The mountains call, and I must go.

Where's Waddington?

One big reason I decided to backcountry ski so much this year instead of ride is because I'm taking a NOLS mountaineering course this summer and figured the gains made from spending hours and hours in the high hills, with a pack on, navigating steep snowy slopes would be more useful preparation than another summer bopping around singletrack. And it's worked - I feel well prepared physically.

One thing I'm not necessarily prepared for though is the area of the trip itself, the Waddington Range in British Columbia. This is simply because not a ton of information on this place exists. I'm honestly not sure how were even getting there...I've heard rumors of day long van rides, float planes, trekking through ancient rainforests...who knows? What I do know is that tomorrow I fly to Seattle and make my way to NOLS Pacific Northwest HQ in Mount Vernon, so this will be my last blog entry here until sometime in mid-August. As such, I figured I'd give you a few snippets I've found about the Waddington Range.

First, the encyclopedic info. But this one is actually better. I LOVE this little snippet:

"Waddington! - Just the name quickens the heartbeat of any alpinist who has happened upon an article or even photo of this mysterious and remarkable peak. Mount Waddington? Does it really exist or is it just a tall tale? If it does exist, it's at the very least a place that very few people know much about, where very few people have been, and information about which is somewhat limited and hard to find. Climbers that have been to the range often speak of the place with an animation and excitement warranted by only a few great ranges in the world. In my mind Waddington and the remote parts of the Coast Range have always seemed like places that ordinary climbers can't go: too remote, too difficult, and too involved. Like the mountains in places that end in "ikstan" or "onia". Unattainable for the mere mortal."

There are two YouTube links that pop up when you type in "Waddington Mountains." They are not overly confidence inspiring and do nothing to clear up the picture:

What do you learn here? Well, it looks like the weather can turn heinous, it looks like we'll be spending time on steep snow and it looks like if something goes wrong Canadians are going to paratroop in to save your butt. Interestingly, one of the paratroopers broke his leg trying to do so. Hmmmm...

So where is the Waddington Range? This is as hard to describe as it is to find info on. Here's a map I found:

Pretty detailed, huh?

How about this one?

This map breaks down the major mountain ranges, and it looks like Waddington is one of them. Helpful indeed.

OK, here is an actual map of the Waddington Range itself. From what I've gathered, it's an area slightly smaller than Yellowstone and it has a crapload of glaciers.

Strange things seem to happen in this place. Here's one account.

Want to see what the place looks like? Far and away, these are the best images I have found.

So there you have it. That's basically what I know. Not a lot. No fancy guidebooks, no blogger accounts, no long movies. Which makes me think this place really is the frontier, that adventure and the unknown is a given, not something hoped for. And that makes me very happy and a little scared too. It feels a long way, both geographically and as an experience, from my backyard in Happy Valley.

Thanks to all those who made this summer and this opportunity possible. That's all then - signing out from the blogging and communications world until the middle of August.

Packrafting Lake Isabelle

I went on a fun little adventure last week - my inaugural Packrafting trip. A packraft is a relative anomaly in Colorado, but in Alaska they are almost common place. Alaska is chalk full of lakes and rivers, so this device is a near necessity to do any human powered overland travel. The Alpacka Packraft is basically a four-pound inflatable raft. The lightweight, combined with its remarkable durability (people have taken these things on expeditions and rowdy rivers all over the world) opens up a lot of potential for cool, multi-sport backcountry adventures.

For my maiden voyage, I decided to take my Yukon Yak and four-piece paddle into the Indian Peaks Wilderness. Colorado is pretty dry, but I've always been attracted to these high alpine lakes. My destination on this day was Lake Isabelle and Long Lake, with hopes of maybe paddling/portaging the river between them.

It was great fun. The boat worked exceptionally well. It was amazing to paddle around Lake Isabelle and get under and up-close-and-personal with a bunch of melting snow features. The paddle down the river was interesting - I have almost zero river running experience, but in this case ignorance was bliss. I must have hit 125 rocks on the way down, but the Yak emerged unscathed. I had to portage around some gnarlier sections, through dense ten-foot tall alder brush, over swamps and through forest, but with a four pound boat it's really not a big deal. Finally made my way to Long Lake and a mellow paddle along her northern bank.

I have no way of substantiating this, but I'm going to call it a first ever trip on this section of river. The Lake Isabelle to Long Lake channel has been navigated! Actually, I'm not even sure anybody has ever boated Lake Isabelle before, as it would hardly be convenient to bring a non-Alpacka boat on the three-mile hike in to even get there. Adventure! Gotta love it.

This boat has lots of potential. I'm dreaming up this plan for October to ride my bike with my Alpacka from Loma to Dewey Bridge along the Kokopelli Trail, paddle from Dewey Bridge to Moab on the Colorado River with the bike strapped to the deck of the Alpacka, ride to the 24 Hour of Moab course and then race the 24 Hours of Moab. Or a trip across Alaska. Or some sort of combination ski/paddling trip. The possibilities grow.

The boat, set for her maiden voyage on Lake Isabelle. I quickly learned that cold water causes inflatable rafts to lose air pressure and had to fix that before I sunk to the depths of this lake. The pack straps to the front which counterbalances body weight. There are many accounts of people strapping bikes and skis along with their packs to the front of these things. The boat itself compacts to the size of a small two-person tent.

View towards the continental divide from the middle of Lake Isabelle.

The stream connecting Isabelle and Long Lake.

Getting set to paddle said stream.

The guru and skiing my first 14er

It's been a heck of a spring and summer for skiing. It used to be, I'd maybe go up a couple times during this season. A fun diversion from biking. Things have completely flipped this year, to the point where I'm going skiing 3-5 days per week, often solo, exploring. It's been awesome. I feel like I'm in the best shape of my life and just feel like a better person because of it. It's true - mountains do bring goodness.

Because I'm heading on my NOLS mountaineering course next Tuesday, this week marks the end of this particular spurt. Of course there will be a ski date in August, and hopefully some early season freshies in September (and October, November and December), but today marked the end of the spring/early-summer ski season for me.

Sometime last week (I've lost track of days of the week) I had the honor to ski with the master of the mountains himself, Dale Atkins. Dale was tagging along with his son Sam and friend Mike. Dale is perhaps one of the top one or two backcountry ski experts in the country. He used to run the Colorado Avalanche Information Center, and has a resume that includes participation in the inaugural Extreme Skiing Championships in Valdez as well as a super gnarly 50° plus 4,000 vertical foot descent of 15,299 foot tall Mount Robson. On top of it all, he's a super humble, mellow dude with an infectious stoke for the mountains.

For me, this day was a chance to go to school with a guru. Sure, we skied a couple super fun runs at the North Fork Lakes Bowl - which shall hereafter be known as the "Valley of the Giants" - shot lots of photos and enjoyed watching the 15-year olds shred the crap out of the place. The treat, however, was Dale taking a good hour plus to teach correct mountaineering technique, ice axe placement, all sorts of different self-arrests and terrain analysis. I've learned some stuff this spring through just getting out there, but I've also been doing a lot of things wrong, and it was awesome to have someone who really knows their stuff point them out and help correct them. Yeah, it was a good day - just being in the mountains, hearing unbelievable stories about skis and rescues Dale has participated in and learning.

Yesterday I took a small clan from the nordic team on a hike to the top of Torrey's Peak. I had an ulterior motives for this - I wanted to give the Dead Dog Couloir a look and see if it was still skiable. While things looked a little runneled out from a distance (never a good sign), the thing went, straight from the top. Today, it was up bright and early for a solo assault on this couloir that I've dreamed about skiing for a half-decade.

One thing I didn't realize until today is how popluar 14ers are. By the time I arrived at the trailhead at 6:30 am, there were close to 100 cars parked, and the base area was a hub-bub of activity with families, church groups, triathletes and everything in between preparing to bag one or two 14ers (Gray's Peak is right next to Torreys...it's popular to nail them both in one day). At first the crowds annoyed me, but I decided to put on my friendly cap this day and enjoy the process. It's cool to see people getting out and about - it's a heck of a lot better activity for our society than countless other things people do.

The hike up was uneventful. An hour and half to the top with skis. Not bad. Near the summit I came across two separate parties of two skiers who were going to ski the Northwest Couloir. I was happy to hear this as I didn't want any unnecessary rock/snow/skier fall on Dead Dog. Summited around 8:30 am. The snow was still too firm for safe skiing, so I hung out on a picture perfect summer day at 14,267 feet waiting for things to soften a bit. The top was a stream of people, and the fact that I had skis combined with the precipitous nature of the drop down Dead Dog couloir got some interesting comments. I guess if you are from Iowa these things might seem strange. Things were jovial up top though - some good humor and happy faces. You can't climb a mountain and not be happy.

Decided to drop in at 9:30 am. The initial 200 yards required a direct 50° drop off the summit, three quick turns and a passage through a narrow rock choke into the couloir proper. The narrow rock choke scared me a bit, as the rock would have warmed up the snow making the thing unstable. It was funny - lots of folks positioned themselves on a nearby rock outcropping to watch the descent. They saw all of three turns as you quickly ducked behing a rock wall out-of-sight. All the people had me a little nervous to be honest, so I was happy to have not biffed the first part and equally happy to slip around the corner to solitude.

The couloir itself wasn't too bad in terms of steepness - a consistent 45° - but the snow was probably the worst snow I've ever encountered. To call the thing runneled out would be a gross understatement. The slope was basically a mogul run of long snake-like vertical bumps. Challenging skiing to say the least. One top of that, the whole thing was littered with football sized rocks, buried an inch or two into the snow. You couldn't open things up for more than 20 feet without having to do some very precise navigation to avoid the rocks/death runnels. There was no Davenporting out there today - this was survival skiing.

It took about 15 minutes to pick my way to the bottom. Dead Dog is done in terms of skiability for the year - probably was about 2 weeks ago - but even though the turns were hardly flowing - it was exceptionally rewarding to have skied this slope, with no falls, and to have dropped off the top of a 14er. I don't know - it just has me stoked. At one point while picking my way down I stopped in the couloir and just soaked it all in, how great it is to be alive, doing something that requires total focus and makes you feel so small and strong at the same time. I love it, and it was a good way to cap off this phase.

A few photos for your enjoyment...

Sam Atkins completes his first ever snow climb high above the Valley of Giants (el valle de los gigantes).


Dale Atkins does a little snow sampling. Hey, this thing looks steep in this picture!

So it was my idea to check out the ice-choked Greenland-like lake, but it was definitely Dale's idea to leap across the ice-stream filled crevace in ski boots. Here's young Mike Vigers doing his best Kobe Bryant impression.

Parental consent. Sam Atkins takes the leap of faith.

The North Fork Lakes are rarely confused with the Carribean Sea.

No it's not Baffin Island or Antarctica, it's EL VALLE DE LOS GIGANTOS!

Welcome to the Blue Lagoon.

Atkins Sr.

Los Gigantos!

New school meets old. Schralping it through the bergshrunds.

Fast forward to today. I can always tell a more intense experience because I take less photos. Some of these were actually shot on the hike from yesterday.  Anyway, this would be Dead Dog Couloir. When you are skiing it, you drop off the summit of Torreys, cut hard under the rocks to the left to get into the couloir itself and the descend 1,500 or so feel till the snow runs out. It's aesthetically pleasing.

If you want solitude, I wouldn't recommend hiking Torrey's Peak on a July weekend. The masses and me near the summit.

The view from inside the Dead Dog. Skiing 1,500 vertical feet on this type of snow is as exhausting mentally as it is physically.  Super challenging for sure.

Couldn't leave this without giving a few props to the Ned Nordic team (at least a small part of it). The classic summit pose on Torrey's.

Dead Dog splits Torrey's Peak. This was my first ever 14er ski descent. Just 53 more to go!

And now a few more summery images for the snow-haters

Dog and hiking them in the hills is a big part of our lives here. This is a common little place we take them.

Zuma. Zuma was a rescued dog from hurricane Katrina. His first few months of his life consisted of almost getting poisoned to death and living in a small box. Life in the Colorado high country is better.

First ride on the 650B. Rides real nice. A little local one-track trail.

Kind of been setting the bike aside this summer to play in the high mountains. I'm excited to get back into it though after the NOLS trip. It's always fun to renew a passion with something after you've done something else for awhile. Fall riding is the best.

A little bit of rain makes things lush and fun in the woods.

The moose are making a comeback and it's good to see. This was shot right out our backyard.

Wow

I've been riding for 16 years, but this is the coolest thing I've ever seen done on a mountain bike.

Inspirational for sure.

Beacon of Light-ning

Up early to ski Radiobeacon Couloir with Meriwether this morning. Gnarly stuff. This couloir scared me going up - it required a lot of traversing over a huge cliff, I couldn't get my ice axe into the snow and I was just thinking too much. You gotta get into that zen groove when you are climbing these things. Being scared is good, but I felt a little out of control at moments today. Oh well, some days are better than others - rage the next time out.

The skiing was solid. Steep and good. I feel so much more comfortable on skis than I do toe-pointing on crampons. Snow was corny in places, sun cupped and rotten in others but it was all pure goodness. Early electrical storms today required a hasty retreat. A good day skiing in a nice area - we didn't see a single other person!

Here's a black-and-white montage of Meriwether shredding the crap out of place.

Calm before storm

Mellow day today. Body was feeling a little worked over this week, and I want to get a lot of skiing and riding in next week, so in the spirit of listening to the self, took today off. Spent the day rigging up a new computer, dabbing with music and putting a 650B wheel and a spiffy IF rigid fork on my Moots. I like the idea of 650B - or 27.5 inches - smack dab between 26" wheels and 29" wheels and am looking forward to giving it a go. Aesthetically it looks right and it felt great taking hot laps around Eldora. A report soon.

Back up to the high country tomorrow. Skiing a steep little chute with Meriwether. Should be fun. Here's hoping the mountain will be good to us. These skis are never routine, and while it may sound like a bunch of spiritual mumbo jumbo to say the mountain has the final word on what you get to ski that day, it's totally true. To forget that is to play with fire.

The flowers have really been helped out by the rain we've had the past few days. I think they'll be peaking late next week.

Happy July 4th!

Whit and Brandon make their way up the North Fork Bowl before an Independence Day ski back down. Indian Peaks Wilderness, Colorado. July 4, 2008.

Summer in the Wilderness

Cool phone shot of Gray's and Torrey's

Finally managed to download a bunch of photos from my phone. This device takes crappy snow shots, but I like what it did with this Gray's and Torrey's shot from May 25 during a ski on Kelso Mountain. Makes those peaks look like something in the Himalaya.

Feeling a little worked. Day off tomorrow. Hmm...it took awhile, but I think I feel that stoke to ride bikes in the woods coming back.

Skywalker Success

The Skywalker Couloir has called to me for a long time, but for one reason or another I have only skied a part of it, years ago, with King Nimby. Actually, the reason is pretty simple - the Skywalker Couloir scares me. With good reason too. It's inset, which means a high likelyhood of rock-fall and ice-fall, reaches about 55 degrees in slope angle near the top and has some of the crappiest run-outs in the area, meaning if you fall you'll likely mess yourself up or die.

That said, without risk there is no adventure, so today I decided to try and sneak up the beast. This would easily be my most difficult ski of the season thus far and it would be solo to boot, meaning all those little voices in the head - "man this is steep"..."how the hell am I going to put my skis on?"..."can I even ski this?" - would have nobody else to drown them out and take away the tension. It would require mental discipline, as well as being on my game physically to make a successful climb/descent. I've been skiing a lot this spring though, and felt like Skywalker was a reasonable next step. If you are going to progress in this sport, you can't stagnate at one comfort zone.

Getting to the couloir was uneventful, save the bushwhacking through head high brush to the base. The thing looks steep and intimidating from the bottom. No question about it, this would be a helmet, crampons and ice axe day. The lower flanks were fairly straight forward, but as you climbed it increased in steepness. Despite the warm night last night, the snow was bulletproof, making for nice cramponing but occasionally sketchy ice-axing, as you could get the axe in the snow only a couple inches or so. The couloir narrows near the middle and sinks deep into cliff walls on either end. Beautiful, but today I wasn't so much gazing at the view as I was focusing on the task at hand.

Onward and upward, until the near summit when the slope got wicked steep. This is where mental toughness comes in. If you actually think of the what-ifs you are in trouble. Best to keep positive thoughts churning in the head and the legs in perpetual motion. The problem was, I could identify no clear place to put on my skis, a real problem on a 55 degree slope. Near the rock at the entrance of Leia (which I did not ski...it's melted out to about five feet wide and skiing it would have required straight lining down a ridiculously steep 30 foot chute before trying to dump my speed on a 55 degree rock solid slope. I don't have the skills to do that) I tried to settle into a moat near a cliff edge and get comfortable. It was tough to get comfortable though, as I was on a tiny ledge of snow that I honestly didn't trust.

This was the scariest part of the run. I kind of had to shimmy my body around to do the necessary tasks. Remove poles and skis from the pack, being extremely careful not to drop anything down the face of the mountain, remove crampons gingerly, tighten boots, remove ice axe and strap it to the pack, and finally put on skis and poles. Whew...the whole time I had a noticeable shake and was praying the little snow ledge I was on wouldn't collapse. But then I looked down the run and realized that yeah, I could ski this thing. It was steep, it was solid, but it was doable.

I had two choices. Wait in my precarious position or take my chances skiing the still-too-solid snow field. Skywalker is weird - despite a south aspect, it doesn't get any sun until mid-morning. Had it been 10:45 am, the conditions would have been prime. However, it was 9:45 am...solid and serious business. That said, I didn't trust my little platform, so with a concerted effort to shut off the brain, I dropped in.

Immediately I was stunned by the force of gravity pulling me down the steep slope, combined by the chatter of my skis. This was survival skiing and I was tapping into everything I've learned in the sport since I started skiing at age three. Falling was not an option, but on the third turn I almost did just that. I'm using lightweight skis and boots - great 99% of the time - but on this particular turn the boot flexed way too far forward and I almost pitched headfirst down the steepest part of the slope. With a quick instinctual motion I tossed my body down the hill and recovered it, banging out ten more turns with my heart rate zooming at around 210 beats per minute.

I stopped to evaluate. The snow was sun-cupped, icy and as challenging as anything I'd ever skied. Should I wait for it to soften up, or keep on the present path? I reminded myself that I grew up ski racing on icy slopes in Vermont and as long as there was an edge to be had, I could do this thing. Just then an ice chunk went ripping over my head at about 40 mph. It was time to move. I linked turn after turn, an icy scrape with each motion, flying through the air with each subtle tweak of the muscles to change direction. Was it pretty? I don't know, but I do know it was total focus and it was effective. Your mind enters this zone where the only thing that matters is the turn, because to think of anything else invites mistakes. In a place like Skywalker Couloir with conditions like today, mistakes are not an option.

Many turns later, lungs searing and legs crying, I reached the bottom. The adrenaline rush was overwhelming, and I collapsed on the tundra, stoked and relieved beyond measure. Without a doubt, this was the top 10 hardest runs I've ever done on skis. The steepness actually wasn't so bad, but the brutal snow conditions combined with said steepness made the thing an adventure to say the least. Hours later though, there is a pride in having tackled this thing solo and having pushed myself. It's the most alive and free I have felt in a long, long time. A damned fine way to usher in July (I hear it's 95 down in Boulder today).

Monday at the North Fork Lakes Bowl

I had this whole post ready to go, but it somehow got vaporized. As such, a short entry with some photos of a stellar Monday skiing at the North Fork Lakes Bowl will have to suffice, as I want to ski tomorrow early.

Today's line. Straight forward and sweet. So much snow back here...should be skiing well till August. Snow climb up, ski down. Gradually got steeper near the top to around 40°. Velvet corn back down. Perfect.

Summit looking towards Neva. Met the crazy mountain guy up here. That'll be a story when I have more time.

These Stonehenge cairns are popping up all over the neighborhood. I like 'em!

Never taken a good flower shot, but I kind of like this one.

The paintbrush is starting to pop on the tundra.

I know mom, I need a haircut.

Tomorrow's skiing aspiration.

Bear attack at a 24 hour bike race in Alaska

Crazy...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25446868/

Sunday Canoe

A crisp 36° degrees this morning, the coldest it's been for weeks. Took a day off from the high peaks to go on a little paddle around Gross Reservoir with Suz.  So nice to have a lake like that in our relative backyard. A fun perspective paddling around from the water's surface, checking out the sheer cliff faces, burn zones and places usually only seen from singletrack trails far above. The only bummer - I sun burned my knees! Ouch.

Tomorrow, back up to timberline for some skiing in the Storm Lake basin. Early morning, long hike in, what could be better?

A visit to the park

The creeks continue to flow at their peak, the high country becomes a little less white everyday and still, the joy of making a turn is no different now than it was six months ago. That locked in feeling, upper body driving down the hill, legs in that perfectly balanced stance, set the edge, getting light, flying from turn to turn, a dance down a mountain in a place so regal it makes Buckingham Palace look like a 7-11. Everything up here is big, everything dramatic, except for us, the human beings who are mere guests in this harsh landscape, working with all our might to avoid the hazards this winter-turning-summer world can offer. Today's destination, Ptarmigan Chutes in Rocky Mountain National Park.

The three of us wound our way up the freeway that is Flattop Mountain Trail. Some snow down low, but once you broke free above timberline, the travel was smooth and fast. And as is always the case, the higher you went the thinner the crowds got. It's an amazing feeling you get when you break above timberline - free, energized and unbelievably happy. In the background, Longs Peak looms.

The lowlands were shrouded in a bank of fog, while the divide basked in sunlight.

The face of the mountain watches stoically as the people race like rats.

Broke out onto the rim and had to make a route decision for the descent. Fortunately we had the smarts to forego the big chute underneath the hanging cornice, instead selecting this wide-open 40° face. Meriwether - the little black dot in the upper left - getting his ski groove back on. Perfect, smooth corn snow!

Immediately after skiing the top section, the area where we were contemplating skiing ended up having a significant slide as a cornice fell. It may not look like much here, but the power of even these small slides is humbling and makes you realize that the you have to be careful when looking for the slope to ski in the high mountains. It may sound cliche, but humans are nothing compared to these natural forces.

The lower cirque. Kept looking over my shoulder while skiing down to make sure one of those cornices up above didn't pop. A skiers makes his way down in the lower left corner...no bigger than a rock.

A tower rises above the mountain valley. A great ski in the land of snow fields, calving cornices, waterfalls, marmots and a lone coyote. Surreal as hell coming back down to the zoo that is Bear Lake parking lot, where newlyweds were getting photographed, kids were screaming and folks were vying for the close-in-parking space to save 100 yards of walking before going on a hike. Personally, I'll take the high mountain solitude anyday.

And the Endless Winter continues...