Posted by Topher Donahue on Thu, Jul 22, 2010 @ 04:29 PM
Last winter I was standing on the rim of the Canoe River drainage, stunned by the view across some of the biggest glaciers left in British Columbia. Above us, the 3516-metre bulk of Mt. Sir Wilfrid Laurier dominated the sky. I turned to ask Dave Gauley, our heliski guide and assistant manager of CMH Cariboos, about skiing from the big peak’s summit. He told me that it used to be a CMH ski run, but that a big crevasse opening had effectively killed it.
With ten years experience as a professional freeskier, Gauley is not one to be easily deterred by terrain challenges. He mentioned something about trying the descent, not doing it, climbing out of a big crevasse - and then skied away and dropped into the Canoe. Distracted by big terrain and stellar heliskiing, I forgot about his unfinished story.
Earlier this week I was daydreaming about big mountains, remembered Dave’s story, and caught up with him – he’s easier to catch in the summer - and here’s what he had to say:
If you skied it (Sir Wilfrid Laurier) from the summit to the valley (which they used to do) it would be 2500 metres vertical. I’m not sure how that ranks with other CMH runs, but it's pretty frickin’ long. I tried to ski off the summit, but there is a big, melted-out crevasse a few hundred metres below the summit you have to climb out of.
The North Canoe Glacier (which would be the lower part of the run) also has huge crevasses, and an icefall that it did not used to have. I think when they built the Cariboo Lodge in 1974, it was in the middle of the biggest snow decade in the area. From talking to oldtimers like Kiwi (Gallagher) and Ernst (Buhler), as well as (people) who grew up in the area - that's kind of their memory.
So I think the changing of the glaciers is a combination of back then they were really lucky with a huge snowpack to fill the crevasses, and glacier recession is now coupled with less snowfall. Bingo - less terrain to ski.
Other runs in the Cariboos are changing quickly too, like pretty much everything at the apex of the Premier Range on all the big ice (“big ice” is guide speak for glaciers) is becoming trickier to ski. Crazy Horse, Little Matterhorn, Penny, Ned's Moon, Thompson Glacier, Jerry's Perch, The Zipper… These are just a few runs that are becoming difficult, or are no longer possible to ski.
Another thing that has changed is that they were much more aggressive on glaciers in the old days as well. Those first Euro guides did not know anything about tree skiing, so they almost exclusively skied on glaciers. What was acceptable risk then would in no way fly today.
I heard, maybe from Bob Geber, that the Bugaboos has lost 30-50% of their glacier skiing from the original area over the last 40 years. Just look at the S&S Glacier. I skied it on a guide exam in 1997 - we were roped up shitting our pants - and they used to take heliski groups down there!
Sounds like a good reason to book a heliski trip now before we lose more ski terrain! Are there any of you lifelong heliskiers out there who can remember the natural closures of ski runs being a sad day?
Photo of skiing Ned's Moon in 2010 by Topher Donahue.
Posted by Topher Donahue on Fri, Mar 26, 2010 @ 12:10 PM
Running helmet cams while heliskiiing is all the rage. Be your own hero. But the results too often will make your friends want to puke. When a few seconds of helmet cam view is cut into traditional footage, it gives an awesome perspective, but watching endless raw helmet cam footage makes me feel like I’m sitting below deck on a tossing sailboat, reading a newspaper while the other passengers eat roast beef sandwiches and smoke cigarettes.
Check this steep skiing footage for a stomach churning example of what I’m talking about:
Jeff Bellis, a ski guide for CMH Revelstoke, uses a chest cam in this clip for smoother motion, and cuts it into other footage for a much more palatable effect:
November in Revelstoke from Jeff Bellis on Vimeo.
So, as a still photorapher I became inspired to put a different twist on point of view imagery, and hoping to avoid the nauseating helment cam effect, I decided to give it a try. I put a trigger release down my sleeve and mounted my industrial strength
Nikon D3s on my chest with a 15mm fisheye lens. Here’s one from a bluebird day last week at
CMH Cariboos:
And one from a deep powder day last year at
CMH Adamants:
What do you think about helmet cam footage and point of view imagery? Have a favorite point of view clip? Comment here!
Posted by Jane Carswell on Fri, Dec 04, 2009 @ 12:16 PM
by Ken France, Area Manager, CMH Kootenay
What a treat! Seldom have we seen so much snow in our skiable terrain at this time of year. Heli-Ski season began on December 2 at CMH Galena Lodge and Mike Welch, Area Manager, said that skiing on Wednesday was some of the best skiing EVER! Dave Cochrane was rippin' it up in fluffy white stuff in the Cariboo front ranges yesterday and he measured the snow depth at 2300m to be 2 metres plus. Dave says "Yesterday I was ski touring in an area called Kangaroo. We had an excellent day skinning up the ridgeline and a supberb decent through beautiful glades. If there was ever a year to take advantage of fantastic early season snowfall, this is it."
Not only is all this deep fluffy snow fun to ski in, it also opens up more terrain for us to enjoy. As you can imagine, the ground out there is rough; logs, creeks, boulders, cliffs, small trees and underbrush dominate the landscape around here. Unlike ski hills that meticulously manicure their runs to take advantage of early season skiing/riding potential, in the heli-ski world we “get what we get”, and actually need 1.5m to 2.0m (4’ to 6’) just to cover up the surface roughness so we can get down the mountains safely. Even those depths typically do not “squash” the underbrush enough to allow travel through some sections. Alder patches, young conifers, willows, and bushes all stand upright until the snowpack is deep enough to cover them or, on a slope, to start bending them over from “snow creep”. Understandably, the smoother things are, the more useable runs we have, regardless of snow stability.
November in Revelstoke from Jeff Bellis on Vimeo.
Speaking of snow stability...
Invariably, with deep early season snowpacks, the weather to create them has been wet. In this region and climate, that usually means fairly warm temperatures (just below freezing) and cloudy skies. The warm temps are good because they better facilitate metamorphism and sintering together of the snow grains, thus adding to snow stability (thereby reducing the risk of avalanches). The cloudy skies prevents the sunshine from forming surface hoar crystals and facets which, once buried deeply enough, are often the failure plane in skier/snowboarder/snowmobile caused avalanches.
We are now pushing 3m (10’) at most 1,800m (6,000’) elevations in the Selkirk, Monashee, Purcell and Caribou Mountains. Skiable terrain can be anywhere from 1,000m to over 3,000m (3,000’ to over 10,000’) in these ranges which comprise all twelve of CMH’s Heli-Ski areas.
With more snow on the way, we in the industry are drooling over the prospects! If our words don't convey the 'awesomeness' of what we've got out there right now, perhaps this video CMH guide Jeff Bellis made in Revelstoke earlier this week will! Many of us have been out ski touring because we just can't let these remarkable conditions pass us by. Come and join the fun!
Posted by Topher Donahue on Fri, Oct 30, 2009 @ 08:29 AM
"I straight-lined through 35-degree trees for about 2-300 meters..."
With the ski department of my local sporting goods shop featuring as many shapes and sizes as the bikini department, I had to find out what a ski guide thinks about all the recent ski innovations. Dave Gauley, the assistant manager of CMH Cariboos is an outspoken proponent of all things ski. He started Steep Weeks at CMH and was selected one of the Top 50 skiers in North America by Powder Magazine - although if you ask him he'll likely tell you there were only 50 skiers back then. In case you believe his humilty, here's a YouTube clip of Dave going sick near Mt. Waddington in the BC Coast Range.
In between shifts stocking the lodge with enough firewood to keep a winter’s worth of heli-skiers cozy and warm, Dave found the time to share this perspective with us and compared ski design evolution to the technology in rock climbing that opened up new frontiers of mountain sport for everyone, not just the cutting-edge athletes.
Topher Donahue: I’ve noticed a lot of guides don’t wear the super fat skis, and I haven’t seen any guides on the reverse camber designs. Why is that?
Dave Gauley: Well, I’m happy to give you my take on skis, but it might not be what you're looking for.
TD: Fair enough. What’s your take?
DG: The problem with straight rocker reverse sidecut designs, like the Spatula and Pontoon, is that they give you no degree of control on harder snow or not-so-deep powder with a firm surface underneath. Even here we don’t always have bottomless powder.
TD: It seems like every year there is a new big thing in ski design. Are these new skis really helpful or just a marketing strategy?
DG: Ski design has gone through radical changes in the last decade. The last 2 or 3 years have been some of the most interesting - with the evolution of rockered, reverse sidecut designs. Now, skis like Rossignol's S7 and the K2's Obsethed are leading the way by incorporating rocker, reverse sidecut at the tip and tail, with traditional camber and sidecut underfoot. The result is a super versatile ski that excels in any snow condition. Last year I skied exclusively on the Rossi S7 (Outside Magazine S7 review.), and the K2 Obsethed (EpicSki review.) and now I look at the mountain with a totally different set of eyes.
TD: You’ve looked at a lot of mountains, so that’s a pretty dramatic statement. How do you look at the mountains differently with these skis and do you think other people will feel the same?
DG: These designs are a little wild, and people will be reluctant to try these skis. I must admit the first time I had them (The Rossignol S7) on my feet I thought they looked ridiculous. But my first run I was sold. I straight-lined through 35-degree trees for about 2-300 meters then was able to throw my skis sideways to dump some speed, and fully be in control. So you can just go straight through tight or tough tree or terrain sections and be confident that you will be able to get it together when the terrain opens up. Not so with conventional skis. Whatever speed you reach on conventional skis you have to be able to deal with. Not a problem when the snow is super deep and slow, but when the going gets fast...
TD: That's kind of a quantum leap if you ask me. So why will other people be reluctant?
DG: I think a lot of people, guides included, are reluctant to ski on innovative skis because of the stigma. They feel that fat or radically shaped skis are weak and for bad skiers. But the same thing was the case when the first fat skis came out. I don't see anybody skiing on skinny 205 GS skis any more. Some people need more time to wrap their heads around it. I am all for making mountain sports easier. For example, in climbing I don't try to climb a 5.13 in my mountain boots. I choose a weapon for the task. (TD: In this case tight fitting, goofy-looking slippers.)
TD: You mentioned the problem of the pontoon-style rockered skis on firm snow. Did you notice any problem with this new, shall we say, hybrid design?
DG: There is NO disadvantage with these new ski designs whether it be for the expert, or not-so-expert skier. They make skiing easier, just as cams and sticky rubber shoes for climbing - which in my opinion makes it better because it opens up more possibilities.
Dave Gauley will be leading the next CMH Steep Week in CMH Cariboos during April of 2010.