By Shane Orchard
IT’S A LONG WAY TO GO TO OBSERVE THE INSIDE OF A CLOUD. AND ALL IN THE HOPE THAT ONCE IN A WHILE THE MOUNTAINS MIGHT SHRUG OFF THEIR SHROUDS, AND ALLOW THE FEW HUMANS AROUND A CHANCE TO GO EXPLORE. BUT SOMEONE HAS TO DO IT, SO WITH AIR TICKETS JUST TWO WEEKS OLD AND TRUSTY TOOLS OF THE TRADE PREPARED FOR TAKEOFF, I HEAD FOR THE DEPARTURE LOUNGE…
11:00 A.M. MARCH 29 “What do you mean 23kgs?” I thought it was 32. “Oh, I can take my laptop plus 7kg cabin baggage?”… “Great, I’ll just repack a bit and come back in a minute.” Holy smokes, I was yet to pass stage one! I hastily looked for anything small and heavy I could hide in the bottom of my laptop bag. Crampons might fit in, and yip, a camera lens could go too. I put on an extra jacket then made sure the carry-on weighed a good 7kg and fronted up again. “24.5… oh, I think that’ll be okay” the nice lady said, “have a great trip”. I was on my way. 11:10 A.M. MARCH 29 “Is this your computer case sir?” Oh no, the crampons… duh! “Umm, is there a problem with those? I couldn’t fit them in my other bag.” That required checking, apparently, and five minutes later I got a reply. “We don’t allow crampons in the cabin but no problem, we’ve contacted an airline representative who’ll check them in for you.” It looked like my planned crampon-wielding takeover of the in-flight bar was off the cards! Shortly afterwards the same nice lady from check-in found her way through security, crampons in hand. “No problem she said, we’ve located one of your checked bags… do you mind if we unzip it and pop these inside?” “No I don’t mind at all,” I said hastily, “sorry, I was a bit rushed…” And with that and a friendly wave from the security officer, I was a lot closer to AK. 5:00 P.M. MARCH 29 LAX. Not the flashest place to hang about. I’d already inquired if the last plane to Seattle was full. It was. So it was back to the original plan of a 13-hour book reading stint, perhaps broken by sleep if possible. Come midnight the crowds thinned, as did my enthusiasm for the book. Then I spotted those comfy looking curved couches in the foyer. Empty at last! I quickly scuttled over and tried to work out how to lash four bags of various sizes around me in some configuration able to thwart any sneaky thief. The solution was to lie on all of them, and whilst doing this a couple other kids came along and started setting up their versions of the same. At least they’d be a few pairs of friendly eyes about, so I made some small talk, and settled down for some airport sleep time. This is where that oversize snowboard jacket comes in handy. I pulled the hood over my face for a lights out effect and dreamt of the morning.
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Sooner or later, you’re bound to end up right place, right time. This line epitomized rare, perfect Alaska; sunny, steep, stable, deep, watched by curious mountain goats and merely en route to an even sicker, bigger peak! PHOTO: SHANE ORCHARD
Hiking up to this cliff, I was distracted by pillows plastered on around the corner. Dropping in, the lot peeled off, sending me crashing down into saplings amongst fridge-sized blocks... slightly shaken, I needed a breather; and of course Shane-O was only to happy to hand over the lens and do this drop justice. PHOTO: RUARI MCFARLANE 68 NZSNOWBOARDER
‘Though the clouds were low, one thing was becoming really clear… more pillow lines than you’d ever seen”.
Fools Gold, maybe, but the search is mighty addictive. Exploring all our options at Paulson Bay, Prince William Sound. PHOTO: SHANE ORCHARD
4:30 A.M. MARCH 30 “It’s time to get up, the time is 4:30” said my cell phone’s talking alarm in that cute pommie chick accent. Awesome! I already knew where Alaska Airlines were and headed straight there. This is where I learned of a cunning fast-track plan to score a seat on an early flight. The check-in lady was so helpful she even forgot to charge for my bags! I’d discovered you can go standby on any flight on the same day, and a much earlier Seattle to Anchorage flight had some unsold seats. And here’s the bonus; check your bags through on that earlier flight and like magic you seem to go to the front of the standby queue! Sure enough, I got to Seattle and went to inquire how many were waiting for seats to Anchorage. “We’ve got about 40 or 50 people waiting, is your name on the list?” they asked. I checked, and I was number six! 12 NOON, MARCH 31 It’s so hard to wake up in Alaska! I remembered that much from the last trip. It was snowing outside so we checked the weather and made a plan for the next day. Ah ha, major storm on the way! 4:00 P.M. APRIL 1 Finally we’re on top of a mountain, even if only the mighty ‘Flat Top’ situated within plain view of downtown and literally walkable from our house on the outskirts. It’s freshies though, and we shuffle over to look down the north face chute we’d seen from the house. Whooah, it’s at least 45 degrees for a long way down out of sight. This is quite some backyard, I was thinking. We’re a little worried about how Prudhoe the dog is going to fare chasing us down, but some minutes later she comes porpoising down our tracks looking totally happy. Shredding the gnar, Prudhoe! 9:00 A.M. APRIL 2 Yes, I was out of bed before midday. And it was blue outside. Time to check the excellent backcountry reports you get in these
parts. It said 19” fresh in the Turnagain car park and more up top. What to do? It was time to head out of Anchorage and get amongst it! The plan was to check out the Turnagain Pass Mountains for the next week or so whilst some other Kiwis found their way up. So we headed for the Pass for a snow check, and sure enough the mountains were pasted. Dangerously beautiful one could say. We headed for the safest looking line and found a bunch of kickers hidden in the trees. Perfect! Meanwhile the locals had other ideas and began putting in more daring lines than might have been sensible. So we split thinking that maybe tomorrow might just be the day. 12 NOON, APRIL 3 This is it. The rib rolled off disturbingly. I could see a small mushroom a bit further down and beyond that only the dark shadows of the ‘Superbowl’. A semi-safe, first big line. Dropping, turn, turn, launch off that mushroom, aargh can’t see, cut right, sweet there’s the rib again, don’t go off the other side, hit that bank, aargh can’t see, where’s that roller, point it, cut right, avoid those cookies… sweet! 3:00 P.M. APRIL 3 We regroup on the ridge after choosing a super spaced out strategy to get us up the headwall past numerous avalanche paths. But nothing was moving so we headed for the back peak. Further up the valley the iconic Grandaddy Chute beckoned, one of the classic local lines. But it didn’t have the features of our next line, another super-rib in the superbowl. This one had a 15-footer onto the rib, leading to a platform above a big cliff, and towards a 15-footer escape route to the face below. If only snow would stick to ridges like that in New Zealand! It was so good we did it twice, stoked in the knowledge that tomorrow’s storm was on the way.
If you go with the right crew and a tight plan, terrain of this caliber isn’t as unattainable as you’d think.... PHOTO: SHANE ORCHARD
9:00 A.M. APRIL 7 They forecasted another 6 to 8” new snow, so we check the freshies total. Umm, what? 28” in the car park overnight and still snowing! That was the day we discovered riding the trees in Alaska ain’t too bad at all. 9:00 A.M. APRIL 8 Another 6” overnight and it’s bluebird. Plus, the remaining Kiwis Phil ******* and Tess Carney have turned up, right in time for a stunner. We go straight back to yesterday’s discovery, knowing exactly where those steep pillow lines through the trees are hiding. Plus we have a track to follow! We look longingly at the many ridiculous lines about, including a couple of spines further up our ridge. It was a big evening tour but we had to give it a crack, eventually finding our way to the ‘Roundtop’ as we called it, a peak at the end of the valley. Now where was that one break in the cornice line we were hoping to find? We made sure of its location before getting a little closer to check out the view. It was the kind of steep loaded AK line we’d come for that was for sure, but first things first, so we found a test location and proceeded to dig our pit. 20cm pow, a little bit of slab, a bit more pow then a firmer base perhaps? Hello a sneaky weak layer 80cm down popped to our attention. Damn it, I’d rather like to rule out that chasing me down. As often happens around here it was a case of ‘close but no cigar’. 2:00 P.M. APRIL 12 We’re loaded up with food and heading to Whittier for the 3:30pm tunnel opening. Also known as ‘Shittier’, this place has reputably the worst weather of anywhere. Which means at least one thing… lots of snow! We miss the tunnel opening and wait for the 4:30 instead, just in time for our appointment with the ‘Good Times’, a local charter boat. We spot sea otters and porpoises along the way, as we head out into the stormy waters of Prince William Sound. Before long we’re in
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glacier country and everywhere there’s a good 2 metres of snow right to the beach. Aboard the Good Times was a good time alright, but if only we had a sled on board! Though the clouds were low one thing was becoming really clear… more pillow lines than you’d ever seen. Maybe we’d just found the world’s biggest terrain park, at the unlikely location of sea level! 2:00 P.M. APRIL 18 After driving all day in the sun we get to the wall of cloud that is Thompson’s Pass, gateway to Valdez. Oh well you can’t complain about more snow, so we pull over and start hiking the first thing we see. There’s been 4 feet of fresh from this storm so far… let’s hope tomorrow we might get to see it, aye! 7:00 P.M. APRIL 19 Is that a blue hole? Quick, let’s scramble. Two hours later and we’re on top, looking down a nice long chute in the rosy evening light. Now you can’t do that back home in New Zealand! And so continued our Valdez mission. As they say, ‘One in the bag is worth two in the bush’. At least two in the bush when you’re talking bluebird days in AK! Cloud dodging became a major pastime and many days were a quest for that elusive ‘sucker hole’ that tended to turn up now and then. Problem was, the sun usually peeked through just long enough to get you amped before vanishing right when you needed it... like on top of your line! Slowly the storms backed off, and by late April we’d seen enough of the Chugach to have scared ourselves a few times over. Each adventure was a chance to test some limits of some kind. It’s all there to be done in AK, that’s for sure. But that’s a whole bunch of stories right there! Back home in one piece now, it seems a world away, and it really is. But that’s why you’ve just got to go, if you want to know the real Alaska.