Posted by Topher Donahue on Tue, Jul 27, 2010 @ 09:05 AM
The CMH kitchens produce the kind of dining experience you see in the lefthand photo, in the kind of locations you see in the righthand photo. The juxtaposition seems kind of unreal to me, so to get a glimpse of how they do it, I asked Rick Carswell, veteran chef of heliski lodges, CP Hotels, Holland America Cruise Lines, the film industry, pirate ships and the food and beverage manager for CMH.
TD: What issues do you face cooking at a CMH Lodge compared to an equivalent restaurant?
RC: As a chef at CMH you have an incredible amount of culinary freedoms, and on the flip side lifestyle restraints that are different from your average restaurant job. There is no-one else qualified in the lodge to cover for you if you get sick or injured and that can be intimidating and all-consuming. I remember being sick once and I had a dream that I walked down the hall to the managers room and told him that I was sorry that I wouldn't be able to cook breakfast because I was going to die - and I was terribly sorry. He thanked me for telling him and said it had been a pleasure getting to know me, then I turned and walked toward my room were I was going to die.
TD: How do you get all that food in there anyway?
RC: It takes about a week per lodge to refit them in the fall for the coming winter with all their food and beverage inventory. I figure as accurately as I can the amount of food they will need for this coming winter, run quotes for those supplies from all our vendors and then drive it to the lodge by the semi load. If you are at a lodge early in the season ask to have a look in the store rooms. It's impressive to see the wall of Kokanee beer, or the 100 bags of flour. During the operating season, the fresh food is ordered weekly by the chefs, received in Banff from the 15 or so suppliers where it is then sorted by area, reassembled and shipped to the appropriate helipad to meet the helicopters for it's trip to the lodge. Quite an interesting journey if you're a fresh mussle from PEI to a mountain lodge in three days, one plane ride, three different truck rides, one helicopter ride, one ski-do ride and passing through about a dozen sets of hands to get there.
TD: What does a CMH chef typical work day look like?
RC: Long. At CMH workday begins at 6am and finishes at 9pm and goes day after day for two weeks before you get a break. As a chef, if I got out skiing it meant that I would work into the night to get pay back for my reward of skiing, but man is it worth it. I can work on six hours sleep if I can get a few runs in the middle of the day and I find that I work much more effectively if I get outside for a bit.
TD: If an experienced chef wanted to work for CMH, what advice would you have for them?
RC: This is a serious work hard play hard environment. But you need to have the experience and confidence to be able to pull it off. We look at chefs with about five years post apprenticeship experience and hopefully in the eight years of their work experience they have moved to lots of different places, worked different styles of cuisine and have some management experience. It's a hard position to fill and certainly we have taken the chance on lesser experience levels for exceptional personalities who mostly have worked their way up our ladder but team is sustainable because we manage to retain about 80% of our chefs from one season to the next. The average work/life expectancy for our 44 chefs is around ten years, which is pretty spectacular in this industry of nomadic pirate chefs. My best friends are CMH chefs and we go back 20 years with this company. They are a book of stories and talent.
TD: Anything else you'd like to add?
RC: Come, enjoy the mountains and the skiing, but when you get back to the lodge stop by the kitchen and visit the chefs, I'm sure you'll be impressed with my friends, ask them about the vegetarians who eat lamb when they are at CMH, ask them what wine they will be drinking with dinner, ask them about their greatest culinary disaster and how, as a good pirate, they pulled it off and nobody noticed. My friends tell good stories.
Posted by Topher Donahue on Thu, Jun 10, 2010 @ 09:30 AM
What makes a great heli-ski run? The easy answer, of course, is any heli-ski run YOU are on, but for the insiders perspective I asked Steve Chambers, the manager of CMH Revelstoke.
1) Great Snow - At CMH Heli-Skiing, we have runs that range in length from 400m to 2000m and if the snow is perfect it doesn't really matter if you're on a short or long run! This is why people come heli-skiing in the first place. I'm not talking about just any kind of deep snow here. I'm talking about that infamous, dry, interior British Columbia powder. This is the stuff of legend - you can almost feel your skis on a firm base deep in the snowpack while the lightest, fluffiest snow is blowing up into your chest, over your shoulders and yes, even over your head. You will remember this run and this day even years from now. After 16 years of doing this job, January 5, 2009 still stands out as one of those epic days with perfect snow, top to bottom on every run all day long. The best day ever? Perhaps...
2) Fall Line - The helicopter lands, you put on your skis, your heli-ski guide shuffles over to the 'edge' and you look down to the valley floor and see the helicopter, another group at a pickup or the pickup flag itself. There's one thing that stands out - it's STRAIGHT down with no deviations from the fall line! It's also a guide's favorite as well and a common phrase heard when you have the right group is 'see you at the pickup'. Need I say more?
3) Transitions through Terrain - There is something to be said about the run that begins high in the alpine and makes its way through the sub-alpine and then down below treeline to the valley floor. You know the type of run - we're talking about the mega-classic, long CMH heliskiing runs that give you all the goods. There's the high glacier landing and open turns followed by the sparse trees at treeline where you feel the snow getting a little deeper and then the finale into the old growth trees and that deep powder. It's amazing to see all that type of terrain & snow in one run.
4) Incredible Scenery & Location - Some runs just have a quality about them even before you make a single turn! Take another helicopter flight into another landing and wait for the silence after the machine leaves. Look around and try to imagine another place like this in the mountains anywhere on the planet. Now try to imagine 100's of places like this at CMH's 11 areas. I still have runs that leave this impression on me even after all these years - you never get tired of being there again and seeing the reactions on the guests faces when they have that 1st experience.
5) The Right Group - Not every run in heli-skiing is going to have that perfect powder but with the right crew and the right attitude, it doesn't even matter. I have had some truly 'dud' runs over the years that were a blast nonetheless because of the people I was skiing with. These are the kind of people that can make any situation seem fun and enjoyable and regardless of the snow quality, they're having a good time. It is only skiing after all and is probably a better alternative to what you could be doing instead...
6) History & Reputation - Every CMH operation has 'that' run - the one everyone talks about because of its history, legends attached to it, famous photos attributed to it and so forth. Just getting out at the top of a run like that gives you goose bumps even before you make that 1st turn. These are the quintessential heli-ski runs that have many of the above elements and then some.
7) First Tracks - What can I say? This is the selfish part of the blog where, as a guide, I get to rant about how much fun it is to get 1st tracks - on every run. There's something about that untouched blanket of snow in front of you that just makes for a great run. If you're right behind your guide and just out of their tracks to either side, guess what? It's all fresh right there as well! This is what most of us think about when we picture ourselves heli-skiing anyway - making our way down some untracked piece of mountain real estate and leaving our own little impression upon the terrain.
Photo by Topher Donahue
What makes a great heli-ski run for you? Share your thoughts...
Posted by Jane Carswell on Thu, May 13, 2010 @ 12:10 PM
by Russ Peardon, Director of Information Systems, CMH
Safety and service are deeply imbedded in CMH's culture and Internet access has become important to both. Our heli-ski guides use the Internet in our snow safety program to collect and share weather and snow data. Internet access is becoming so ubiquitous that it is an intrinsic part of the lifestyle of many of our guests. They just expect it to be there. We take pride in providing by far the best, most reliable internet service in our industry. There is a bit of a story to how we do this, one I thought you might find interesting.
Within our facilities, we use industrial-grade versions of the wireless access points you might have at home. In most of our buildings, 12-15 access points are needed to provide reliable coverage. It has been an ‘archaeological adventure' connecting those devices together in some of our older lodges. CMH's hard-working Infrastructure Manager Tim Hodgkinson returned from some particularly challenging work in the Cariboo Lodge commenting: ‘If we have some sort of apocalypse, I am going to the Cariboos - the place is solid concrete!'. Undaunted, we are taking another crack at improving coverage there and in the Monashee Lodge this summer.
Getting internet service to our lodges provides a range of challenges. Of course, ‘town' facilities like Kootenay, McBride and Revelstoke are easily serviced by commercial grade ADSL, much like you may have at home. Guests are often surprised that the same is not true for the Gothics, Monashees and especially Valemount lodges. Although these road-accessible sites have ‘town power and telephone', our phone company does not provide any kind of high-speed internet service due to their distances from the nearest connection office.
At the other end of the spectrum are four remote lodges - Adamants, Galena, Gothics and Monashees - each of which is a long way from any terrestrial internet source. For these lodges we rely on satellite internet. At each lodge we have a 1 metre Ku-band dish, and a 2.4 metre C-Band dish. We added the C-Band dishes this summer at considerable expense, as we found the Ku-Band dishes performed poorly during heavy snowfall. In addition, the lone satellite internet provider available to us in western Canada appears to have heavily over-subscribed the Ku-Band network. While the new C-Band dishes deliver the best satellite service available to us, it is important to understand just how limited even that service is. Our tests show download speeds of 0.8 to 1.1 megabits per second. Compare that to the 4.0+ mbs available to residential customers in most urban settings. I enjoyed hearing Monashee Area Manager Paul Vidalin explain this at dinner to his guests this past season: ‘Imagine your home internet is running at ¼ speed. Now, imagine you've invited 44 friends over, and most brought their laptops, iPhones and Blackberrys...'. These systems are sufficient to provide e-mail and web browsing services to all guests. Sadly, it only takes one or two guests streaming video or Skyping to slow them down for all.
Where the lodge is close to an internet source, and geography favors us with a low-elevation, line-of-sight ridge repeater location, we can bounce the internet from the source to the ridge, and then down to the lodge. We've employed systems like these for our Cariboo and Valemount lodges for three years, and in 2009 upgraded services there. We also added new systems for the Bugaboos and Bobbie Burns lodges this past summer. At their core, these are really simple wireless access points with very strong radios and highly directional antennas. The tricky part is delivering power at the ridge repeater site, especially during short, cold December days. As you can see from the photo of CMH Guide Kobi Wyss lining up the antenna, we use a mix of solar and wind generation, with battery backup. These systems are certainly the future for us. They are expensive and touchy (requiring redundant satellite backup systems), but offer terrific internet speeds.
Whichever CMH Heli-Skiing area you visit next, we want you to simply fire up your internet device and do what you usually do with great, simple service, without concern for how it gets to you. If you are interested in more details or have comments or suggestions, I'd enjoy speaking to you directly and can be reached by e-mail or phone at 1.800.661.0252.
Posted by Topher Donahue on Fri, Apr 30, 2010 @ 10:27 AM
My neighbor told me recently that he had a friend who was a helicopter pilot, and he was thinking of getting a group of skiers together for some recreational heli-skiing that would be a lot cheaper than this professional, guided stuff.
Here in North America, mountain guiding is sometimes seen by self-proclaimed experts, like my neighbor, as an excellent resource for beginners and peak baggers, but not a service for real climbers or skiers. In many cases, people learn backcountry skiing and climbing from friends with various experience levels rather than being taught by professional guides. Inevitably, learning from friends involves a lot of trial and error, and with more people realizing the benefits of wilderness recreation more people are asking the question: Do I really need a guide?
The simple answer is no. Thousands of people ski off-piste (outside prepared ski runs) and climb mountains without ever hiring a guide. The more complex answer is that it depends how much time you can afford to put into the experience you want to have.
Let’s take a downhill skier for example. If you want to experience skiing in the legendary deep snow on the wild peaks outside of a ski resort, then doing it alone, with reasonable safety, requires several years of learning and practice. Doing this without a guide can be a reasonable undertaking if you have the time to put into the learning. Going heli-skiing on your own, however, is a really bad idea.
For a professional opinion of what this might look like, I asked Marc Piché, a long-time CMH Bugaboos guide and the author of The Bugaboos, One of the World’s Great Alpine Rock Climbing Centres. Marc is a well-rounded mountain guide trained by the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides and one of the few guides who splits professional time relatively equally between ski touring, heli-skiing, rock climbing, ice climbing and mountaineering.
TD: If a group of skiers, first time or experieced heli-skiers, hired a helicopter and went skiing without a guide,
what would happen?
MP: I think they would quickly realize why people hire a guide. No other means can deliver you to so much complex terrain so fast. It is one of the most demanding and rewarding forms of guiding but trying to go it alone in a new area with no experience would be a recipe for disaster. To an experienced recreational backcountry skier, heli-skiing may seem pretty simple but what they probably don’t recognize is how much experience it takes to safely manage the fast paced logistics and multiple hazards of heli-skiing in big mountains.
I told my neighbor that I would want nothing to do with an unprofessional heli-ski adventure, but that if it ever happens to let me know so I can write a story about it.
Would you go heli-skiing without a guide?
Posted by Topher Donahue on Fri, Apr 23, 2010 @ 09:01 AM
When you show up at the airport these days, just getting on the plane is an adventure. It reminds me of travel in parts of the third world where you need a pocket full of bribe money, extra time to get anywhere, the mental fortitude to patiently handle whatever you encounter - and a sense of humor.
Remember when air travel was fun?
First they ding you for your checked luggage. Ok, if we all travel lighter, the airplanes use less fuel. It also gives the marketing department at airlines like Southwest endless advantage over the other carriers: they just advertise NOT doing what the other airlines are doing. Now Southwest advertises, “Your 1st and 2nd checked bags are free only with Southwest Airlines!”
More recently, Spirit Airlines unveiled a plan to charge for carry-on bags. Anything that goes in the overhead bin will cost passengers $45, almost double the cost of a checked bag. Some items will be exempt from the rule including “umbrellas, coats, cameras, car seats, strollers, medicine, reading material and food for immediate consumption. “ I can just see the new travel luggage that looks like a Burger King go-bag but is actually a high-quality roller bag, hair driers that look like Nikon cameras, and jackets with pocket capacity for a 2-day trip.
Now Ryanair, a low-cost European carrier is taking the next step: charging passengers to use the toilet! And they are trying to convince aviation authorities to allow them to redesign the cabin with only one toilet to make room for more seats. If passed, the new ratio will be 189 seats for one toilet! In an article in Business Week, the Ryanair CEO, Michael O’Leary rationalizes: "The purpose of charging for the toilets is to change peoples' behaviour," he said. The company sees profit in the theory that by giving people incentive to use airport toilets before they depart, it would be able to remove two out of the three toilets on each plane, making space for six additional seats. Seats they can sell.
Who are they kidding? Changing people's bodily functions? Everyone I know already tries to avoid using the cramped cabin toilets by using the airport toilets just before boarding. I don't know of anybody who waits to get ON the plane to use the toilet. I can just see Southwest Airline’s next slogan: “Use the toilet for free!”
Do you think this family is waiting until they board to use the toilet?
The nice thing for us at CMH is that these trends in the air travel industry make our all-inclusive approach and helicopter travel seem that much more refreshing. Just show up for a CMH Heli-Ski trip and we’ll take care of the rest. Sure, we charge additional for massages and alcohol, but everything else is part of our award-winning
adventure travel package. We’re not about to start charging for the spa, nor do we charge rental fees for our fleet of powder skis and guest packs - and we certainly don't charge you for using the toilet.
Photos by Topher Donahue
Posted by John Entwistle on Fri, Mar 05, 2010 @ 05:21 PM
I would like to start this week off with an apology. Last week the intern blog was not posted. There is however, a good reason for this lack of posting. You see, last Saturday both myself (John) and Frances were competing in the Canadian National Powder 8 competitions at Lake Louise Ski Resort.
When we signed up, we had absolutely no idea what we were getting ourselves into. All we knew was that we could both ski and the first and second place teams were going heli skiing with CMH. We were told that there were only three teams registered so there was a very high chance of doing well. We were almost guaranteed a spot in the top three! Almost... When we showed up to the day lodge early on Saturday morning, we found out that people who are good at powder 8 competitions generally do not sign up until the last minute. We were then sitting there in the Sitzmark lodge, surrounded by people in matching uniforms and touring boots. Turns out that in the end, there were 13 teams that we would be battling with to claim the top prizes.
Now to say that we were unprepared for this event would be a massive understatement. To give you an idea of just how unprepared we were, I will give you a quick list of the top events of the day:
Frances picked me up at 7:30: I had been up and ready to go since 6:30. This was because she had emailed me after I had gone home on Friday night accepting my suggestion to leave at 7:30 rather than 6:30. I missed the memo on that one...
We arrived at check in: It took us a good 15 minutes to come up with a team name... We finally settled on L'amateur... I later realized we should have had the team name "The Inturns".
We boarded the gondola: This was the first time that we had ever been on any form of ski lift together.
We skied down to the larch chair: This was the first ever "run" that we had skied together. Yes the very first... I am starting to think that wasn't such a good plan.
We boarded the larch chair: It was at this point that Frances asked me what we do for the powder 8 competition. My answer was simple: We ski down and make 8's in the snow. I mean... how hard can it be... We then determined that Frances would lead and I would follow. We are still not sure which the easier position is.
We started hiking: At the top of the larch chair, Frances saw the purple bowl for the first time. This was the large bowl that we would be hiking up for the competition. I thought she was going to hit me for a while.
We hiked: It turns out that sitting on the computer writing blogs and updating social media all day isn't a great workout. Frances was definitely the superior hiker. To be fair though, I did have to carry her water, helmet, and food in my backpack.
We got to the top: This is when the competition actually began. Luckily we were the 12th team to go so we had some time to watch teams and mentally practice. Then we watched the first team go... Turns out that powder 8 competitions were nothing like I had thought. I did not realize you had to be synchronized with your partner... I just thought you went and made 8's in the snow. So Frances asked me what we were supposed to do again and we adjusted our game plan.
We did our first run: Just a reminder that this was the second run we had EVER done together. We started out and it went terribly for the first 4 turns. We then got in to a rhythm and the bottom part was not bad. All things considered... The top 8 teams were moving on to the next round. Which of course meant that you had to hike up the god forsaken purple bowl once again (something that we didn't really want to do)
Of course we qualified: 8th!!! We were 8th... 4 measly points from not having to hike again...
So we hiked again: This hike really sucked. The snow was like sand and it was nearly waist deep. For every step up you went down half a step. And when we got to the top they told us we had to go right away!
We did our second run: Our second run started off well, we then did some synchronized falling half way down, and continued to do some decent turns to the finish. We unfortunately had to compete head to head with the 1st place qualifying team... So clearly, we lost. We had enough points to put us in 6th, but not enough to advance to the next round. We were happy because this meant that we didn't have to hike again!
We went to the after party: The after party consisted of beer, nachos, jagermeister, and the jagerettes...and some stories that might not be safe for the internet. It was quite the party. We then returned home where I slept for 14 hours (woke up just in time to watch Canada win the gold medal game!)
It was a great event and a big thank you must go out to the Lake Louise Ski Resort for hosting as well as CMH and The Skoki Lodge for supplying the amazing prizes!
And as they say in the Olympics... We didn't lose the gold. We won 6th place!
Posted by Jane Carswell on Fri, Jan 29, 2010 @ 10:01 AM
Last month we had the pleasure of hosting snowboarding legend Tom Burt at the Monashees for a 5 day TransWorld Snowboarding Shred Session. I caught up with TransWorld's Photography Director Nick Hamilton this week to get the skinny on what went down at the lodge.
JC: Hey Nick, how did you land a cool job like Photo Director for TransWorld Snowboarding Magazine?
NH: I have been shooting for TransWorld for 15 years now. 8 years ago I took the job as Photo Editor at TransWorld and moved to California. 2 Years ago I was promoted Photography Director when TransWorld started really expanding from a print magazine (largest circulation Snowboard Magazine in the world) to a fully multi media company now making Snowboard Videos, TV Shows, Major Events, and also our huge online presence.
JC: Who was you’re hero that inspired you to ride and has your career with TransWorld enabled you to meet him/ her?
NH:I grew up on the US East Coast (Ice Coast) riding New Hampshire and Vermont. I was skiing and then switched to snowboarding but I also got interested in photography as a hobby so have always looked up to pro snowboarders and photographers alike. One of my first days working for TransWorld I went to the TransWorld Industry Conference in Alaska and ended up at the bar having a whiskey with Craig Kelly, Jake Burton, and Jon Foster (legendary snowboard photographer that worked for TransWorld), that was one of those heavy moments where I got totally blown away by my company.
JC: You have travelled the world covering snowboarding for TransWorld, how do the Shred Sessions differ from a normal magazine trips?
NH: The Shred Sessions are so much fun! They are the only time I really get to go out and ride with some everyday snowboarders. All of my other shoots are with a group of Pro’s and our only goal is travelling and shooting photos which can be pretty slow setting up shots. The Shred Trips are a blast as we are all there to have fun and get tons of powder runs in.
JC: You recently returned from CMH Monashees with Tom Burt and Shred Session I. How did it go up there?
NH: We had a great time up at the Monashees. It was the first time to that lodge for all of us so we were blown away by the place and totally had a blast. Unfortunately it snowed too much (?!) while we were there and we got grounded for 2 days but Tom kept us entertained and we even hiked some little powder runs off the road behind the lodge to get some turns in during the storm. I have heard great things about the Monashees terrain so we hope to redo the trip in March and really get some runs in. I still think Galena is the best place I have ever been for snowboarding and hear the Monashees is on par with Galena so can’t wait to get out there and ride some more.
JC: What were some of the career highlights that Tom shared with the group?
NH: We watched a couple videos from Tom. He was one of the guys that pioneered snowboarding all over Alaska so hearing about “Cordova Peak” and some of his other first descents was really cool.
JC: There’s still space left on the March 20 – 25 Shred Session II in the Monashees. Why is this an opportunity that serious riders shouldn’t miss?
NH: If you are passionate about Snowboarding and Heli boarding this is the session to come along on. Everyone in the group feels the same way. The idea is just to fill a group with Snowboarders and have a Pro to shred with and get some tips from, and a Pro Photographer along to get some shots to send home. Everyone in our group talked about a trip where they were the only Snowboarder on a Heli trip and it’s just not the same camaraderie as when you are a group of Snowboarders together sessioning the mountain and riding the terrain differently.
JC: Any hints on who your pro will be on that trip?!
NH:HAHA not sure yet. Every pro that has come has asked to come back so our options are always open. The idea is that people come on the trip for the session and not get too hung up on riding with one specific pro, especially as their plans can change last minute (that’s the nature of being a Pro these days). However, I saw Gretchen Bleiler the other day after she was announced on the US Snowboarding Team going to the Vancouver Olympics. She was our first Guest Pro the Shred Trips and wants back after the Olympics are out of the way too!
Thanks Nick, See you in March at the Monashees!
Check out Nick's photos from the January session here. To secure your spot on what promises to be a great ride with CMH & TransWorld in March, contact Maria in reservations at 1.800.661.0252 or via e-mail at info@cmhinc.com.
Posted by Jane Carswell on Tue, Jan 19, 2010 @ 10:41 PM
This week Canadian Mountain Holidays will release Volume III of “Moving Towards Sustainability", its regular corporate sustainability report. I sat down with Dave Butler, CMH’s Director of Sustainability to chat about a few things, including the work and stories that lead to the completion of this latest report.
JC: Dave, what exactly does it mean to be the Director of Sustainability for a Heli-Ski and Heli-Hiking company?
DB: What an amazing opportunity! In short, it means keeping both eyes firmly on the far horizon, ensuring that we can keep sharing these mountains with our guests for many years to come. On the one hand, we face many challenges as the world becomes more complex so it keeps me hopping to try to stay one step ahead of those challenges. But on the other, I’m working with a group of colleagues who all feel deeply passionate about these incredible places we share with our guests. With that as a strong foundation, I rarely see any resistance to finding new and innovative ways to take advantage of our fiscal, social and environmental opportunities.
JC: Congratulations on Volume III of Moving Towards Sustainability. This third volume represents a significant amount of work on not only your part, but of the Second Nature Committee and all the staff at CMH. Is it a relief now that it’s done or have you already got a task list started for Volume IV?
DB: For all of us who have worked on this, it’s a real pleasure to be in a position to share it with everyone connected with CMH. But it’s not unlike pausing to enjoy the view during an amazing hike, looking at where we’ve come from and where we’ve yet to go. There are many, many more steps ahead of us, which is both daunting and exciting. In our case, it’s becoming clearer to me that this incredible hike has no end-point.
JC: What do you see as the major accomplishment for CMH since releasing Vol II in 2007?
DB: There are three, Jane. The first is the amazing innovative attitude that I see on the part of many of our staff. We’ve featured many of those stories in the report. The commitment of individual employees, and groups of employees to continued improvement and personal initiative is a constant source of inspiration for me. The second is the focus we’ve put on working with, and influencing our suppliers to change their behaviours and practices for the better. To me, that’s an unanticipated and very positive result from our own efforts. And third, we’ve come out of the closet, so to speak, about how we’re dealing with energy use and climate change. It’s an issue globally, and I’m pleased that we have begun to talk openly about our efforts.
JC: Sustainability at CMH is something that we all believe in and it seems from your latest report a number of the new, successful initiatives that have made a difference have come from the team ‘on the ground’. Can you tell me one of those stories that really sticks out?
DB: The work that Rick Carswell has been doing to investigate the background of some of our suppliers is a great example, Jane. His efforts to research and understand the realities of beef and fish production, to go beyond emotion or marketing hype, is the kind of thing we should be doing more often. It also reinforces the fact that there rarely any black and white answers to complex issues, and it reinforces the value of publicly reporting on the reasons for our decisions.
JC: Climate change is a complex and emotional issue. Why has CMH decided to talk about it in this report?
DB: It’s an issue that has grabbed the public’s attention like no other that I’ve seen. I feel that it’s important for us not to wade into the debate about climate change, but instead to be clear on what it is we are doing about our use of energy. That’s what we’ve done in the report. We talk about how we measure our use of energy, and most importantly, we’re open about what it is we’re doing about that and where our challenges lie from a business perspective.
JC: What would you like readers to do after they’ve digested the report?
DB: Two things. One: I would really like feed-back from readers. Tell me what you think about what we’ve chosen to do, and how we’re doing it. Give me your suggestions for us to move forward, or let me know what questions might remain unanswered for you.
Second, I ask you to take a look at your own business or life, and give some thought to changes you might make to begin your own journey toward sustainability. I would be grateful if you would share those with me.
JC: How can our readers contact you and where can they find the full report?
DB: Feel free to leave comments right here on the blog and let's get the conversation going. Share your feedback with others. Alternatively, email me at DaveB@cmhinc.com or call me at 1.250.426.3599. To read the overview or the complete report, visit the Sustainability Report secton on our website.
What questions or comments do you have for Dave Butler and the CMH team about our commitment to Sustainability?
Posted by Jane Carswell on Fri, Jan 08, 2010 @ 04:59 PM
In the world of Helicopter Skiing there are some pretty common misperceptions:
1) Guests jump out of a hovering helicopter with their skis on and race off down near-vertical ski runs as fast as lightning.
2) Heli-Skiing is ‘Extreme Skiing” where everyone is jumping off cliffs and racing through trees.
3) Heli-Skiers are typically uber-fit male millionaires.
4) Heli-Skiing is for experts only
Like I said…Misperceptions.
In the world of heli-skiing, guests do not jump out of helicopters. Our pilots find wide ridges where there is enough space to comfortably land and unload the helicopter and no one gets out until the guide's two feet are on the ground. There’s no need to rush when the pilot drops the group off and you have the chance to enjoy the view before clicking into your bindings and heading off.
Helicopter Skiing is not extreme skiing and safety is the #1 priority at CMH. The Columbia mountains, where we ski, are vast and varied. There is an excellent selection of steep tree runs, wide open glacier skiing and everything in between. We have enough terrain to ensure that each group of skiers is skiing the kind of terrain they are comfortable in. If you want to jump off cliffs – Go For It!
Well it is true that you need to have a certain level of fitness, uber-fitness is not required. If you ski frequently you will be OK, but if you are looking for some extra pointers on how to get tuned up to get the most from your heliski vacation, visit this blog often. We’ve teamed up with Exercise Physiologist Delia Roberts to bring you some ‘Fit Tips’ to keep you skiing happily for the duration of your trip.
And no, not all heli-skers are Male. Last year at CMH over 20% of our guest were female. Over the last 45 years we have hosted hundreds of female heli-skiers so we’ve come up with a list of Q&A for Women Heli-Skiers to help you overcome any hesitation.
Millionaires? Great if you are, but you don’t have to be to ski with CMH. We offer Heli-Skiing from $1175/day and while that seems to be more than a day at Vail we suggest you read this article from G.D. Maxwell (see pages 2 & 3) that initially ran in Skipressworld.com in January of 2005.
Experts only? I asked Marty von Neudegg, who has worked here at CMH for more than 20 years, about this one and here’s what he had to say:
“If you are a strong intermediate skier you are good enough to come Heli-Skiing. By “strong intermediate” we mean that you must be good enough to handle the terrain at your home area in control in various snow conditions. You do not need to have had any powder skiing experience at all. Skiing in powder is the easy part and you do not need to worry about that! If you are reasonably fit, have a good understanding of how your skis and body work together, know how it feels to ski on various pitches and you are comfortable committing to the fall line of a ski run, ski 15-20 days a year or more, then you are most likely ready to come heli-skiing.”
Still unsure. I have two more resources for you. The First Timers section on our website will answer a few more questions for you. But if you are serious, and curious, then I suggest you call and talk to one of our Heli-Ski Experts. Our Reservations team will give you the best advice for you to make an informed decision. My guess? In the end, you’ll come heli-skiing. Because you can.
Posted by Topher Donahue on Wed, Jan 06, 2010 @ 10:09 AM
Every few years a new avalanche rescue transceiver, or beacon, becomes the new standard, and as with every generation of beacons the best one is the one that never gets used in an avalanche. To get an idea of the changes with the new equipment this year, I questioned Kevin Christakos, Assistant Manager at CMH McBride, transceiver expert for CMH guide training, member of the CMH Mountain Safety Advisory Group, and a fan of all varieties of snow toys ranging from little kids sleds to big kid sleds and whatever skis are on his feet.
TD: Are all 12 CMH lodges using new transceivers this year?
KC: Starting this winter all CMH areas will be using the Mammut Barryvox Pulse transceiver. The guides have been using it for the past two years and it was used in McBride, Valemount and Bobbie Burns last winter. During this time we have been giving feedback to manufacturer, which has then been incorporated into the development of the latest version.
TD: What are the advantages of the new generation of beacons?
KC: These new beacons are great, they are very easy to use, have a significantly larger range (you find them sooner), and they are able to separate the signals so if there is more than one signal to be found it is much easier; this is a very big change.
TD: Will they be much better for novice users or just better for guides and experienced users?
KC: The transceiver is now a small computer and is programmed differently for the two user groups. For novice users the transceiver does all the work and the user is simply giving it legs to get around. For guides more options are available so they can take control of automated functions in certain situations and wring the maximum performance from the transceiver.
TD: Any problems (like tripping the switch from search to send while searching) with the new beacons?
KC: All modern transceivers are designed in a way that the user can quickly change from searching to sending a signal in the event of another avalanche. This means the user must take precautions not to accidentally switch over to send during a rescue and confuse the other rescuers. To avoid this, when you are not actively searching the transceiver is placed back into the harness. Don't let it dangle from the retention cord this is a sure way to accidentally switch from search to send. The Pulse beacon also emits a warning signal when it is switched back to send so if it is accidentally bumped you will hear it.
TD: Other transceiver advice for heli-skiers?
KC: Transceivers are part of a rescue package that also includes radios, probes and shovels - all part of the CMH Guest Pack. It is equally important to train in the use of all of them. Interestingly, we tend to focus on beacons but the longest and most difficult phase of rescue is the shoveling. Having a plan for how you will dig someone out and training with it makes a world of difference when the clock is ticking.
There is also some great information available online. The Canadian Avalanche Centre is an excellent resource and even has an intro course you can do online for free. Mammut, the maker of the Barryvox Pulse, has a good educational and technical section of their website as well.
Every heli-skier is required to train in use the radio, shovel, probe, and transceiver before going heli-skiing with CMH. Thanks to decades of collective experience by snow scientists, mountain guides, ski patrol, other snow professionals and the CMH Snow Safety program, the vast majority of heli-skiers never use avalanche rescue equipment in an avalanche scenario, but this training is an essential time to switch out of holiday mode and pay attention to a system that is not difficult to learn and does save lives.