Welcome to Haines

A four hour ferry ride out of Juneau, with glaciers peaking out from under a heavy blanket of clouds, deposited me at the little town of Juneau. The weather on this trip, like the plane trip, was still hiding the fabled mountain ranges of Alaska.



I was picked up at the dock and transported to the lodge that would be my home for the next week. Within half an hour I was steered away from crevasse rescue training and onto a fishing boat, the Sundowner. The intent? Check some crab pots, check out a seal colony and shoot guns. Welcome to Alaska.



The next day introduced me to the biggest component of heli skiing in Alaska. Waiting. We milled around the lodge for a few hours, then went out to the airport to wait some more. With two film crews staying at the same time there was a bit of action on the tarmac with people entertaining themselves one way or another. An extra large entertainment system was rolled out of an equally large Airstream caravan to blast some tunes. The Airstream was kitted out in the most decadent ski-bum fantasy. A man-garage at the back with ski racks, work bench, said disco-sized music system and room for a snowmobile and more. Kitchen galley area and bunks up front, coupled to the quintessential North American oversized pick-up.


The waiting paid off though. We took off around 1pm, and flew until 7pm, racking up some good vert in 7 runs. The first run was reasonably mellow but fun, building up to a shoot off a run called Editor's Choice, pushing 50 degrees and reasonably tight. This is what I came to AK for! We ended the day with bluebird skies and massive grins. A few beers at the bar, dinner and early to bed.

Today we played the waiting game once again. Only longer. We finally flew for some window shopping runs (wait for the AK dictionary) and did three quick runs down the same face, called Telemarker's. Not steep, but some fun shoots and bumps on the way. We were dropped off for our fourth run before the weather completely closed in and we were picked up at the top again instead of risking being on the glacier in a complete white-out.

Word in the lodge is that tomorrow is going to be epic. Don't want to get my hopes up but it's nudging 10pm and most people have already gone to bed, so I'm going to take their lead...

Photos will come soon.