A couple feet of fresh followed by an extended forecast of cold, sunny weather lured me back to BC as the calendar turned to February. The statistics say it's a low snow year in the Coast Mountains. I say it's been all time - cold temps have preserved snow quality on most of the good lines, and the combination of blue skies + stable snowpack has provided lots of opportunities to go big. On this visit I split my time between the Duffey and Whistler zones. Here are the highlights:
Matier NW Face & Anniversary Glacier - The premier line on the highest peak in the area. It's hard to imagine conditions being any better than this...except for the subzero temperatures, that could have been a little better. I humbly present my thesis project for Pemberton University's Master of Sluff Management program:
The Big Esposito (E Face of Peak 2401) - This is a tricky objective that I'd scoped out a couple of times from across the valley. I thought I finally had the perfect day for it, but was forced to turn around 2/3 of the way up the face when I hit bottomless sugary facets on top of a rock slab. These conditions made ascending nearly impossible and skiing a dangerous proposition. Hopefully I'll get another crack at it.
Spearhead Traverse: Done as a one-day push from Blackcomb to Whistler. This was early in the season for the Spearhead, but there are some benefits to being an early bird: a sense of solitude without any guided groups creating bottlenecks out there, nice cool temps for the endless slogs, and friendly conditions for the inevitable descent of Singing Pass Trail by headlamp. My partner bailed after the first big climb when it became apparent that he wouldn't be able to keep the pace required to cross those 13 glaciers before getting benighted. I decided to push on alone and eventually caught up to the only other party doing the traverse that day. I was incredibly fortunate to run into Sam and Greg, two absolute crushers from Squamish, and finish the traverse with them. It got dark and the full moon emerged just as we crossed the last glacier, providing another dimension to the magic that characterized this whole day. I think this is one of the best videos I've ever made, despite the complete lack of serious skiing:
Hidden Peak E Face - Lucas came up from Seattle and joined me on one of the more obscure and adventurous lines in the Callaghan Valley. A bit of routefinding around cliffy terrain was required for the descent to Cirque Lake, but our efforts were rewarded with some of the best powder I've ever skied.
Decker Mountain - This little project is the embodiment of my motto: "make the most of every trip to the mountains". Over the course of two days I skied 5 different lines on Decker's north face, and was able to film 3 of them in good conditions: the Triple Decker. Isn't it great when the title writes itself?
Fissile Peak/Banana Chute - This was my first day skiing in the Whistler area, and I decided to earn my turns by touring up from the valley via Singing Pass Trail instead of using the lift system. It took most of the day to get up to Fissile for a relatively small amount of good skiing. After that I ponied up the CAD $45 for a single-ride backcountry ticket to get to the alpine - not a bad deal when you consider that you can barely get lunch in Whistler for that amount.
I'm grateful to my dog Charlie for being a good sport and joining me on another van trip, this time in colder temps than either of us would have liked. Charlie started the winter with a cone of shame, but he's doing great now and it makes me so happy to get back to the van after a day in the mountains and enjoy his company.
There's still lots more to do in the Duffey, so don't be surprised to see a Part 3 over the coming weeks.
