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Published: April 21st 2009
The boot pack going round
This stretch took the best part of an hour to walk.We spent the weekend before last down in Vancouver which no doubt Helen will continue with her quality blogs on in the next few days. It rained quite a lot down in the city which is not an uncommon event, this meant it was snowing heavily in Whistler which I was missing out on!
In order to get my fill of late season powder and also partly as I was starting to feel a bit unfit I fancied a long hike out in the backcountry to get some deep and steep turns in I got in touch with a few other people I know out here who were also having similar thoughts and so on Tuesday 14th it was on....
Despite a couple of people dropping out - one had to work and the other missed his bus up from Vancouver we eventually had a good crew of about 10 people together and each with our back country safety gear - transceiver, shovel and probe each headed out through the back country access gate on Blackcomb Glacier after checking the avalanche risk (moderate which it seems to always be).
The target was an area called Corona Bowl which
A few turns on the way
This is now the back side of where you can see the bootpack going to in the last picture.
We got to do a quick run down here before the hiking continued again drops you back into the ski area so thankfully there is only one walk involved. Some of the others wanted to do a much tougher run called DOA (Dead on Arrival!) but we talked them out of that.
The walk was pretty non eventful but it involved a 2+ hour walk through knee deep snow whilst carrying a pack, food, water, and snowboard. Its much easier for skiers as they have sticky skins that they attach to the bottom of their skis and they glide along the top where as a 13 stone snowboarder (me) found it much harder going.
That said the views once we were away from the crowds were incredible with glaciers and jagged peaks all around it was quite beautiful and good reason to take the occasional well earned break.
If felt like an eternity to make it over to Corona from the access ridge and even then there was a final 10 minute climb to the very summit. We chilled out at the top for a while for another break, rest & fuel up (left overs from the previous nights tuna pasta for me) and then from there on it was all
The next walk
Corona bowl access is the dip far right from the boot pack downhill. We got some sweet powder turns for all of 5 mins before we re-entered the ski area and rode down to Blacks pub for a couple of beers.
It was a great day, one of the best of the season and quite odd being out all day to only do one run but well worth it, Powder Mountain was great the other week but it seems a bit more rewarding hiking rather than relying on the snow cat or a heli to transport you around, as they say you have to 'earn your turns'.
Needless to say the next day I was completely shattered and my leg muscles were pretty sore!
We now only have less than a week to go, the snow is starting to melt in the village, things are warming up, summer is just around the corner and the bears are starting to make up...
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