Well, the last helicopter landed last Saturday, calling an end to the 2011/2012 CMH heli-ski season. As sad as that may be, it does mean that we have time to reflect on the season, and go through loads of fantastic pictures that we recieved. For this blog post, I thought I would create a tribute to the machines that make it all possible: the helicopters.
1. This picture was taken in February up at the Bugaboos. Photographer Alex Edwards is our support helicopter pilot, and managed to snap this mid-flight picture from a nearby ridge.
2. In my opinion, there are two situations where I am ok that a helicopter is not flying. The first being when it is dark, because I need my beauty sleep so that I can get out and ski the next day. The second would be when it is snowing so hard that you can be guaranteed that once you do get back in the air, the skiing is going to be beyond epic. This picture by Topher Donahue shows just how much early snow Galena can get.
3.The Bell 407 is the sports car of helicopters. This picture shows it in action, and I like it. Going to pick up the next group of small group heli-skiers in Kootenay.
4. Wait a second... Oh. I see what I did here...
5. And for the last picture, I will put up a picture that I took. Because I can. This is also the best view of any helicopter- because if you are looking at one like this, it is coming to pick you up for your next run. Giddy up at CMH Galena!
Calling this a review isn’t quite right. Perhaps a rave is a better word for it.
Dave Mossop and Eric Crossland, of The Sherpas Cinema, directed All.I.Can, a spellbinding work of art that defies categorization as merely a ski film. It’s been called the most incredible ski movie ever produced, and based purely on the pile of awards the film has received, it just might be.
While All.I.Can includes a plethora of mind-bending ski sequences, including futuristic footage of Kai Peterson catastrophically botching (as well as impossibly sticking) new-school tricks in the midst of horrifying alpine faces, the heart of the film is a powerful discussion on the environment.
When a heli-skiing sequence ends with one skier joking around with a gas pump, pretending to shove it in another’s eye, I went from being a spectator to being a fan; we all have impact, so it’s what we do about it that matters.
Slow-motion, time-lapse and digital animation created with high-end technology are all used heavily, but tastefully, to give a strong sense of the passing of time and to illustrate change in the natural world. The film also unflinchingly delves into the relationships between international travel, mechanized skiing, and environmental impact. It takes the new approach that environmentalism isn’t about being against things - instead it is about changing our perspective on our relationship to the environment, and then changing how we live accordingly.
The modern free-skiing visionary, JP Auclair, (whose street skiing segment in the film was viewed 124,000 times on its first day online) summed it up nicely: “People are always saying ‘do less of this, do less of that’ but I don’t think it’s about doing less of anything - it’s about doing more...”
The film’s example of large-scale environmental balancing in the ski industry is the Whistler-Blackcomb ski area installing a micro-hydro plant in one of the mountain’s creeks that offsets the entire energy usage of the ski area.
Having just posted a blog about the CMH Galena micro-hydro reaching financial payoff and saving a thousand tonnes of CO2 emissions after seven years of operation, I realized the visionary drivers of the ski industry are all coming to a similar conclusion - we can’t run ski lifts of any sort without burning energy, so let’s do more, lots more, to balance our impacts with contributions.
Several skiers interviewed in the film discussed the unique place skiers and mountaineers have in the environmental project:
One said, “Skier’s connection with nature and the mountains is incredible, and it puts us at the forefront of what is going on with the environment.”
And another pointed out, “You have a constituency on the hill who, by virtue of what they do, every one of them is an environmentalist.”
It’s not just the cinematography that speaks to the passing of time and the acceleration of change. The youngest skier in the film is about three years old, the oldest, 75. “We used to have more snow” said one of the older skiers.
Even the topic of ski technology is brought back to the philosophy of embracing change. One skier mentions how, with the drastic changes in the shape of skis, “the average skier now is not fearing change, they’re expecting change, and that’s pretty cool.”
As the credits rolled, I sat back and wondered if I had anything negative to say about the film. One thing came to mind: we are just learning how to talk about these things, and it seems that All.I.Can is like the first few awkward - albeit beautiful, scary and inspiring - words in a difficult conversation about our world and its immediate future.
Partway through the credits, the film’s carbon footprint is shown, including what they’ve done to offset 100% of the making the film.
It made me realize just how visionary CMH Heli-Skiing’s sustainability report was when first published eight years ago in 2004, by neither pretending to be low impact, nor hiding its metaphorical head in the sands of progress - and instead being clear about environmental impact, initiatives, and the balance of providing carefully considered access to the world’s greatest skiing.
Photo of this blog writer/skier's house being equipped with solar power in Colorado - just one of many skier's houses powered by solar in the area. I talked with a CMH million-footer who was putting geothermal heating into his home to help offset his impact.
What are you doing to offset yours?
As of this ski season, the CMH Galena Lodge’s micro-hydro plant has fully paid for its installation cost - as well as saved about half-a-million litres of diesel fuel and nearly a thousand tonnes of carbon emissions over its seven years of operation. Last February, Luke Crawford, the maintenance expert at Galena, gave me a tour of the hydro facility, a tiny structure shown in the photo below, nestled among snow mushrooms near a stream a few hundred metres from the Galena Lodge.
Between keeping the Lodge and its energy systems in operation, and bagging as many pillow lines as possible, Luke took the time to answer a few questions:
TD: On average, how much of the lodge's power supply does the hydro provide?
LC: From end of ski season to start of ski season (April 1st- December 1st) it provides essentially 100% of our electrical power.
During the season, it provides 100% electrical power needs from December 1st until usually sometime in early Febuary. From that point to the end of the ski season, we are running the diesel generator 15-18 hrs. each day. However, even when the generator is running, 100% of the hydro power is dumped into heating our boiler loops.
The short answer would be about 80% for the year.
TD: How much did it cost?
LC: It was anticipated it would take 5-7 years for the hydro plant to pay for itself from the greatly diminished diesel bill. The installation of the plant itself cost about 450,000 dollars and saves between 45,000 and 50,000 litres of diesel annually (which translates into reduced carbon emissions to the tune of about 130 tonnes a year).
TD: How has it changed the energy use/awareness by staff and guests?
LC: For staff I would say we are all much more aware of conserving power and to a certain extent greater awareness of what the power hogs in the lodge are eg. Hobart dishwasher, bathroom floor heat, the older style flourescent lighting.
With the guests I can't say I have really noticed much, however I have only worked here since the plant was installed. Every tour there are usually a couple of guests who take quite an interest in the hydro setup at the lodge.
TD: When was it installed?
LC: 2005
TD: Any issues with it?
LC: The biggest one is that we have a two-month period each year when the hydro plant cannot produce enough power to meet the Lodge's peak demand times which are in the morning when everyone is getting up, and then around dinner time.
The reason is that the run off from the creek always drops to a certain point that is just not enough for the lodge during those time periods of the day. The plant was designed with the goal of being able to meet all of our electrical requirements for the entire year, so it is unfortunate that this did not materialize into reality for the lodge.
Occasionally, something happens up at the hydro plant's weir that cuts off the water supply for the plant, forcing it to shut down. These can last from mere minutes to...in very rare instances a couple of days, in which case we rely on the generator until the issue is resolved.
The Galena Lodge micro-hydro plant is just one element of CMH’s quest to be the leading sustainable tourism company in North America. Visit the stewardship pages of our website for more information.
There’s nothing wrong with snow-riding as fast as possible into the water for fun, but if you think about other sports, there is no other momentum sport that has a tradition quite like pond skimming.
Imagine mountain bikers in high gear pedaling full power into a mud hole to see how far they can go before the inevitable face plant, surfers chattering onto a rocky shoreline to see how far inland they can make it, skateboarders riding onto ice to see how long they can keep it together - and then the sport’s aficionados going on to make a tradition out of it.
Squaw Valley claims the first organized pond skimming event, in 1990, on Lake Cushing, with a Ski Patrol party that included the brilliant idea of trying to ski across the lake. Today, the wild event is known as the Lake Cushing Classic, explained nicely here by a Transworld Snowboard writer, and it's the Tour de France of pond skimming events with life preservers and helmets as mandatory equipment.
Warren Miller popularized the pond skim in the vaudeville sections of his ski films, and the idea caught on. Now many ski resorts hold springtime pond skim parties - and in the process have risen the bar in both silliness and innovation. The double-pond shown in the clip below from last year’s Big Sky event has taken the pond-skim construction to terrain park levels of engineering.
This coming weekend, April 14-15, there’s a Pond Skimming Championship at Heavenly where contestants are judged on success (staying dry) and distance, as well as the more esoteric criteria of style and crowd appeal.
And crowd appeal it certainly has. The unpredictable nature of snowboards and skis moving at high speed on water creates a rodeo-like spectacle. The bull might throw the cowboy immediately, or he may hang on for a bit, but most of the time it all ends with a spectacular wreck.
The magnitude of the stunts reveal that people are taking their pond-skimming efforts to a higher level. Last year at Big Sky, on the kicker between the two pools, jibbers were pulling aerials, sometimes sticking the second pond, other times not...
The floatation of fat skis has changed pond skimming every bit as much as it has changed skiing; maybe for the next generation of the X-Games we’ll see skier- and boarder-cross courses with water sections and wave pools, but for now the fun factor of the pond skim still rules.
Photo by Topher Donahue of the Mt. Everest of pond-skimming potential: CMH Monashees...
“I want to live in Revelstoke, British Columbia.” is how Ross Borden, one of the founding members of Matador, began an online article describing his experience heliskiing with CMH Revelstoke.
The article, and this accompanying video, Powder Highway Part 3: Heli-Skiing in Revelstoke, is the crown jewel of a three part series chronicling the Matador crew’s adventures along what they call the Powder Highway, with stops at Fernie and Kicking Horse along the way.
Locals might argue about what constitutes the real powder highway, but everyone would likely agree that Revelstoke would have to be part of it. The article compares Revelstoke to what Jackson Hole might have been like in the 60s, and with a taste of full-throttle sledding, lift service at the legendary Revelstoke Mountain Resort, and helicopter access to the world's greatest skiing, the Matador boys did get enough flavors to have some authority on the full Revelstoke fun factor.
Borden goes on to be blown away by the CMH Heli-Skiing experience, and doesn’t hold back on giving us some nice compliments that we just gotta share:
“I’ve flown with a handful of heli outfits in Nevada and Alaska; I can say with confidence that CMH is the most professional heli operator I’ve ever come across”
“First of all, they have all the non-skiing logistics down to a science. From group trainings in snow and avalanche safety to the lodge where you stay, from equipment to 5-star dinners, everything is convenient and you are getting the very best.”
Borden concludes by saying that CMH Revelstoke had some of the most spectacular ski terrain he’s seen in 25 years of skiing, and then suggests booking at least a week to really get the most out of the experience. We couldn’t agree more!
The only thing that would have been better, would be if the Matador team had arrived for some truly blower powder! While their visit looked fun, most of us who have skied or snowboarded with CMH know that the powder is often way, way, way deeper than what the video shows!
Thanks for the good work, Ross!
Over the years, the CMH million foot program has gone through many changes. The original dinner jackets turned out to be completely inefficient as ski wear and so the design later turned to one piece suits- the ultimate in snow protection. In recent years, we have transitioned to the traditional blue Arc’teryx Jacket with black pants which allows for sufficient ventilation of flatulant gasses, as well as increased versatility in the restroom.
For the 2013 season, we have decided to review our million foot suit program to take it to the next level. We are living in a digital era; everyone is now skiing with Gopro cameras, cellphones, boot heaters, hand heaters, gps goggles, and an array of other electronic devices. It would only make sense that our leading skiers would be wearing the leading styles in outerwear.
During out brainstorming session for what the next generation million foot suit would be, we were shown this clip by one of our vendors:
At first, everyone was skeptical. But once we thought about it, and how much of a fantastic achievement skiing 1 million vertical feet really is, we decided to explore the options. As it turns out, the LED application can be applied to our existing Arc'teryx jackets, to provide the ultimate in mountain function and flash. The thin LED shell feels no different to the person wearing it, and adds that extra level of "look at me".
We will be setting up our drying rooms at the lodge with charging stations, so that every million footer can be sure to have a fully charged suit each morning. The expected battery life is around 11 hours.
Marty Von Neudegg, is particularly excited about the new suits: “CMH is always on the leading edge of clothing technology for our environments. With so much of our skiing done in the trees, we felt that this suit will give our million foot guests the visual edge they need to see and be seen. And of course, in their home ski areas, everyone will know that they are a CMH Million Foot Skier…from three lifts away. It will certainly inspire conversation about CMH and what it means to wear one of our new Million Foot suits.”
Using L.E.D. Technology, these suits are the latest in technology fashion accessories. They still use the same goretex pro-shell technology to keep you warm and dry. The thin, lightweight, LED outer layer will act as a heat source, keeping you extra warm on those cold days. The LED’s can be turned off to conserve power during times of high natural light (eg. daytime)
“We are extremely excited about the possibilities of the new suits, after dark is a time that we have never been able to explore the great mountains in our areas.” This year, for the first time, CMH will be able to offer a week, exclusive to million footers with the new suits, where we will start skiing at 4pm, and ski well into the early morning hours. It will be the first exclusive night heli-skiing program offered. Because of the luminescence of our new suits, we will require no additional lighting. Each skier and boarder, lighting their own path down the mountain. We will of course have a specially lit guide’s suit, so that all of the night heli-skiers will have a reference to follow.
The first million foot night heli-ski trip will take place April 1, 2013, also known as april fools day 2013. What a big event for April 1! This year we will just stick with this article... which is a good enough april fools joke as is!
The CMH Facebook page has always been a source for the newest CMH pictures, videos, stories, and updates. And now, it has received a massive face lift.
If you are a fan of CMH on Facebook, you may have noticed that we have switched over to the new "Timeline" format. From the top you will still get the same photos, videos, updates, snow reports, and fun stuff as always, but we have backfilled our timeline with many of the dates and stories that were key in the evolution of CMH. You can now go back and see events such as the first heli-ski trip in the Bugaboos- April 4, 1965. The opening if each lodge is highlighted by a section from Topher Donahue's "Bugaboo Dreams". You can see, and scroll through, all of the major dates to the right-hand side of the timeline- Right back to the beginning of CMH! Stay tuned as we will be adding more and more!
Do you have any historical CMH photos or stories you would like to see on our timeline? Feel free to send them our way at info@cmhinc.com.
“Probably 75 or 80 percent of our guests are wearing helmets now anyway.” says Todd Guyn, a 17-year veteran heli-ski guide and the Mountain Safety Manager for CMH Heli-Skiing, while explaining the new CMH policy that makes helmets now mandatory for guests attending the two most aggressive Powder University programs: The Steeps, and Steep Shots and Pillow Drops.
It only makes sense. Any skier or snowboarder who signs up for these heli-ski programs that, conditions allowing, will take them into challenging alpine couloirs, jumps, and steep trees, is probably hoping to launch their cranium down some of the wildest lines they've ever dropped into.
Todd has some suggestions for helmet fit and design specific to skiing and snowboarding in the backcountry:
The first, and most important thing to consider, is that wearing a helmet can hinder your hearing. CMH guides have reported several cases of guests not hearing instructions because of their helmets - and listening to your guide’s instructions is far more important for your safety than any helmet or physical safety device.
To avoid blocking your ears, Todd suggests wearing helmets with earflaps that can be removed - and remove them for heliskiing. To keep your ears warm, wear a thin balaclava or headband instead of the heavier ear pieces that come with helmets. This configuration also has the advantage of making it easier to ventilate and cool your head on those warm days and allows for wearing hearing protectors in the helicopter.
Second, if your helmet has a large brim, make sure it is detachable. In the event of a fall, tree well or avalanche, the brim can pack with snow and catch on things, pulling the chin strap dangerously tight around your neck - not good. Even better, use a helmet without a brim.
Third, make sure your helmet fits properly. Take your goggles and the hat or balaclava you will wear riding when you go helmet shopping, so you can be sure to get the right fit for you.
Finally, a surprising warning for all you helmeted hard-cores out there:
Dr. Jasper Shealy, who has been studying skiing and snowboarding injuries for over 30 years, is sited in the Canadian Ski Council’s 2009 report, “Helmets and Ski Safety Facts and Stats". The article reads, “Although it has been demonstrated that wearing helmets can be effective in reducing the severity of head injuries, Dr. Shealy believes that the increased use of a helmet can alter behavior of the user, leading to increased injuries.”
The report states, in no uncertain terms, that “Helmeted skiers and boarders tend to ski faster.” and concludes with a word for the wise: “Helmet use is only one part of an overall program of risk reduction, such as skiing and boarding responsibly.”
In our discussion about helmets, Todd made it clear that he feels strongly that the safety benefits of wearing a helmet while helicopter skiing and boarding vastly outweigh the issues, provided the skiers and snowboarders can hear their guide’s instructions and that skiers and snowboarders make decisions with the understanding that no safety device can be expected to replace good judgment when playing in the mountains.
This is a guest post by Stephanie Wong, CMH's Mountain Operations Assistant.
Before I started working for CMH Heli-Skiing & Summer Adventures, I would never have dreamed I would be able to go heli-boarding. Alas, my dreams have come true! A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to spend a few days at the famous Bugaboo Lodge. Being a female snowboarder, you can imagine that I had some anxiety about fitting in with the rest of the guests at the lodge. Even though I’ve been snowboarding for over 10 years and I head out to the ski hills every day I have off (unfortunately I’ve got the goggle tan to prove it), I was still unsure about how I would be received by the other guests. Before even getting to the lodge, I had butterflies in my stomach and thoughts whirling around inside my head – “Would I hold up the groups? Will there be a lot of walking and traversing? Should I bring collapsible poles?” I felt like I was in heading to my first day of high school all over again! Luckily I was driving up to the lodge with another staff member (Mike Morton) who helped to ease my fears. Not only that, but on the way to the lodge we were driving in a blizzard! Nothing calms your fears like the excitement and anticipation of getting some face shots and pow turns!
Fortunately, my excitement and anticipation were fully rewarded - the first day of skiing was a-m-a-z-i-n-g. It had snowed about 30-40cm the night before, leaving us with fresh blankets of that glorious white fluffy stuff – once I got out of the helicopter my instincts just kicked in and all my fears and butterflies evaporated. Not only that, I was riding with Brodie, an old friend who also happens to work with me in the Banff office. Having a buddy there definitely elevates the fun level!
Back at the lodge, I realized that my childish fears of not fitting in were unfounded. Everyone was so friendly and welcoming – eager to hear about what I do with the Mountain Operations team at the CMH head office. I didn’t feel one step out of place the entire time that I was at the lodge. I even learned a great new game called Perudo and met some fantastic people. It eventually became evident to me that it’s not about what we are at home or what we do for a career, but it’s about the love of skiing that brings us all together. Once you strap on your skis or snowboard, everything else in the world just seems to fade away.
A big thank you to all the Bugaboo staff – thanks for showing me what CMH is really about! Good times, great friends and awesome riding! Can’t wait for next year!
Photo: Steph (in red) sharing a smile with friends new and old in the Bugaboos!
The first day of spring rolled around this week, and if you were stuck at a CMH lodge without a calendar, you would have no idea!
Here are a couple of awesome pictures from right around the official "change of seasons" - But they might as well be from mid-January!
Allan from the Monashees is really enjoying guiding this spring:
Sure, this picture has some sun... But the snow is still mid-January like:
The K2 Demo Days were a little earlier in March at CMH Kootenay- This was the begining of the snowy spring:
The Bobbie Burns is "sinking" that this spring snow is deep!:
At Mcbride, you can get private spring heli-skiing. Because there isn't enough snow to share... Yeah right!:
Spring means longer days, more vertical, and LOTS of snow! Come and get it!