I was able to weasel my way into the Louis/Rowley ski trip this year (thanks Guy!) as we toured
into Kokanee Glacier Lodge. Here are some fun photos and video of the amazing powder, super fun times,
and great skiing to be had in this area.
First some pics before our trip
Full size
Here is my sales guy Carl at the top of Cypress Mountain doing 'night skiing'.
Full size
Henry and I having music time, even though I look crazy.
Full size
Henry having happy pancakes in Cochrane.
Our trip to Kokanee Glacier
Day 1 - Around the Lodge
Full size
Here is our intrepid crew getting ready in the rain in Nelson. From right to left, we have Jeanna,
Louis, Rowley, me, Iain, and Marius.
Full size
Lou and I on the first chopper out. It was a challenging flight in as the storm was coming in pretty hard.
The pilot did an impressive job staying low, and getting us up the valley to the lodge.
Full size
This little guy (Copper) was on our flight as well.
Full size
The Kokanee Glacier Cabin, by far the nicest ACC hut, from the air. This cabin has hot and cold running
water, a complete waste water treatment plant, micro-hydro power, and lots of space.
Full size
Marius came all the way in from Norway to join our trip. Here he is outside the lodge.
Full size
Louis says that the snow at Kokanee is excellent.
Full size
We try really hard to be conservative in snow and stability assessment when we're skiing. Here is Rowley digging our
first snow pit of the week. We wound up doing three (two regular pits and one extended column test) over the course
of the week. With snow depths well over 3m, this was a really interesting snow pack to play with.
Full size
Rowley with his DB hat. He should be a sledder...
Full size
It turns out that Marius' bindings were set for an 8-year-old so until he sorted this out, he did a lot of
'hucking his face'. Here's one example.
Full size
As we made our way back in from the Enchanted Forest, Louis put in a really impressive skin track that
navigated around some challenging wind slab features. Here are Jeanna and Louis looking into the valley.
Full size
And again looking out at the bowl above Enchanted Forest.
Full size
As we skied across Kaslo Lake back to the cabin, I thought the light on the mountains was nice.
Since Jeanna didn't join us this day, Louis got it all out
Full size
We elected to do more of an adventure tour on this day since Jeanna wanted to take a day off. We went up Enterprise Pass
and dropped down towards Tanal Lake. This turned into a bit of a tree thrash as we weren't totally sure which way to approach
this drainage. This was the first look we had outside of staring into tree wells, so we were pretty jazzed.
Full size
A panoramic view of the drainage we skied up into. You can see PLR Couloir as well as some pretty serious avalanche terrain
above us too.
Full size
We had a discussion around the best options for gaining this bench. Rowley's suggestion of staying in the tree islands
turned out to be the winner here.
Full size
A look at a pretty serious fracture line high above us.
Full size
Our friend Marius having a bite of lunch at our high spot on this tour.
Full size
Louis, Rowley, and I decided to put an approach onto the couloir that we named PLR Couloir. This was the visibility
when we made the decision to go for a closer look. This is the Kokanee equivalent to 'zero precipitation'.
Full size
Other than nipple-deep unconsolidated snow up 45-55 degrees for over 100 vertical metres, there was virtually nothing
stopping us from skiing this line! Thanks go to Louis for trudging up this slope for us.
Full size
In some places, it wasn't as hard as other places, but it was a push nonetheless.
Full size
For Iain (and for us too), this trip was also about learning. Here he is doing his first snow pit, and he's actually
doing an extended column test. Snow depth was ~320 cm at 2200m elevation.
Full size
Rowley and Marius look on as we had a beautiful bluebird day to go explore the glacier.
Full size
Iain and Louis cutting the back of the extended column.
Full size
Louis and Rowley picked a really great low ramp to use to get up onto the glacier. Here is a gorgeous
look at our skin track on the snowfield.
Full size
Jeanna at our lunch spot for the morning.
Full size
Rowley and Marius having a break on the granite.
Full size
We continued all the way up the glacier and gained some more elevation. Here's Rowley near the top of our
route for the day.
Full size
Jeanna and Louis at the radio repeater tower. The look on Jeanna's face says it all. I read her saying,
"I'm never climbing up this silly thing again!"
Video look-around at the top of the repeater tower
Full size
Of course, when a guy finds a big black tower at the top of a glacier, what would you do?
Full size
The day started off a bit later, with a bait and switch. The team wanted to huck things and I wanted to tour,
so we hucked while the sun was cool, and toured after. This was the site of the big jumps.
