Bootpacking at Kicking Pass Mountain Resort.Reuben Krabbe
"I made the team again!" J.F. Labrecque says as he joins a dozen bipedal creatures curiously walking down a steep, snowy alpine mountainside in quizzical zigzags.
The dreadlocked, four-season veteran of Kicking Horse Mountain Resort's (KHMR) volunteer bootpacking crew doesn't have skis on his feet, but instead slings them over his shoulder in a slow trudge downhill. To the uninitiated, it looks puzzling. But to locals from Golden, B.C., it's a coveted preseason ritual with a waiting list of 60.
Starting in early November every year, KHMR's patrol works with two volunteer groups to litter its expansive alpine bowls with footsteps before the mountain opens. It's a practice that helps break up problematic early season layers in the snow-pack, stabilizes the base and keeps precious storm layers from peeling off the ridges. For passionate skiers such as Labrecque, it's a way to get in shape, get above the clouds in the Purcell Mountains and bask in the high-alpine bounty that's often deep and fluffy well before opening. The reward is a few untouched, private powder runs each day, delivered under the watchful eye of the ski patrol, who act as guides.
"It's almost like cat skiing," Labrecque says as he loads back into the heated cabin of a Bombardier 275 snowcat for another ride back up high. (Cat skiing is backcountry skiing accessed by a snowcat rather than helicopter or lift.) He adds that some years are leaner than others, but not this one. KHMR was already measuring 50 centimetres in its weather plot at the base of the alpine by mid-October. Then a warm front around Halloween squashed that down and formed a temperature crust. Shortly thereafter, a new system deposited another 80 centimetres on top. That's the wallowy mess the bootpackers are cycling back up to punch through in a feverish push on this day.
"We're in a unique climatic region," mountain safety supervisor Kyle Hale explains, "and we're also unique in the amount of avalanche terrain we have. … If we don't do this aggressively in November, we'll end up with problems later."
What Hale's talking about is the "conterior" snow-pack – a combination of continental (everything east of Golden) and interior (everything west of Golden, until the Coast Range) conditions. So while the equally alpine-breaching resorts in the Rockies also employ bootpacking as an avalanche-management technique, they typically get fewer early, intense snowfalls, and are able to use their own staff for the task. On the coast, what falls is deeper, heavier and moister; bonding well and breaking down far less in the milder temperatures. So coast locations altogether don't need bootpacking.
But what's most uncommon about KHMR's bootpacking program is the distinct relationship it relies upon with the small community at the foot of the mountain's evergreen apron. A familiar cast of experienced Goldenites routinely fills the volunteer roster by September. Some are ex-patrollers, some are guides in training, others are just well-known, accomplished mountain folk.
"Our crew is almost entirely repeat people," Hale says. "One of the requirements is that they have an avalanche-safety-training course and all their own safety equipment." Golden, in particular, he says, has a high population of people in that category. "That's a big part of our skiing clientele."
Labrecque, for his part, confirms that getting up here early lets him "feel the snow," giving him a sense of what's going to be supporting him for the coming season in the adventurous terrain he loves most.
"It's looking great," he says, clicking into his skis for the day's ultimate payoff. "I think just one or two more good dumps and it'll be good top to bottom!" At this point in the season, snow has been falling consistently, and the bootpackers have been working hard to earn their turns.
KHMR is scheduled to open Dec. 8, but may announce an earlier "preview" weekend; stay tuned.