Shames - little hole in the wall near Terrace BC
This obscure ski hills averages 40 feet of snow a year. Not a big deal in itself. I live in the Coast Mountains in SW BC where that's a reasonable snow pack.
I'm a bit jaded though and have had the good fortune of having seen big terrain in North America (travels through my home province of British Columbia, visiting the Canadian Rockies etc.).
However, this resort serving a population of about 20,000 people (if one were to be generous) is smack-dab in the middle of the most stunning readily accessible terrain I've ever had the fortune of seeing.
Apologies in advance for the huge panoramic photos. Nothing else will do justice to the grandeur and sweep. Take your time to let the photos load.
To give one a sense of scale, the surrounding mountains are "only" about 1800m to 2000m high.
Shames resort boundaries start at about 650m and extend to about 1050m. The resort occupies less then 10% of their tenure
From the resort entrance you can see the Fay-zurs Chutes. They are about a 120m vertical climb with skins and a 600m run back to the bottom chairlift
http://www.leelau.net/2009/centralbc...meIMG_7049.jpg
This is the view from the resort's highest lift - a T-bar
http://www.leelau.net/2009/centralbc...owerskinup.jpg
From The Dome (1440m) you can look W to an endless series of bowls. The smallest bowl in the background is Thunder Bowl, which is what we skied today.
Thunder Bowl is about the size of Flute Bowl (which is a large'ish sized bowl by Whistler standards. Geronimo Bowl is twice the size of Thunder and Super Bowl is twice as big as Geronimo.
I counted 12 named bowls in the tenured area and another 9 bowls off the tenured area dropping back to the ski-hill access road. A busy day in Shames sees about a 100 skiers; the math is pretty staggering.
http://www.leelau.net/2009/centralbc...bonerbowls.jpg
I should emphasize that this is the slackcountry accessible terrain off Shames. A one-way backcountry access ticket will run you $ 10. To give a sense of scale, getting to Thunder Bowl is a bit less then 2 hours.
Getting to Super Bowl would be more in the 3 to 3.5 hour range. A heli-drop at the top of Super Bowl would cost you $80.
None of this touches on the touring on the other side of the valley; which the locals have named "Happy Valley" as a counterpoint to the "Valley of Certain Doom" - a name bestowed on the hanging slidepath valleys west of Shames by magazine writer Les Anthony.
http://www.leelau.net/2009/centralbc...rbowlviews.jpg
I'll be writing a full-featured article about Shames and its access. I just got pretty stoked working on these shots so thought I would share them.