Nothing like bringing in the New Year with a three day ski trip into the back country. New and old friends together with alcohol, good food, and untouched powder lines. We intended to head out to Roger's Pass for some alpine action but stayed local to try to get into the Tantalus. We called Blacktusk Helicopters on Friday night to book a Saturday flight, but they recommended to avoid the Tantalus right now. We decided to skin up to Cloudburst leaving Saturday morning.
Leaving the car at 11, we arrive in New Years Bowl after a four hour skin. Photo shows Ken Jones following a pre-cut ski track on approach to the bowl.
Time to catch some laps before dark.
As night falls, we begin to dig the snow cave:
This is us in the cave when it is complete. I thought it was our best roof yet! Cribbage, dinner, and drinks in the cave.
New Years Eve! Very grey day.
We take our snow profile of a North-East face.
Amazing snow pack! A firm base with stable powder. Green light for steeper lines!
A few short gladed runs close to camp. Jones and Tim skiing back down to our skin track.
In the afternoon we pick our line up the gut of New Years Bowl. I don't have a good photo of the entire slope. This photo shows the topmost third with the straight zigzag on the left showing our ascent and perfect turns on the right for descent.
Tim up on the ridge. We spent our days in the shadow of the mountain but caught a few rays of light up on the ridge before descending off left.
Paul and Natassja are expected to join us before dark but they are nowhere to be found. We ski down and find them after thirty minutes or so. Two hours to skin back up to camp with our new heavy load - firewood, three bottles of wine, tequila, champagne, bottled water, snow peas, Doritos, a French Press, and dry mittens. Paul brings the party as usual!
Evening starts with a few drinks by the fire.
Fighting in the snow and New Years count down.
Bring in 2013 with a midnight slightly intoxicated ski! First of the year!
New Years Day is a blue bird! We are running laps up to the ridge for that beautiful 40% powder descent. Each lap is about an hour up and ten minutes down.
View from the bottom. The graininess, noise, and lack of colour is 'art' (this was a terrible photo taken from very far away).
View from the top of the ridge:
After two laps on the ridge we ski for about two hours through gladed terrain and logging roads. When we reach the car, we head straight for chicken and bacon.
OMG bought a GPS last week!!! I'm really enjoying this.
