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Thread: AK
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05-06-2017, 11:00 AM #1features a sintered base
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AK
Worked on it for 20 years and finally made it happen this year. Heli-trip in AK (hat tip to unnamed maggot for setting me up with the right operation, and thanks to those in my group for most of these images). April 15-22, Points North Heli.
First view of AK:
Home for the next week:
Nice sunset provided a sense of the calm before the upcoming storm.
Ski day 1:
We got on it from run 1--got lucky with the (and talked my way into the) good group and incredible guide (guide and part of the group had been together the previous year). When I saw where we were first landing, and that the heli's skids were hanging into space on that first landing I could hardly believe it (but by the end of the day it would be routine).
We had sun every day, and while it hadn't snowed for about a week when we arrived (and it didn't snow while I was there) every day we got everything from excellent, wintry boot deep powder to perfect spring corn (and everything in between, including wind-blown hard pack, light breakable crust, etc.). Not completely 'charge it' conditions, but really ideal for skiing some big, steeper lines.
Scale a little tough to tell, but this does something to show it (sorry for crappy filming--no viewfinder (screen instead) makes filming in light tough):
Day 2:
Got to ski this middle ramp:
Skied past some pretty stuff:
And got to ski down to this amazing glacial terminus:
Day 3 started with yet another oddball landing with the heli still in a hover so we could ski this
Something over 3000 vert, 52 degrees at the top and 48 through the middle.
Getting in took a little doing:
Everybody skiing pretty gingerly through this part--no one wanted to take a tumble here:
But able to open it up lower down:
Out of the chunder and onto the apron:
Day 4 opened with the hairiest landing yet--full hover, neither skid even touching the snow, just the nose toed in so we could ski this:
But first, some housekeeping--digging out the LZ in case other groups might come through and knocking down some cornice (it turned out we only dug it out for ourselves for the following day when we would ski the other side):
We skied down later to this scenic spot and had lunch there:
All of which led to skiing this beast; the line of the trip.
A closer view of the top of it:
It took our group a solid hour to ski this. There was definitely even more than the usual amount of nervous energy surrounding this one, but I didn't really appreciate it until we got to the last, easy pitch before the pick-up zone and our guide, who had been consistently cool and unperturbed until then, exclaimed, "I can't believe I fucking took you guys down that!" as the last skier came in. Top was a set of very steep spines, then skiing a steep, open pitch of about 1000 vert over some exposure, before making our way through some scary seracs at the bottom. There had been a lot of chatter on the radio about not making any turns through the bottom part with the seracs, but I didn't fully get it until I was below them:
The ride back in that afternoon was a lot quieter than usual as the adrenaline ebbed and everyone slowly came to terms with the descent we had just skied. I would find out later that it's not considered a 'client' route and that one of the other helicopters had been told to stay put nearby while we skied the line, just in case.
Day 5 would include some corn harvesting:
But also some more wintry skiing:
Last edited by Dexter Rutecki; 05-06-2017 at 01:52 PM.
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05-06-2017, 01:25 PM #2
Sweet TR. Love AK.
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05-06-2017, 02:43 PM #3features a sintered base
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cont.
One last, new big line that we actually skied twice.
Attachment 205765
Here, on the way up to it, if you watch the last second you can see the ridiculous, postage stamp LZ:
Hopping the berguschrund down lower:
Attachment 205766
The bergschrund in question:
And we went back to get one we had skied a few days earlier, which now didn't seem nearly as steep as it originally had (it all becomes pretty relative after a few days of this stuff).
A few random videos:
Last edited by Dexter Rutecki; 05-06-2017 at 03:15 PM.
[quote][//quote]
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05-06-2017, 03:46 PM #4
Sweet TR! Thanks for sharing.
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05-06-2017, 04:37 PM #5
Good stuff man.
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05-06-2017, 06:54 PM #6
Dude, nice - really nice.
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05-06-2017, 07:29 PM #7
Sick Bird! Fuck yeah is right.
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05-06-2017, 07:41 PM #8
congrats!
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05-06-2017, 08:22 PM #9
Seriously...that's a lifetime of amazing photos and videos! Good on ya!
It makes perfect sense...until you think about it.
I suspect there's logic behind the madness, but I'm too dumb to see it.
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05-06-2017, 08:43 PM #10
Wow, memorable trip!!!
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05-07-2017, 12:30 PM #11Registered User
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So fucking good bud!
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05-07-2017, 01:25 PM #12
congratulations on catching one of the best weeks of a horrible season. Kevin was wrong when he told me no steep lines would get skied this season. Glad you got to prove him wrong.
off your knees Louie
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05-13-2017, 07:02 AM #13Registered User
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Wow
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05-14-2017, 11:26 PM #14Registered User
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Well. Fucking. Done!
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05-15-2017, 07:19 AM #15
Very nice!
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05-16-2017, 11:30 PM #16
I would sell my soul to KSL for a week like that!
"The skis just popped me up out of the snow and I went screaming down the hill on a high better than any heroin junkie." She Ra
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05-17-2017, 02:14 AM #17Mike Pow
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Awesomeness. Worth the wait
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05-17-2017, 05:14 AM #18
Just like magic mt
Great trip
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06-04-2017, 06:08 AM #19features a sintered base
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Thanks all of you--and to be honest, as good as it looks in the pics/vids, they don't even do the experience justice.
It would be worth it.
Yeah, just like it. That's a problem that I am confident I have the will to ignore.
Pretty sure he was as surprised as everyone was--although I believe they may have only had around 15 'up' days for the entire (10 week) season. I started talking to PNH in December or early January, and when I checked in in February I got an unbelievably bad report which included (verbatim, I believe), "All I can tell you is stay away from Alaska right now." After looking like it would be a complete wash I got completely, incredibly lucky for what turned out to be probably the only week I could've gone.
Bottom line on all of this is that it's so unbelievably good that I would advise anyone who really wants to ski big lines to get the hell up there. Really can't say it strongly enough--if you like that kind of skiing I'm just not sure there is anything better, or possibly even compares.[quote][//quote]
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06-04-2017, 06:39 AM #20Registered Undead
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Well done. Thanks for posting!
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06-04-2017, 06:41 AM #21features a sintered base
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So, kind of ran out of time and then forgot about this after posting, but wanted to put up one last part--the last day, my only non-fly day (we were worked from the previous days and had already had to purchase more fly time, which for me included a call to my cc company to raise my credit limit and a phone call home advising the wife that we would be unable to make any more purchases that month as additional Jet A had already accounted for all our cash).
At the town museum (this is Cordova which is on Prince William Sound, site of the Exxon Valdez disaster), the "Shame Pole," which includes illustrations of dead animals and the Exxon CEO.
Also in the museum, the only bear I saw up there, to my disappointment (have done better in NH):
Then off to the town glacier:
And with that it was on the milk route plane through some small AK towns, Juneau (smaller town than I thought), to red eye it through Seattle, Chicago, and finally LGA.
Big bonus: car was still on the random corner in Queens where I had left it and had not even been fucked with (this time).
That's all, folks. Seriously, get yourselves up there. Mortgage the house, sell the kids, pimp out the pets, whatever. You will not regret going.
Last edited by Dexter Rutecki; 06-04-2017 at 06:53 AM.
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06-05-2017, 07:51 AM #22
Right on man! Glad you could nail it, thanks for the TR!
“I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country
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This is OUR mountain - come join us!
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06-06-2017, 06:04 AM #23Registered User
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FKNA
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06-06-2017, 11:32 PM #24glocal
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Really glad to see you made the trip, Dex.
FKNA indeed!!!
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08-12-2017, 07:43 PM #25
Dex, you lucky fucker!
I was there for week 6 and the entire crew got SHUT OUT. We did get to ski Eyak and go ice-caving in a snowstorm, but we spent most of the week at the Reluctant.
It was nice on training day, but snowed and rained the rest of the week. Raining when we got on the plane on Saturday.
Your pics and videos are fantastic but painful to watch
(A unique pic - a bonfire on a snow beach on the Orca Inlet)Last edited by bucbanzai; 08-15-2017 at 03:57 PM.
Me, I want to live with my feet in Dixie
and my head in the cool blue North
- Jimmy Buffet (Nothin' but a breeze)
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