I alluded to it in a post before, but I got the incredible opportunity to ski in Alaska last week, and I wanted to spread the stoke, and a thank you, here on the board.
I was writing a story for Telemark Skier next season on Owens' operation in Girdwood, Chugach Powder Guides, so I left last Monday with our photo editor, Tom. We chose Girdwood and CPG because of the options they had: heli, cat, and resort skiing, and as the trip played out, we were quite thankful. Basically, the trip left me spellbound, and I'm trying to pull together the pages and pages of notes I have into words that will actually do the terrain, the scenery, the skiing, and the whole area some justice. It was incredible in every sense of the word... so an enormous thanks to Owens, our guides, pilots, and everyone up there who helped this happen. Now to the trip:
I've never been to Alaska, I was pretty giddy with anticipation on the flight up. My neck actually hurt after the flight from craning to see mountains out the window as we approached the Kenai. Shrouded in clouds, peaks barely edged out, but they were amazing. The clouds cleared approaching Anchorage, and the sun created this cool prism effect off the plane window on the mist over the water:
Not 20 minutes off the plane and Tom's friend had us at the Great Alaskan Bush Company. An Anchorage must-see apparently, although the 4pm, Monday afternoon strippers were probably not their best girls (I hope). Continuing on to Girdwood, the sun faded away, and the clouds and fog set in.
We were hoping to fly Tues-Sat and check out some of the new Seward terrain that Owens got, then stay through Tues night to ski Alyeska and some backcountry. The weather had other plans.
We awoke to dripping water out the window, and I didn't need my contacts to know that the weather wasn't good. 5 minutes later and vision clear, I saw it was far worse.
Waves of rain blew past the window, and in spite of the safety briefing and avy beacon work, it was clear that we weren't going anywhere. The snow phone made clear that it was snowing up high though, and there was some accumlation, so we got on the first tram at 10:30 (you Alaskans have it nice on powder mornings).
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