall as we neared the top. It was unlike anything I'd seen before. Snow pellets the size of very large Nerds candy. The slope at this point was 45 degrees or steeper, around the time we stopped skinning and starting bootpacking. If you listened, you could actually hear the snow running downhill. Like sand in an hourglass that's tilted, it would run, then accumulate, release, run agan, accumulate again, etc. At times it was like a river of snow. I didn't bother trying to shoot it as the light was low and we were trying to push for the top.
12 meg video, just under 2 minutes, music by Tetrix
It was a fairly short day, 3 runs each on a 1,000 foot shuttle run. Untracked powder snow on top of a pretty hard crust layer. Great fun as you'll see in the video. We finished it off with a long skin up to the chute. It was about a 1,750 feet climb to where we stopped. The weather had been getting worse and daylight was starting to dwindle, so we aborted the climb about 2-300 feet shy of the goal of the base of the rocks. The climb was worth it though, the snow was blower.
One really interesting thing was the snowfall as we neared the top. It was unlike anything I'd seen before. Snow pellets the size of very large Nerds candy. The slope at this point was 45 degrees or steeper, around the time we stopped skinning and starting bootpacking. If you listened, you could actually hear the snow running downhill. Like sand in an hourglass that's tilted, it would run, then accumulate, release, run agan, accumulate again, etc. At times it was like a river of snow. I didn't bother trying to shoot it as the light was low and we were trying to push for the top.
12 meg video, just under 2 minutes, music by Tetrix
We (Dave, Adam, Jeff and I) enjoyed a single day of private heli on Saturday at RK Heli. We spent about 10K on 1.9 hours of flight time in an Astar 350 B3. That price got us a couple nights in a condo at Panorama, buffet breakfast, lunch, 2 guides, about 35,000 vertical feet and the chance to call the shots. Mostly.
Winter snowfall is unpredictable. Historically, early March should be mean blower powder, but the past couple years, nothing is guaranteed anymore. We went hoping to get fresh deep powder and steep trees. We found a snow pack that's down 20% from historical levels, no fresh in a while and temperatures that could have passed for April only a few years ago. Those global warming folks might be right.
We still requested and got to ride the trees to the somewhat astonished looks from the guides. Yeah, the snow up high was a bit better when we made a couple runs up there to show Jeff (it was his first heli trip), but we'd rather have steeper stuff with some bumps, pillows, etc. The overcast skies also made the trees a better option. This was the nice thing with private, you're paying the bills, they'll take you mostly where you wanted to go. With stability being "triple good" in the words of the lead guide, I asked for a couloir or two. Nope. I got scolded a few times for venturing too far off the beaten path. We sessioned one run that had never been ridden before. That entitled us to name it, but apathy prevailed.
All in all it was a great day of heli-boarding. Was it my best day? That's a tough one to answer. Having control over the group (no weak links) was great. Being able to mostly control terrain selection was great. Take me to those trees. OK. Having complete control over pacing was perfect. We're going to stop and take pictures or film. No problem. There was no sense of urgency at all, like you normally get with big or small group heli.
So what kept the day from being the best ever? For me it was snow. I've been lucky and had some amazing heli trips where it snowed every night and you woke up to blower. You were also cursed with weak links, flatter terrain, too much alpine, etc, but for me the perfect feeling is floating down a steep treed run, going as fast as I can with blower snow flowing over head. I didn't get that this trip, but I still had an amazing time. The one big downer on the day was a blind crash to tree that resulted in a sprained ankle that got progressively worse throughout the day. By the last run I could still ride, but barely walk!
I think the group's focus is being pushed more and more into the sled/splitboard side of things for next year. There's no concrete plans for a mechanized trip at this point. Alaska is being tossed around as a 2010 trip and I suspect we'll probably make it back again for another private trip next year.
Large (35 meg) video. 4+ minutes. Music by Tetrix
Winter snowfall is unpredictable. Historically, early March should be mean blower powder, but the past couple years, nothing is guaranteed anymore. We went hoping to get fresh deep powder and steep trees. We found a snow pack that's down 20% from historical levels, no fresh in a while and temperatures that could have passed for April only a few years ago. Those global warming folks might be right.
We still requested and got to ride the trees to the somewhat astonished looks from the guides. Yeah, the snow up high was a bit better when we made a couple runs up there to show Jeff (it was his first heli trip), but we'd rather have steeper stuff with some bumps, pillows, etc. The overcast skies also made the trees a better option. This was the nice thing with private, you're paying the bills, they'll take you mostly where you wanted to go. With stability being "triple good" in the words of the lead guide, I asked for a couloir or two. Nope. I got scolded a few times for venturing too far off the beaten path. We sessioned one run that had never been ridden before. That entitled us to name it, but apathy prevailed.
All in all it was a great day of heli-boarding. Was it my best day? That's a tough one to answer. Having control over the group (no weak links) was great. Being able to mostly control terrain selection was great. Take me to those trees. OK. Having complete control over pacing was perfect. We're going to stop and take pictures or film. No problem. There was no sense of urgency at all, like you normally get with big or small group heli.
So what kept the day from being the best ever? For me it was snow. I've been lucky and had some amazing heli trips where it snowed every night and you woke up to blower. You were also cursed with weak links, flatter terrain, too much alpine, etc, but for me the perfect feeling is floating down a steep treed run, going as fast as I can with blower snow flowing over head. I didn't get that this trip, but I still had an amazing time. The one big downer on the day was a blind crash to tree that resulted in a sprained ankle that got progressively worse throughout the day. By the last run I could still ride, but barely walk!
I think the group's focus is being pushed more and more into the sled/splitboard side of things for next year. There's no concrete plans for a mechanized trip at this point. Alaska is being tossed around as a 2010 trip and I suspect we'll probably make it back again for another private trip next year.
Large (35 meg) video. 4+ minutes. Music by Tetrix
My last day on snow was February 12th at Bella Coola Helisports. Work and a trip to Cuba took care of the rest of the month. On Sunday, I headed out to Wateron Park with Peter, Adam, Dave and Greg (a skier - no pics, sorry, gotta hate)
The one big downside with Waterton is the 3.2 mile (5 Km) round trip mostly flat skin in/out from where they barricade the road to the edge of the Cameron Lake. There's a perfectly good parking lot that visitors to the park in the summer get to use on the edge of the lake. The ridable terrain is just above the lake. A letter writing campaign has already been initiated. There are rumours of a protest including a barricade in summer if that fails to get the road opened. Yeah, the terrain and snow here are that good! Help out by emailing them here.
There's been a snow drought for quite a while and temperatures have been fairly high, so avalanche risk was low and we were expecting marginal conditions. There's supposed to be a burnt forest outside the park boundary, so we wanted to do some exploring. After a brief search, we mostly gave up and decided to take the marginal conditions. The first run was about 1,800 feet on a south facing slope. The fresh stuff was 4 inches deep on top of a pretty icy layer. Way more fun than hot and sunny Cuba, but not epic.
We lost a member when Peter decided to skin back to the vehicles. He's mostly recovered from some hip flexor issues and didn't want to re-injure them. The rest of the group headed across the lake and up the north facing slope. We'd ridden this face last time we visited, but we were probably a mile or so away from the up track we'd used then. We tried to find a decent spot on the topo gps map, but wound up billy goating up some really steep stuff the whole way. The sun had come out though, and the snow was infinitely better than the first run, so we soldiered on.
The long climb was worth it. I'd recently gotten a new battery for the goggle-cam, so I felt it was time to get some first person footage. We setup a couple times for still photos, but the snow was just so good that we didn't bother with any more of them. Within minutes we were at the bottom of a amazing 1,000 foot run. Very steep, nicely treed and probably close to a foot of powder. We we very stoked to find snow like this. The long skin back the cars removed a bit of stoke. 1.2 miles back to the edge of the lake and another 1.6 miles from there back to the parking lot. Sigh.
I'm just finishing up editing the video footage from the trip - should have it up soon. Edit: Video is finished. It's about 20 meg, so give it some time and it comes complete with some Cuban music!
The one big downside with Waterton is the 3.2 mile (5 Km) round trip mostly flat skin in/out from where they barricade the road to the edge of the Cameron Lake. There's a perfectly good parking lot that visitors to the park in the summer get to use on the edge of the lake. The ridable terrain is just above the lake. A letter writing campaign has already been initiated. There are rumours of a protest including a barricade in summer if that fails to get the road opened. Yeah, the terrain and snow here are that good! Help out by emailing them here.
There's been a snow drought for quite a while and temperatures have been fairly high, so avalanche risk was low and we were expecting marginal conditions. There's supposed to be a burnt forest outside the park boundary, so we wanted to do some exploring. After a brief search, we mostly gave up and decided to take the marginal conditions. The first run was about 1,800 feet on a south facing slope. The fresh stuff was 4 inches deep on top of a pretty icy layer. Way more fun than hot and sunny Cuba, but not epic.
We lost a member when Peter decided to skin back to the vehicles. He's mostly recovered from some hip flexor issues and didn't want to re-injure them. The rest of the group headed across the lake and up the north facing slope. We'd ridden this face last time we visited, but we were probably a mile or so away from the up track we'd used then. We tried to find a decent spot on the topo gps map, but wound up billy goating up some really steep stuff the whole way. The sun had come out though, and the snow was infinitely better than the first run, so we soldiered on.
The long climb was worth it. I'd recently gotten a new battery for the goggle-cam, so I felt it was time to get some first person footage. We setup a couple times for still photos, but the snow was just so good that we didn't bother with any more of them. Within minutes we were at the bottom of a amazing 1,000 foot run. Very steep, nicely treed and probably close to a foot of powder. We we very stoked to find snow like this. The long skin back the cars removed a bit of stoke. 1.2 miles back to the edge of the lake and another 1.6 miles from there back to the parking lot. Sigh.
I'm just finishing up editing the video footage from the trip - should have it up soon. Edit: Video is finished. It's about 20 meg, so give it some time and it comes complete with some Cuban music!
