Browse Reports By Period: 2014 RSS

In Search of the Elusive Turn

2014-12-15T04:48:00+0000

I joined the "Beginner Friendly Backcountry Skiing (Baker)" trip scheduled for Dec13th, looking forward to an easy day and hopefully at least enough snow for a few decent turns, we were not disappointed. We skied/toured in an area bordering the Mount Baker Ski area, not far from the Baker Lodge, run by the Mountaineers. The existing snow that had been pounded by recent warm, wet stormy weather was transformed into a well consolidated and bonded firm crusty layer dusted with a few centimeters of fluffy snow.This stuff was perfectly suited for getting in our turns so we could, on the way back, dodge the numerous rocks, holes, and people between us and the parking lot.

Corteo Peak Southwest Ridge

2014-11-01T11:24:00+0000

I originally scheduled a club trip to Corteo in 2013 but it was cancelled as the highway was closed by numerous rockslides. A year later, I was back but solo. Corteo is easily approached from the Maple Pass trail at Rainy Pass. A good hiking trail goes to the pass and provides quick access. It's about one hour to the pass from the trailhead. The east face of Corteo is directly across from Maple Pass. My route was the southwest ridge. I descended a couple of hundred meters into the basin below Corteo's east face. There is a bit of a sketchy climber's track at times but the ground is open and it was straightforward hiking. In the large basis there is quite a bit of granitic rockfall from the face above but it is easily crossed as it is quite stable. I traversed up to around 6700 feet to traverse the south slopes of Corteo. The traverse was tedious despite the mostly open terrain. There was a lot of sidehilling on steep, hard dirt and loose rock. It took about two hours to reach the southwest ridge proper. Mount Benzarino connects with Corteo by its southwest ridge. The southwest ridge is somewhat of a knife-edge and rated at Class 3-4. It was a pleasant climb of about one hour duration to the summit. A well-known NWHikers.net party had summited two days earlier but there were very few recorded climbs in the simple summit register - a plastic bottle. I guess Faye Pullen had not been this way. During her sweep of the Washington 200 she had replaced most of the summit registers in the area.

Sigurd Trail Work Executive Summary

2014-10-12T00:29:00+0000

Fall 2014, the British Columbia Mountaineering Club extended the Sigurd Trail in Tantalus Provincial Park. The club funded helicopter flights for the work party, consisting of Paul Kubik, Peter Malacarne and dog Linus. The five day camp built a one kilometer extension of the Sigurd Trail into the Moraine Camp at 1200 meters elevation in the glacial outwash plain below the Pelion-Ossa Glacier. A latrine was prefabricated in Vancouver and assembled on site. The route to Ossa Camp on the west ridge of Ossa Mountain was flagged. For a more detail on what was accomplished, please view the 9 minute video on YouTube using the link below.

BCMC extends Sigurd Trail, Fall 2014

2014-10-11T17:07:00+0000

The club builds and maintains the Sigurd Trail in the northern Tantalus Range in the Coast Range of British Columbia just north of Squamish. The trail rises from Squamish River through the old growth, heavily forested Este-tiwilh/Sigurd Creek Conservancy and enters Tantalus Provincial Park. The trail is popular with mountaineers climbing Pelion and Ossa Mountains and traversing the Tantalus Range. Each year, people attempt to get to Sigurd Lake and most fail. A lot of work on the trail was accomplished in 2014. The crowning achievement was a five day camp with Peter Malacarne, myself and dog Linus. With funding from the club, we extended the trail about one kilometer into "Moraine Camp" at the glacier snout on the north side of Pelion and Ossa Mountains and flagged the route to Ossa Camp on the west ridge of Ossa Mountain. Peter contributed some photos and I put together a couple of videos that I published on YouTube. The first video is "Sigurd Whimsy" and the second video is one for the executive committee which goes into detail of what we accomplished with the funds that were provided.

Box Creek Canyoneering

2014-10-06T23:00:00+0000

This summer I discovered another beautiful part of BC- its canyons! After doing some guided and unguided canyoneering in Utah and Martinique earlier this year, I took my brother (12 years old) with me to explore some local canyons. After descending picturesque Cypress Creek a couple times, we headed to Goldie Creek and Mosquito Creek, all three of which basically lie within Translink connection from my house! Then, on a rainy, nasty day on which my friend and I had actually planned on getting on some Squamish rock, we headed off instead across the Squamish River. Stepping out of our inflatable toy boat, we disappeared into dense forest beside Monmouth Creek and entered a knew world of raging streams, carved granite and huge basalt cliffs, hung with a curtain ferns. We descended Box Creek, which was simply spectacular. The next week I took my dad and brother up to do it again, this time with a camera on a sunny day. From the footage I edited together a little video. The video! (click here) Enjoy! And hopefully we can have some BCMC canyoneering trips in the future!