Phelix Hut: Goodbye Lisa and Jules
Our friends Lisa and Julian returned to Austria. Just before they left, they organized a slew of excellent parties. One of the parties involved skiing up to a backcountry hut belonging to the outdoor club (VOC) and spending a weekend there. Maya and I stayed for three days with some of the others. It was a great combination of beautiful sun, blue skies and excellent snow. Here are a few photos: In the afternoon we broke out into the alpine and it got chilly. Anne apparently measured -22c, and it wasn’t even dark yet. No wonder Maya’s hair froze. In the evening we had a bit of a party in…
Ring-Callaghan Traverse: Clawing the Thin Ice
I love frozen lakes. The thin ice covering them is like a call to arms. I feel drawn to the ice, to test it, walk on it, throw sticks and rocks at it, and am always surprised to see them bounce off the ice instead of making a splash in the water. Maybe this has something to do with growing up in the Middle East, where ice exists strictly in the freezer. My wonder at ice formations extends of course to the biggest pieces of ice we are likely to bump into, glaciers. Getting close to glaciers and traveling across them is still a novelty to me. This trip took…
- Backcountry Skiing, British Columbia (and nearby), Duffey Lake Road, Trip Reports, Varsity Outdoor Club (VOC)
Anniversary Glacier: More Spring Turns
Yet another trip up the Duffey Lake Road, this time a few kms beyond Marriot Basin, which we had gone to the previous weekend. The route to Keith’s hut is in the forest for the most part, but it is very mellow. There were a few entertaining creek crossings, and soon enough we arrived to the cozy hut. Apparently the hut can be very crowded on the weekend. In fact, I had read a report written by someone who had spent the night with three dogs on the bottom floor. For this reason we brought tents, but in the end didn’t use them. It had started raining not long before,…
- Backcountry Skiing, British Columbia (and nearby), Duffey Lake Road, Trip Reports, Varsity Outdoor Club (VOC)
Marriot Basin: Time for some Spring Turns
Last weekend we headed to Marriot Basin with Lisa, Julian and Colin. After strapping the skis to the roof in a jumble of ropes and bungee cords, we drove three hours to the trailhead. While we were getting organized, a rental car pulled over, also full of VOC’ers, but going to Mt. Rohr on a day trip. We headed up the logging road, admiring the views of the Joffrey group behind us, the fresh snow, and mostly the warmth and sun. We entered the forest, and were happy to follow tracks from the day before. We emerged from the forest, crossed a small frozen lake and soon found ourselves at…
- Backcountry Skiing, British Columbia (and nearby), Sea to Sky, Trip Reports, Varsity Outdoor Club (VOC)
Brew Hut: Another Misadventure to Brew Hut
Easter long weekend requires an adventure, it’s not every week that we get a four day weekend. Gili and I signed up for the trip to Brew hut organized by Philippe LeBillon a few weeks in advance. We were hoping for a nice weekend in which we’d skin up to Brew, enjoy some spring skiing and warm up in the hut at night. As usual nothing really worked out as planned, especially when a trip to Brew is involved. When a group of us gathered in the clubroom on the Wednesday before the trip, Philippe opened by saying that the weather didn’t look too good and maybe we should reconsider…
- Backcountry Skiing, Birkenhead, British Columbia (and nearby), Trip Reports, Varsity Outdoor Club (VOC)
Phelix Hut: Pre New Year’s Trip and Blisters
We decided to spend four days at the Phelix Hut. We woke up early for the long drive – about three and a half hours north of Vancouver, past Pemberton, and up a logging road. Luckily this logging road is plowed semi-regularly, and it was in easy driving condition. On the way in I heard on the radio that the temperature at Pemberton was -13c, and of course we were going to be about 1500m higher than that… We were happy to find a vehicle parked at the trail head, since it meant that we would have a broken trail to follow. The first part was along a logging road…
Mt. Rohr: Mt. Rohr on Skis
It is always nice to go back to the same place in different seasons. When we hiked to Mt. Rohr in early September, the forest was colored by shades of green and the lakes were deep blue. We returned in early spring, this time with our skis. Everything around us was white, of course, including the lakes. Last winter was rough for backcountry skiing, and it was the first season that I actually got a bit into it. Unfortunately, most trips included low snow conditions, icy slopes and in several cases we had to carry our skis instead of using them. However, we heard that conditions in the Duffy Lake…
Silverdaisy Mtn: Winter’s Silver Lining
We headed to Manning Park for a ski touring day trip to Silverdaisy Mountain. This was a BCMC trip headed by Jos van der Burg, a dutch from Chilliwack who I had heard good things about. I picked up my three passengers (all girls) early in the morning, and we met the rest of the group in Chilliwack. I had felt the strong winds on the road already, every now and then a gust hit the car and tried to push it off the road. From there it was another hour to the trail head at Cayuse Flats, where we started skinning up the snowy Cayoose Creek FSR. A few…
Garibaldi Lake: Maya’s First Overnight Backcountry Skiing trip
Last weekend we did a two day backcountry skiing trip to Garibaldi Lake. It had been foggy for a few days in Vancouver with a forecast for continued fog. Just a bit higher than the city it was sunny with blue skies, which is what we had for the two days. When the temperature gets higher as you go up, it is called an inversion. Apparently on that weekend it was 6c in the city, and 18c on Mt.Seymour (a ski hill on the North Shore), at least 1000m higher! The road to the parking lot had not been plowed, so we parked on the side of the road and…
Norske Peak: Going For Glory on Norske
A few weeks ago I read a trip report by Robin Tivy on Bivouac describing a two day trip to Manning Park and an ascent of an obscure peak – Nordheim. This was possibly the first recorded ski ascent of Nordheim, and it was mentioned that “if you really want glory”, Norske was up for grabs. I’m not one to usually look for glory, but it seemed like a good enough excuse for a trip into a relatively untraveled area. I emailed Piotr Forysinski who was eager, and Phillip Zielke came along too. Phillip had arrived to Vancouver in December (from Germany) and had only skied several times before this…
