avalanche vs. backcountry skiing course

I would recommend the Mountaineers Backcountry Ski/Snowboard Mountaineering Course. It is a great class and it encompasses both Avy 1 certification and backcountry travel. Jerry White leads the class and it is very informative and the lecturers have a huge amount of experience and knowledge.

After you take a class, find a group to tour with and start practicing what you have learned. It is amazing how much more you will learn once you get out there and start using the info from the classes.

Good Luck!

You can also check out Mountain Madness's Avalanche level 1 and Intro to Touring 3 day course. Very similar to Pro guiding. It covers the Level 1 with a Friday evening lecture and 2 full field days at Stevens with a Saturday afternoon lecture. Sunday evening they cover tour planning and do another day in the field to cover the ski touring. Not a bad option if you are looking to kill two birds with one stone. www.mountainmadness.com .

Thanks for the feedback re: Mountain Madness. I've actually been looking very closely at their intro to touring course you referenced below. It seems like a great way to cover a lot of information which you could obviously build from through experience and additional sessions like a dedicated avalanche class.

Thanks,
Chris

i've taken both, and found both extremely useful. there will be some overlap btw the wac class and avy 1, but not that much.

gotta say though that after taking gary brill's avy 1 class, i got so spooked, i had to take the avy 2 class at crystal to recover

Now, ema. I assume what scared you were the case studies. After all, they are, er....case studies. In the long run, pretty much anything that can happen will happen....with enough exposure.

Notice that old "Neverslides" near Granite on I 90 did slide this week.