Don Pattison - Scribe

Originally published in Couloir Magazine - April/May 1993

The Mount Rainer National Park ranger was on a long phone call, at the info desk, and ski film star Mike Hattrup still hadn't shown up. My brother, Pete, was outside Paradise Lodge headquarters banging on the steering wheel of his van so it was up to me to sign up for the climb. Registering for a climb shouldn't take this long, but it was relatively short considering I’ve waited many years to climb and ski Fuhrer Finger on Rainier and few more minutes wouldn't hurt.

The three of us had planned to meet in this parking lot on that May afternoon in 1992 to pack up for the climb. A road closure and held up Mike, coming from Seattle, but Pete and I had driven early from Portland on dawn patrol. We sorted our gear and argued, as only brothers can. The down side of ski mountaineering is that you have to pack the same basic gear for a weekend that is necessary for a month give or take the weight of food and fuel. The up side is that if this climb went like last year our party could wait-out three storm days in comfort. After Mike arrived we packed and left Paradise snow-park under a clear blue sky with good corn snow underfoot. This year the weather, and maybe those fickle mountain gods and goddesses, were with us.

Pete and Mike had their alpine boots and skis on their packs and walked up the Nisqually glacier in mountaineering boots. I cruised ahead on telemark gear with climbing skins, knowing the pay off for their stout gear would come higher up on the mountain when stability mattered.

Our camp would be on Kautz Ridge. We marked crevasses, along the route with wands, just in case we faced a wideout while skiing down. As the rosey rim of sunset blew a harsh wind from the west we pitched tents and crawled inside. The wind and rattling nylon disturbed my sleep allowing time for reflection on the finer points of this pastime.

Extreme or adventure skiing, like free solo rock climbing or steep creek kayaking, is at the terminus of the sport. The “if you fall you die” school of extreme skiing or snowboarding doesn't have a large enrollment or large alumni. Although skiers may occasionally find themselves in some extreme situations, prolonged exposure to the steep and nasty certainly decreases the odds of survival. When the ski gambler ups the ante by skiing a committing route or something no one else has skied before, the payoff is a large rush. A washout, however, could mean injury or death. The definition of extreme skiing? Let's just say it's a natural expansion of a skiers comfort zone and an extension of human curiosity.

We awoke tired and a little later than we should have. Sages say it's better to climb in the firm snow of early morning and wait on the top for the route for snow softened by the sun, than to climb in the heat of the spring sun. But, firm snow can be a polite term for ice, however. Luckily, our crampons stuck like darts on a board as we climbed, unroped, through crevasses into the chute of Fuhrer’s Finger. To those unfamiliar with sizing up slopes from a distance this couloir looks nearly vertical not to mention narrow from the parking lot of Paradise Lodge. To a skier, with trained eyes and confident feet, the corridor formed by the old lava of Rainier isn't as steep and narrow upon close inspection.

I kicked hypnotic steps upward, occasionally looking over my shoulder at the grandeur of Mt. Hood, Adams and St Helens, to the south, rising above the quilt of clear-cuts and forest. Where the top of the chute and the Nisqually icefall meet, we dropped our packs and began the ritual of preparing for the descent. Concentrating on tight boots, bindings, helmet, goggles, and pole straps, I attempted to calm paranoid thoughts that swirled from my head to my stomach.

My first jump turn was shaky and ugly, but I soon found a staccato rhythm. The relaxation of total focus may be a contradiction, but it takes over after you've committed to the objective. While the negative side of fear stiffens, the positive side heightens awareness for survival and focuses the mind. When the muscle memory of a million ski turns takes over, a skier can relax and enjoy themselves. We leapfrog turns down the 45° slope, avoiding slush sluffs, exposed rocks and a runnel down the gut of the chute.

A long, speedy traverse and some tight turns on the ridge brought us back to camp, where we drank much-needed water and gazed back up. The route was now etched with our ski tracks, gleaming in the afternoon sun. It had been worth the wait to put them there.

Originally published in Off-Piste Magazine - Spring - 2001

The tight contour lines didn't look like a vertical ice wall on the topo map. My mind’s eye fantasize them into a nice 45° snow slope topped with smooth corn snow. Perhaps it could include a crevasse-free rollover where hero turns could be made in the warm midnight sun. But instead the headwall of the Esatok glacier, on the south side of Mount Michelson in Alaska's Brooks Range, looked like an ice cube tray standing on end. The first flakes of snow we're peppering the June day as we gazed up at this blue wall. Since daytime last 24 hours in the Arctic June, time was on our side put a plan B to the summit would have to be arranged.

When climber/writer John Harlin proposed the idea of doing the first ski descent of Mt Michelson (8.855 ft) to me at a previous New Year's eve party, we were in good spirits and the whole multi-sport aspect had a new-way-to-do-an-old-thing feel to it. He said we could fly to Fairbanks and then north to Arctic Village, hop a bush plane to the headwaters of the Hulahula river (named by homesick Hawaiian whalers not eskimos) in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, raft to the base of the mountain, climb and ski it and raft out to the Arctic Ocean for a pick up by bush plane. He also said forget your headlamp but bring your bug juice and bear spray.

John had been to the Brooks Range and climbed its highest peak, Mount Chamberlin (9020 ft), as a teenager and had always wanted to return. I was working for an outdoor clothing company and needed a break. Our understanding families said okay but be careful, like they usually did, and the trip took shape. Fellow Oregonian, Todd Wells and an old family friend of John's from Munich, Germany, Konrad Kirch, would round out our foursome. Although Konrad was 65 years old John vouched for his abilities on the mountain and river, and in retrospect he wasn't mistaken. Conrad, a semi-retired lawyer with Siemens corporation had time, money and skill - three valuable ingredients for wilderness adventure - no matter what your age.

In June of 2000 we made our way to Fairbanks and waited to depart north in a series of fixed wing aircraft that kept getting smaller. The eskimo kid, sitting next to me on the flight to the town of Arctic Village must have felt worse than me. I’d had a fun night in a Fairbanks twilight the prior night but he must have embedded more. Reeking of booze and puking in the bag I gave him, he wasn’t helping my stomach or the flight much. But high over the flat interior landscape of Alaska did helped me focus and adjust to the majestic beauty unfolding.

Two bush planes were filled to capacity at the crusty Arctic Village airport and we endured the bumpy flight north, we circled the river, scaring a few caribou, landed on a gravel bar and unloaded. Carefully packing two 14 ft rafts and methodically assembling a collapsible sea kayak we finally stepped off the muddy bank and drifted north on the milky river. Keeping the crafts in the correct braided channel without beaching them on sand bars, was the ongoing contest cheers and laughter were dished out to the less fortunate. Two days on the braided and shallow River what us at Kolotuk creek, where we made camp and sorted ski gear on the golf course smooth tundra. We also deflated our rafts so curious grizzly bears wouldn't turn them into beach toys. Fully loaded for ski mountaineering, we hiked up the foothills in the late evening sun. we could see Mount Chamberlain, surrounding peaks to the north, and the Arctic Ocean.

We stood on top of Mount Michelson long enough for snacks and photos, in milk bottle visibility but not quite a full blizzard. Clipping on our skis, we slid into the 50° top of Crag Rat couloir, name for the mountain rescue group Todd, John and I belong to back in Hood River, Oregon. We could've called it “lost Ptex” couloir just as well, from the base gouges inflected. Swinging jump turns and side-stepping got us down the thin coverage and exposed rock. Luckily, there was no chance of an avalanche because there wasn't enough snow to start one. The last five telemark turns in the deeper isometric puss took us to the bottom were the best turns of the trip. Unfortunately, we skied roped down the lower glacier, back to camp, through crevasse fields, which is a lot like playing crack-the-whip with your buddy. Todd and I could hardy wait to get the rope off and bounce turns down the harmless cracks near camp.

The remainder of the trip was spent cruising the Hulahula on a Club Med schedule. We had a crack of 10 am wake up with riverbank coffee in the morning sun, 7-8 hours of easy paddling, happy hour and fishing for no fish from 8 to 9 pm, dinner, and in bed by 2 am. There were no arctic char or grayling fish in the river yet which sucked because we bought $50 fishing licenses on the Internet. But there were no mosquitoes which is a huge bonus an acceptable trade off for the lack of fresh fresh fish protein at mealtime. At the end of one whitewater rapids section, John and I finally found the limit of our sea kayak by dropping into a hole sideways and taking a swim in the 38 degree river water. Complicating this swim was having our feet stuck in our camera bag straps and, essentially, being bound to the upturned, water-logger craft bobbing down the current. But, averting death can be funny afterwards and we laughed on a gravel bar, in the warm arctic sun, afterwards.

Originally published in Rock and Ice Magazine - Nov./Dec 1988

We’ll climb that hill no matter how steep, when we get up to it - Bob Dylan

The six foot, slender luggage confused the Soviets from the get-go. They could have been weapons of mass-destruction but we looked like unlikely and harmless arms salesmen. In downtown Moscow, we got hard stares from the locals, and they confered in small comrade conferences about us and the ski bags. Moscovites don't see many skiers carrying ski bags walking around town. On the eve of Perestroika we were headed to the Soviet Republic of Kyrgistan to ski down Peak Lenin, in the Pamir mountains, while the old empire crumbled . We had hard currency and they had hard snow in high, beautiful mountains.

In Moscow, the city where every other car looks like a ’66 Ford Falcon, Jimmy Katz, Paul Peterson, Lance Makowski and I assembled to go skiing in a non-skiing country. We had come to the USSR from various parts of the USA and were linked by the common need to climb mountains, and then ski down them on three-pin telemark gear. We found ourselves on the Fourth of July, 1988 hanging at the Moscow Sport Hotel, meeting an assortment of international climbers and preparing for the International Mountaineering Camp (IMC) in the Pamir. The only party to be had on that July 4th was the Communist Party, so escorted by our lovely interpreter Deena, we laid siege to the Kremlin with cameras, frisbees and giveaway American gifts.

An Aeroflot jet carried us south over the flat, interior countryside to the southern city of Osh, in Kyrgyzstan. I was reminded of long flights from Chicago to LA; where I left the humid and staid interior for the dry air and colorful southern latitude. A butt-bruising, eight hour, school bus ride, through the desert landscape, carried us up river canyons to base camp. Rows of canvas tents awaited us, laid out neatly on the plush, alpine carpet. Walling in the valley to the south were the north faces of Peak Lenin and Peak of the 19th Congress, resembling a porcelain curtain in the moonlight. I thought of the tragic summer of 1974 when 15 people, including one American, died on these mountains in an earthquake triggered avalanche. The peaks appeared calm on that first evening and my sleep was only disrupted by Paul's nightly snoring.

In the crisp morning air and bright mountain sunlight we slapped high-fives and gazed at 10,000 vertical feet of terrain on the north face Peak Lenin. A good-looking gully near the summit was quickly named Commie Couloir. With a solid ski buzz established we began sorting gear, packing our hippie granola and their weird Russian canned goods, and generally acclimatizing to altitude with side hikes.

The Kyrgyz ethnic group, the largest in Kyrgyzstan, have historically been semi-nomadic herders, living in round tents called yurts and tending sheep, horses and yaks. This nomadic tradition continues to function seasonally as herding families return to the high mountain pastures in the summer. The family that lived near our camp were very friendly and invited us to to join them inside their yurt for some fermented mares milk and bread. The milk was a challenge to keep down but we tried to be good guests and smiled in appreciation. We had some candy for the kids and some Marlboros for the adults, and although not a healthy offering, it was very appreciated. The father was an excellent horseman and performed some tricks in the meadow after the meal.

When informed that our gear would be lifted to Camp 1 on a Russian ex-military Mi 8 helicopter, we said thanks with a hearty “spah-SEE-buh” and secretly wondered if they could spare some chopper time for afternoon corn heli-skiing. The big green birds also took climbers to the two other IMC camps at Moskvin and Fortambek where they can access Peak Communism (7495m), the highest peak in the USSR.

Base camp life centered around three solid meals served at the camp mess hall. Tables were assigned by country, but the big Bulgarian climber, Valentino, sat whereever he wanted. He liked us for our company as well as our Talking Heads tapes and Jack Daniels whiskey. Usual evening discussion, at the American table, centered around guessing what animal the meatballs might've come from and the weather forecast.

Peak Petrowski, at 14,000 feet on the ridgeline above base camp, was recommended by our coach Victor as a good warm-up ski/climb. Victor is a compact Soviet with a chrome grin from soviet dentistry, who teaches biology at the University of Leningrad in the winter and comes to the Pamir in the summer. He has limited knowledge of telemark skiing but had been to Alaska with a Soviet team to climb the Cassin ridge on Denali. He has a fondness for the US and its climbers. Victor espouses the Soviet acclimatization theory of going to the highest camp and then returning to base camp for R&R before going back for the summit. We penciled in an itinerary with him and the next morning climbed a gully leading to the top of Pietrovsky. The afternoon was spent popping turns down the sun softened “frog hair” towards the Achik Tash Valley. It was good to finally be skiing.

Hiking the white highway of the Lenin Glacier towards Camp One, two days later, we were taking a beating from the sun. Soupy fresh snow wasn't holding weight every step was a cold posthole. The terra firma scree field of camp one and dry socks were a relief.

The Soviets equipped us with a radio and our call name was the “Flexible Flyers”. Every evening we had “radio hour” for check-in. It was mildly comforting to recline, watch the alpenglow show and listen to a language we didn’t understand. The Soviets had two weather predictions; good and very good. It seemed optimism prevailed and we had clear skies the following day for some glacier skiing.

The good news about carrying skis while humping loads between camps is that you get to ski back down to a lower camp at days end, the bad news is that the skis seem to get heavier the higher you progress. After dropping a load of supplies at camp two and making long arcs on the windpacked, chalkboard down to Camp 1, other climbers looked longingly at our skis. Sympathy would replace envy, high on the ridge, when wind gusts would tug at the antler-like extensions above our packs.

Tent city at Camp 2 had its own American ghetto. A guided group from Mountain Trip and a couple from Bishop, CA were settled in with us. An international stew of Austrians, Swedes, French, Bulgarians and Russians kept to separate tent groupings. Three French skiers with alpine gear were also attempting the North Face and we exchanged information in broken translation while resting in the shade of the harsh mid-day sun. Camp 2 resided in a cirque protected from avalanches and rockwall, but not solar intensity. We had imported the wonderful protection of modern sunscreen with us, meanwhile the East Bloc climbers were reduced to wearing gauze face masks. We shared the valuable lotion in the spirt of international relations.

Climbing Razdelny Pass and up the Northwest Ridge required constant use of my Walkman. Reggae tunes seemed to work best for dislocating mind from body during the rest-step-rest climbing. But I was about to go over 20,000 ft in altitude, a personal record and it was affecting me. Paul and Lance were moving fast and would make Camp 3 and deposit their loads. Jimmy and I cached our extra gear on the ridge and got our first views of the rugged real estate to the south. The Hindu Kush and the Karakoram mountains stretched to the horizon in the largest panorama of mountains I’d ever seen.

As afternoon clouds encased us in a white-out, Jimmy and I punched jump turns in the breakable wind crust down from the pass. We have skied together all over the world but that day was a supreme effort without much oxygen. Anaerobic skiing takes a toll and after descending the 30-degree wall we flopped in the snow, breathing hard on the easier lower slope. Snowfall and wind seemed to be getting worse as we all met at Camp 2.

The next day we headed back up to Camp 3 and it was my birthday. I celebrated with many cups of soup and a handful of aspirin, trying to dislodge a thumping headache. Wind slammed our tents all night and dawn broke breezy and partly cloudy. Our crampons and self arrest poles bit the ice as we moved up the ridge. I could barely squeeze-off two pictures before a white-out was upon us. Soon the North Face was gone from view on our left, and we are looking at each other, dumb-struck and stupid from lack of oxygen. The roaring wind limited conversation; we nodded agreement that going to the true summit and skiing the North Face would be deadly now. Crevasses would be invisible and getting lost would be easy. Feeling trepidation and disappointment, our gang of four doubled back and skied the ridge back to lower ground.

Skiing a 7000m peak was only one of the reasons we went to the USSR that summer. While there are big mountains to ski all over this planet, the new political climate in the Reagan-era “evil empire” made visiting the crumbling USSR very appealing. Sitting in a Kyrgyz yurt, the dome shaped homes of the indigenous, nomadic people, drinking some fermented mare’s milk, and talking with our Soviet hosts, we found that you don't have to be George Schultz to achieve some common ground and be a diplomat. We traded some American climbing gear for their handmade titanium ice screws and all walked away happy.

Upon return, rain had turned the lush grass of Base Camp into a mud pit and small streams ran through our tents. Bad news also dampened the mood. An American friend had fallen on Peak Communism and was close to death in the local hospital. During the long bus ride away from the Pamir, I looked back on the white wall of Peak Lenin and began to feel less disappointed and more fortunate.

The big guy says he has a lot of stupid ideas. He can’t help it. They just come out, and he’ll talk about them in that flat Minnesota accent until you start thinking that they aren’t so stupid. Or he doesn’t talk about them, and they just grind away in his brain like big gears while he’s skinning uphill through powder snow or rigging up a sailboard or hauling ass down a dirt road on his motorcycle, and then they just appear. “Here, Donnie, check this out,” he’ll say as he drags me into his booth at the Winter Outdoor Retailer Show in his adopted hometown of Salt Lake City, Utah – and there will be a new, shiny thing perched on the table. It’s been like that every year since the early 1980’s. Voile Equipment, the company Mark Wariakois started and in which he is the majority owner, has been making simple, solid backcountry tools since 1980. Wally (as he’s generally known) has that classic American knack for visualizing what it would take for something to work better. Everything Voile Equipment sells is made in its factory in Salt Lake City, and Wally is a stickler for quality when it comes to the goods the company produces. I got to know Wally while telemark skiing in Utah in the 80’s, and we’ve undertaken numerous adventures since. He lives part-time in my hometown of Hood River, Oregon. He was lured there by windsurfing initially, but, like many residents, he dines at the year round recreation platter that Hood River offers. I recently caught up with Wally on the phone, and the following interview transpired.

Don Pattison (P): O.K., let’s go back to the beginning and the White Bear, Minnesota days. Did your dad teach you shop stuff? Did you pick it up in high school shop classes? How did you get started [with the machines]?

Wally Wariakois (W): My dad taught me a lot of stuff, but I was kind of naturally mechanically gifted. My grandpa had a machine shop and my dad had a machine shop; it goes all the way back to Poland. I got the mechanical gene!

P: So, was your grandfather born in Minnesota or did he immigrate there?

W: No, he immigrated there from Lithuania.

P: Did he have a machine shop in the Twin Cities?

W: Yeah, he had a shop in St. Paul.

P: How did you get into skiing and outdoor activities?

W: When I was a little kid I saw the Olympics on TV, and I had a pair of Northland skis. … Even before that I had a pair of wood skis with no edges that were my grandpa’s. I’d put those on and go down the hill in the back yard. That’s how I got my first runs. From there, kids in the neighborhood and I used a picnic table to make bigger launches and bigger jumps – just the normal stuff [laughter].

P: How did moving to Utah come about?

W: In the winter of ’72, I graduated from high school a year early and I wanted to do something. I bought an old van and fixed it up, had a little Suzuki dirt bike, and wanted to go out West. I had friends a year older than me that were going to the University of Utah. So, I wanted to go check it out. I heard there was good dirt biking out West, too. I came out in the spring, and, you know, pretty much had a heyday [laughter].

P: Did you have a job? Or were you just hanging out?

W: I had money saved up from painting houses in Minnesota and whatever else. I also worked at Whirlpool on the ice cube maker assembly line and made $7.50 an hour, which was good money back then.

P: What would you say was the official start date for Voile Equipment?

W: Nineteen seventy-nine, but I first came out here in 1972. [On that first trip] I just wanted to visit friends, and it was my first time away from Minnesota. The buddy I came out with knew a guy in Aspen that was building condos, and we went there, too. I lasted about two weeks, hauling lumber and being the low man on the totem pole, until I quit and got a job at Aspen Yamaha working for Vern Hill and Buddy Thompson. They let me work on bikes and took me down to Fort Collins to some dirt bike races.

P: When did you come back to Salt Lake City?

W: Well, I crashed a bike at one of the races and split my chin open from one side to the other. That was before they invented the full-face helmet [laughter]. So, I went back to White Bear and partied. I was going nowhere. But one day I was riding my bike over to a buddy’s house, and this guy had a funny thing set up in his front yard. It was a hang glider, and I was like, “Where did you get that thing?” He said he bought it from a guy in California. I got together $300 and bought a hang glider. I took it to some local hills and learned to fly the thing. And then I ended up going to Canada …and they had a little hang gliding meet there. I was flying my hang glider and I met a guy [Larry Newman, Lear jet pilot for Mohammed Ali and one of three pilots of the Double Eagle, a balloon that went around the world] from Albuquerque, New Mexico. He said, “If you ever need a job, come down.” That fall I went there and lived there for a few years. I worked for him [at Electric Flyer] and got a lot of experience setting up jigs and [doing] a lot of small manufacturing work. That was a pretty good education… But he didn’t want to pay me any more than $3 an hour. So, I was traveling around, selling hang gliders, and I came through Salt Lake City. I was flying with a bunch of guys in Utah when things fell apart in Albuquerque. The natural move was to … Salt Lake, not back to Minnesota. I moved here in the winter of ’76-’77, which, I think, was the worst winter on record.

P: Yeah, it was the same here in Oregon. I kayaked that whole winter and didn’t ski one day; it was terrible [laughter].

W: After practicing with my dad’s Sears air compressor and spray gun, I faked my way into a job at a body shop painting cars. The lady that ran the place thought I was great because when I started I was doing one to two cars a day, but by the end I was doing 10 to 15 a day. I made a bunch of money. I started framing houses and welding railings for shopping malls, but the topper was custom painting semi-trucks. I made more money at that, and that’s when I banged out the first pair of Voile plates. It was 1979. I went up to Alta and skied on them right around Thanksgiving, and then came down and bought myself a bottle of champagne because I knew I had something.

P: How did you get the idea for the plates, and how did you make them?

W: I did some body work on Dwight Butler’s [co-owner of Wasatch Mountaineering in Salt Lake City] VW Square Back, and he traded me a pair of Rossignol Caribou touring skis for the work. It was one of the first fiberglass cross-country skis. I had those and some Alfa boots, and I’d go up with Al Murphy. He taught me how to put a glob of red wax on, climb up, and ski this bowl behind Brighton. When I parallel turned, my boots twisted and … were coming off the side of the ski; it was bad. Charlie Butler [Dwight’s brother and the other co-owner of Wasatch Mountaineering] showed me this Eiser binding and the light bulb when on. I made a plastic plate that went underneath a three-pin and attached it to the boot heel with some old door springs and the heel lever off of an old Besser binding. That was my first set of cobbled together Voile plates. When I went to Alta, it was like night and day. I was just ripping, and my feet were just locked down to the skis. In the spring of 1980, I quit working at the body shop, found this old warehouse for $300 a month, and we started building plates.

P: Who was “we”? Who were your first employees?

W: Me and Dwight and Charlie were Wasatch Mountaineering, at the time. We used the shop name so we could buy stuff on credit. Charlie and I went down to Vegas [for the annual Ski Industry of America trade show] with the first Voile plate in a black briefcase with a handcuff on it. We walked into the ski show kind of like the Blues Brothers and showed it to one of the managers at Rossignol. He had it in his sales booth, and Locke and Randy [from Marmot] saw it and ordered 300 pairs. So [laughter], Charlie and I were like, “We’re in business.” That night at the opening party we were walking around and overheard people talking about the Voile plate. We were just laughing [laughter]. We went back and built 20 pairs of plates, put them on 20 pairs of Rossignol Randonees [an early telemark ski], and went to the Copper Mountain demo in our old green Chevy van. We slept in the van in the parking lot. It was like zero out, and we demoed Voile plates on the hill. That’s how it all started.

P: By the time the guys I knew in Salt Lake City started working for you, it was 1985 and you were still doing Voile plates, but what else did you build?

W: Well, Charlie Sturgis [owner of White Pine Touring in Park City, Utah] came by and showed me a Sears shovel and suggested it would make a really good avalanche shovel. I went down to Sears and bought a bunch of them, and I was thinking, “How could I make this thing better?” The first thing we did was to chop the blade down and round the corners. It had a jam-fit handle we tossed, and I took an aluminum tube, learned how to swedge it, put pop-buttons in it, and that was our second product. Then Charlie [Butler] said, “We have to build a cheaper alternative to climbing skins.” So, we stretched out some soft plastic, and, using a wood carving kit, Charlie started carving patterns in it. Then we tied it on some skis and tried it. And it worked! It slid forward and gripped when moved back. So, then we figured out how extrusion worked and how electronic welding worked. The first Snake Skins had Velcro straps to hold them on the ski, and those didn’t work because of edge cutting. We extruded a plastic ribbon and welded it on the skin. The ladder lock buckles would slip, so I came up with a cam buckle that worked. And we extruded a bunch of plastic webbing, in a lot of colors, and made belts.

P: [Laughter] I think I still have one of those.

W: If you need more, I still have some [laughter]. We phased out the Voile plate and Snake Skins probably eight years ago, but they had a good run. One of my best ideas was the Voile strap that reversed the buckle on a standard belt buckle, put holes in a flexible plastic strap, and when you tightened it down it was just bomber. We sold some to Merrell for the Super Comp boot.

P: Yeah, pink ones, in the 80’s, baby!

W: Yeah, so the next thing was, I was riding up the chair at Targhee and [I] see this guy skiing down on a pair of Besser bindings and the light bulb went off again because people were telling me, “You’ve got to make a releasable [telemark] binding.” I saw that Besser and called the guys who distributed them out of South Carolina and started buying up their stock and re-rigging them for telemark bindings. Because people were using “pickle barrel” reinforcements on tele boots and racing and tweaking their knees, there was a lot of demand for a releasable. The Norwegians bought a bunch of them right away because of that problem. Eventually, I bought twenty or thirty thousand of those barrels from Besser, and when it came to the end and they ran out, I gave them $20,000 for the molds, patent, and everything.

P: Did you move production to Salt Lake City?

W: Yeah, we shaved off the “Besser” on the barrel molds, put on “Voile,” and kept selling them. But that started a nightmare for me because my molder was clueless [about] cold weather nylon, and it was cheap nylon and nowhere [near] as good as Besser nylon. The first couple years the binding would release and the piston would shoot right out the end of the barrel. It was like, trial and error, but you’ve got to research plastics and figure out what works.

P: So that takes us to the late 80’s. What was going on then?

W: Yeah, I was fighting the popularity of the Riva binding [Chouinard Equipment’s three-pin binding], and a guy from Jackson, Wyoming, was also putting a heel bail on them. It was killing the sales of the Voile plate. So, that’s when I came up with the idea of the heel spring, the heel lever, and the hooks that connected them. The cable gave you the resistance and the more “active” feel. Plus, you could drop the cable for climbing and lose the resistance. So, to date, I think the three-pin cable has outsold any other telemark binding.

P: Yeah, that binding was great because you could use different cable tensions and get more push on a tele ski for the first time – really lever the ski tip.

W: I think my heyday was about ‘95 or ‘96. One winter we sold 8,000 pairs of Voile cables and it was great. … By then it was the mid-‘90’s and the split board had fired up, and that was a whole new deal.

P: When did you start snowboarding?

W: It was probably in the winter of ’95. I was introduced to Brett Kobernic, another Midwestern tinkerer, and we cobbled together the first splitboards. I figured I should learn how to snowboard. So I made the proto and put two pairs of ski skins on it, hiked up Immigration [Canyon above Salt Lake City], put the thing together, and pointed it down. And, it was like, “O.K., I’m going to start snowboarding.” We had a bunch of demos we built up, and when I was at the demo in Bend, Oregon, I took one of the demos up that bunny hill and carved some turns and figured it out.

P: Jeez, and now the split board is everywhere. You license it out to other companies, you have kits where people cut their boards in half, and then you have your own boards.

W: Yeah, we have the poor boy setup for your do-it-yourselfers. We license with a bunch of companies, and we have the stuff we’re making now.

P: What about building product in the U.S.A.?

W: Yeah, I want to get to that, but I want to go back, for a second, because you were asking me about other “stupid ideas” I’ve had – because there are a couple things that I haven’t really gotten credit for. In the early days of windsurfing, all of the masts were one-piece – a 16-foot or 17-foot fiberglass tube. People started going out in the waves, pushing the limits, and these masts would snap off, right at the boom. So, with my knowledge of swedging aluminum from working up the shovel, we swedged these tubes down, so if you broke your mast out in the ocean, you could jam this thing in both sides and have an instant repair. It turned out to be the ferrule that all two-piece masts use today. The other thing was that Charlie [Butler] and I made the first plastic telemark boot.

P: Really?

W: Yeah, I’ve got a picture of it, and we called it the A-boot – from the A-Team TV show, pity the fool. We made a hundred pairs. I was working with Merrell on a mid-sole which we made out of thin Voile Plate plastic, a kind of built-in stiffener that added torsion to the boots, and they were working on a low-top touring boot that had a glue-on Vibram sole. I knew this guy from Minnesota, Oley Olson, who invented the Rollerblade, and he had these shells that he was using. It was an ice skate boot. Rod from Merrell got us some shells from Roces in Germany. So, we got these Merrell Moon Walker soles that fit these shells perfectly, and we researched adhesives, and man, it was deadly. You had to open up all the windows [when gluing]! But this was three to four years before the first plastic tele boot was on the market. But we didn’t any get credit for it.

P: Well, you will now because it’s in print [laughter]! So, of all your “stupid ideas,” what has been your all-time favorite?

W: The Voile strap. It’s the most universal strap in the world. All the snowshoe and skin skin-tail straps have come from this idea.

P: What is your best advice to your son?

W: Well, it’s a famous Wallyism: “Don’t let the dog know you’re scared or he’ll bite you.” I figured that out one day, and it’s gotten me through life. I was down in Birchwood (it’s an area where I grew up), and it was summertime, with buddies goofing around, and they dared me to walk all the way around the hockey rink on top of the side boards – a two inch-wide topper that was bolted on. It was a pretty good balancing act, and most people would get part way around before falling off, but it’s confidence that gets you through. It ties right into climbing, and hang gliding, and surfing, and anything else where you expose yourself to risk. You can’t let that fear rise up for one instant. It’s like when you’re dropping in on a big avalanche chute – you can’t let the dog know you’re scared. If you’re confident, you can do it.

P: So you’ve been doing it and figured out how to make a living doing it. What’s your take on making a small business go in the U.S.A.?

W: I’ll tell you how I got my inspiration, O.K.? Are you ready? When I was a little kid and was supposed to be reading a book, I would look at catalogs – Sears, Ward’s, Cabela’s, or whatever – and research products. When I got older, I’d call people on the phone and ask questions. I’d see materials and then think about what would be cool to make out of those materials. It was like in reverse, you know – find the materials first. So, the first breakthrough was this thing called the Thomas Register, which was an A to Z giant manufacturing encyclopedia with every manufacturer in the country. I would find people to make stuff for me, and I would find used equipment to buy for pennies on the dollar. I’d find presses and machines and rebuild them. I’d pay cash. I don’t know if this is possible any more, but we bought them and had zero debt. I mean, we had rent and electricity to cover, but we didn’t have giant machines to go into debt over.

P: So now you’re building skis and snowboards. How’s that going?

W: Oh, it’s going great, you know. Every pitfall we’ve had, we’ve turned into a beneficial thing. We got dropped, a few years back, by our Canadian ski core manufacturer.

P: Wood cores?

W: Yeah, so we thought it would be “game over.” But with the help of some people and some innovation, we found a router and are making our own cores now.

P: So you’re running presses and making snowboards and skis?

W: Yeah, we bought European presses that were made for Rossignol. They’re old, but super overbuilt presses.

P: How many boards or skis can you lay up in a day?

W: Oh, in a good week we’ll turn out 60 or 75 boards or pairs of skis. It’s a pretty time-consuming thing. It’s really custom stuff, like shaping surfboards or making guitars. It’s all hand labor … a craftsmanship type thing. We don’t have machines doing everything. If we wanted to, we could buy more presses, get a bigger building, [and] double the crew, but we’d rather just make enough to cover orders for the winter. But the process we use is pretty interesting and unusual, and there are a lot of people in the industry that wonder how I do it [laughter]. A lot of it is good material. We get the aspen [for wood cores] from northern Michigan, and it’s kiln-dried. It’s dried down to less than four percent moisture. Aspen isn’t used in heavy-duty racing skis, but it’s been used in skis and snowboards forever. It’s a light-weight wood like pine, but it’s really tenacious and has a tough, stringy, long grain. You combine aspen with carbon fiber and epoxy, and you can’t beat it.

P: Well, your skis and boards are pretty specialized. They are really made for backcountry use where weight is so important.

W: Yeah.

P: Anything else you’d like to say before my phone battery dies?

W: Well, you were asking me if I felt optimistic about the future of the outdoor industry.

P: Yeah, what do you think?

W: I think there are other people out there like me, and the next cool sport is right around the corner. People are always going to be interested in going outdoors and doing stuff. You have to have a passion, and people who are passionate about the outdoors and movement and gravity are going to come up with stuff. Like kiteboarding – that sprang up, and it’s one of the hottest sports going.

P: Could you explain the “Wally Wiggle”?

W: I think it’s a Minnesota technique that isn’t recognized by the Austrian Ski Instructors Association [laughter].

P: Did you guys bring that to the Wasatch or what? I mean, you kind of ignored the telemark turn.

W: Well, the first wooden skis were so wimpy that a lot of people paralleled on them because the snow here is so light and deep that with your feet together you could get better floatation, and you would just wiggle down the hill. They called it the “Wasatch Wiggle,” and my technique just came out of that. The only time we used a telemark [turn] was in a bail-out or rescue turn, or … on the run-out. Telemarking on the steeps didn’t really get invented ‘til guys like Chris Erickson started jumping up and down at Alta and doing a reverse-parallel, which was what a steep telemark [turn] really was. One time, Charlie Butler and I were skiing in Colorado and a lady came up and said, “You boys look like you are genuflecting.” We laughed.

P: Exactly.

W: Because the first telemark turns were used on the flats, and it was really a low-angle turn.

P: Yeah, the platform you get from … parallel [technique] in powder is where it’s at, and as wider skis came around it takes us to where we are today.

W: I think telemarking might phase out with all the people going to AT, but you know, in the history of the planet earth, no one person will have made more different telemark bindings than I have. Life is like the Wizard of Oz, you have to thank and be grateful for all the people who help you along the way, because in the end, there is no place like home, and it wouldn’t be home without friends

The best things in a man’s life are often his hobbies, and if he will not take his hobbies seriously, life will lose half its charm. And mountaineering is something more than a hobby... And so I make no apology for this attempt to trace the history of our noble sport. --Arnold Lunn, History of Skiing

Lowell Skoog is a thorough and meticulous guy. It’s what you need in a preservationist. Getting the details right is a required historical imperative. But he is also a passionate and poetic guy when he writes about his love of ski mountaineering in the Cascade Mountains. As he says, “Skiing isn’t just about the turns, but about the people who make them.” At this time in his life, Lowell is attempting to meld his two sides.

About ten years ago, Lowell started two big projects: building a database structure that would become the Alpenglow Ski Mountaineering History Project and writing Written in the Snows, a book dedicated to the history of skiing in the Northwest. In a recent telephone interview, he said, “I describe this project like painting a house - only the thing is before you can paint it, you have to build it from scratch, one brick at a time. The bricks being the sources that you find and gradually, as you’re putting together chronologies and grouping things into subjects and finding different references to people and grouping them together, which is what the indexes are that I have on my site, you create a structure of what happened over a hundred years.” And after the house is built? Lowell says, “You stand back with a brush, canvas and easel, and render it into a story, something readable.”

Born in Seattle to skiing, Swedish parents, Lowell and his brothers, Gordy and Carl, grew-up hot-dogging at Ski Acres and Crystal Mountain, learned to mountain climb in college and began venturing into the “American Alps” of the North Cascades. A degree in electrical engineering at the University of Washington landed Lowell a job designing computer software, but he used his free time and new climbing skills to explore ever deeper into the Cascade range. Around 2001, he was laid-off from his job during the dot-com bust, and he and his wife, Stephanie, decided he should take six to 10 months to work on the history project. Later, working as an engineering consultant, Lowell was able to devote time to his ski research, a growing number of related projects, and additionally raise a son. His historical enthusiasm is also a way for him to connect to his father, who passed away when Lowell was 20 years old, and the old Scandinavian ski jumpers from his past.

On his vast Web site, Alpenglow.org, you can see that Lowell has been busy over the years, not only compiling his historical database, but also ticking off Cascade ski tours with his brothers and other ski partners. Many of the tours would, 25 years later, become the chain links for a ski route stretching 362 miles from Mt. Baker to Mt. Rainier, called “Skiing the Cascade Crest.” The route is dedicated to his late brother, Carl, who died in a steep skiing fall in Argentina in 2005. The Cascade Crest route is a poignant memorial to Carl Skoog, who was an accomplished skier and photographer and Lowell’s most consistent partner on countless trips. Carl’s beautiful imagery can be viewed on Alpenglow.org and the Mountaineers Foundation manages a memorial fund in Carl’s name.

The seed that launched Written in the Snows was Dwight Watson’s obituary published in the Seattle Times in 1996. Lowell recognized Watson’s name from brief passages in the books of Fred Beckey (the prodigious Northwest climber, original dirt bag and guidebook author). Watson, born in 1900, was the first to ski Eldorado Peak, North Star Mountain and Glacier Peak in the North Cascades. Lowell says, “I think his tour de force, in 1939, was the ski traverse of Mt. Baker from the Kulshan cabin to the Mt. Baker ski area, which I started calling Watson’s Traverse.” As Lowell began digging into Northwest skiing history, he contacted Fred Beckey directly. Beckey confirmed that Dwight Watson was the “key guy” in early Northwest ski mountaineering, and that his adventures dated back to the 1930’s. Based on a lead in Watson’s obituary, Lowell contacted the Seattle Mountaineers history committee seeking Watson’s old ski movies. The committee had the films and Lowell was allowed to view them. He was hooked. “So, Watson was the kernel that got me started on the whole project,” he recalls.

Lowell eventually became a member of the Mountaineers history committee, allowing him access to more information and, more importantly, the film archives. He refers to these old ski movies as “historical ‘crack,’ because the more you see, the more you want.” He is now the chairman of the committee (like he needs one more thing to do) and is working with the Mountaineers to digitally transfer these “dusty old films dating back to 1928.” He has also gained access to private film sources, like the Bob and Ira Spring collection. The digital video copies are cataloged at www.mountaineers.org/history/cat/movies-film.html.

Around 2002, the Mountaineers history committee wanted to revive the club annuals (journals documenting significant mountain related accomplishments and people), but after three years of trying, couldn’t seem to get it done. Around this time, climbing and skiing forums like cascadeclimbers.com were sprouting-up on the Internet. Lowell and some other like-minded climbers and skiers decided to produce an on-line annual of Northwest climbing and ski mountaineering that was flexible and fresh. The Northwest Mountaineering Journal (NWMJ) was launched in 2004 to provide an edited, permanent, annual record of mountaineering in the Northwest. For seven years, Lowell edited and contributed to the Web site. The NWMJ publishes feature articles and short trip reports documenting new routes in the region. This visually stunning and informative on-line resource was “a very satisfying project” according to Lowell. “I liked seeing all the routes the young hotshots were doing next to profiles of guys that are 90 years old and recalling their glory days.” He says, “The journal was bridging the generations and a very cool thing to be a part of, but very hard and time consuming, too.”

Lowell’s last issue as editor of the NWMJ was its seventh and was published last summer. Lowell observed that “my ski history stuff was getting starved,” so he resigned and hopes that someone will take over the journal. He also felt the need to go back to full-time engineering work. But he is obviously clearing the way to finish the book. He says, “I feel like this long drawn-out journey will be better for it. The book remains this unifying goal that I have, this huge mountain that I have to climb, and I’m getting to the point where I have all these pieces that I’m weaving together, and I don’t have any obstacles in my way.”

Last fall and winter, Lowell realized that he needed more photography for his book. He says, “I spent a lot of time chasing down pictures at the University of Washington, Museum of History and Industry, Mt. Rainier National Park, and several historical societies. “Lowell’s relationship with the Mountaineers has been especially valuable for obtaining access to photographs held at U.W. However, this endeavor also landed him another task and another distraction - archiving Bob and Ira Spring’s entire black and white photo collection. For those unfamiliar with the Spring twins, they started a photography partnership in 1946 and the two set to photograph Washington State as it had never been photographed before and will never be again. Lowell has another daunting task ahead of him.

With book queries getting a luke-warm reception from publishers like The Mountaineers Books and Sasquatch Books, the publishing process frustrated Lowell. “The book that I have in my brain, would anybody publish it?” He wonders. He says that most publishers responded that the market for his book is too small. Most likely, he will not be publishing Written in the Snows on paper, but instead as an on-line document. I objected that some of us would like his book on our shelves alongside the other beloved tomes of outdoor reference and that he should get paid for all his time and effort. Without hesitation, Lowell says he prefers a living, editable document, more like an on-line magazine than coffee table book. But he adds that he hasn’t given up the idea of publishing a version of the book on paper in the future.

During our conversation, I mentioned that Lowell has some classic Northwest ski descents featured in Chris Davenport’s Fifty Classic Ski Descents in North America, an up-coming, slick book of ski pornography to be published in November. I suggested he should do something similar for the Cascades, but he laughed and said he didn’t think his entries were extreme enough for the Colorado guys, “I didn’t select descents that had only been done once, because how can those be classics? Classics should be routes that everyone wants to do. I mean, descents are important, but that is only half the trip.”

Shifting our conversation toward Lowell’s vast personal ski experience, I asked him to name his best trip suggestion for a sunny, spring weekend in the North Cascades. He said, “Anything along the North Cascades Highway. For me, the highway has provided decades of personal discovery. You can never go wrong.” When asked to name his worst bushwhacking “suffer fest” of all time he replied, “Carl and I were camped in the col by Mt. Logan at the start of what we hoped would be a grand two-week traverse, and it was raining and snowing. We gave up the trip and thrashed our way out Fischer Creek…it was soul crushing.”

Otto Lang, founder of the Mt. Rainier and Mt. Hood Ski Schools, writer, filmmaker and all-around stylish Austrian, said before he died in 2006 that “It doesn’t matter how long it takes you to write a book, it only matters how good it is.” Like the Italian guy that took four years to paint a ceiling in the Sistine Chapel, Lowell Skoog has taken his time writing the definitive history of Northwest ski mountaineering, but when he is finished with his “painting,” I’m sure the details will be correct.

Check out the first installment of Lowell Skoog’s Written in the Snows history project at www.written-in-the-snows.net. The first installment is called The Ski Climbers. It describes an iconic period in Northwest skiing, the years between 1928 and 1948 when pioneering ski ascents and descents were made on Mount Baker, Mount Shuksan, Glacier Peak, Mount Rainier, Mount Adams, Mount St. Helens, and Mount Hood.

My younger brother lucked into a salesman job, decades ago, with a major US ski manufacturer, in a major US territory. Every year, for my combined birthday/Christmas present, I receive a new pair of mass-produced alpine or telemark skis in a brown box that has grown noticeably shorter and wider over the years. I am the envy of my so-called ski buddies, and listen to their insults every winter. I have no need to complain. Even the years when the ugly top-sheet didn’t work for me, aesthetically, or the tail washed out, I adjusted and got over it. I ski them hard for a season, they hold-up well, and I sell or trade them over summer with nary a rock dig on the base. It is a lot like the way my grandfather went through American cars. “Trade ‘em before the tires get bald,” he’d say.

Cars and skis have changed a lot in the last 40 years; sustainability, longevity, individuality, and quality have gained importance in both diminished marketplaces. The boutique, or (as I prefer) the handmade ski movement, has gained popularity for these and a variety of other reasons. The crazy, do-it-yourself ski builders who expand their garage and become custom shops or push it bigger and grow into small producers all have a common sickness or obsession going for them: making skis that fill a gap in the mass-market offering and cater to individual tastes.

Remember the Miller Soft? They were fat, orange, 1970’s boards, and born in an Orem, Utah garage by guys that wanted to float above the deep, Alta powder with something better than a pair of Rossi Rock 550’s under foot. These geeky types of characters still exist today laboring in their resinfragrant garages while dinner gets cold or goes unprepared. Although specialty freeride and powder skis account for a high percentage of the limited handmade ski movement, some of the offerings have similar specs to models in the mass-produced lines. After wading into the handmade ski movement world, I’ve sloshed the makers into three main buckets: small producers, custom makers, and do-it-yourselfers.

Like handmade furniture or musical instrument makers, the small ski producers artfully design prototypes and replicate them in a limited production run. Ideally, art and commerce are combined in this small-business model. They produce between 50 and 300 pair of skis a year, and employ a small, over-worked crew. One such company is ON3P (Oh-En-Three-Pea) located in Portland, OR, where I live. I stopped by their small factory and talked to, founder and owner, Scott Andrus about his skis and his company. Scott started building skis in a garage in Tacoma, WA while he was a student at the University of Puget Sound. He scraped together enough money to buy the steel needed for his first press, and he added power tools as he could afford them. ON3P (the name is an abbreviation of Scott’s old address in Tacoma) offers six models. They range in price from $500 to $650.

As I was leaving the ON3P shop, Scott handed me a pair of 186cm Billy Goats to demo. I skied them with alpine boots a couple days later at Mt. Hood and had an excellent day with these lively yet stable skis. Given their 140/115/120 shape and tip and tail rocker, they floated the 10 inches of untracked and chopped powder as expected, but what amazed me was how well they carved fast, GS turns on the groomers. This seems counter-intuitive to the ski’s pintail shape, but mighty stable they were. Every chairlift ride brought questions from other skiers. Mostly older guys (like me) would ask, “Are you finding enough deep stuff for those fatties?” During each ride up, I explained these odd looking skis to people, and I sort of enjoyed the novelty of having something rare and unique dangling under me.

Like having a suit tailored to your body, custom ski makers acquire your body measurements, info about your skiing preferences, your credit card number, and build skis designed just for you. They can mill blanks (the wood core) to any dimension, dial-in the sweet flex that you yearn for (if you know it), and silkscreen a picture of your favorite mountain on the top-sheet. Folsom Custom Skis in Boulder, CO states on their website that their goal “has been to set a new standard: building skis that are made right here in the USA, are built specifically and precisely to each skier, and are built using more environmentally sustainable methods and materials.” After filling out a questionnaire and following up via phone or e-mail, you can get skis theoretically engineered to your specs and suited to your needs. Folsom skis run around $1200 and there is an understandable waiting period to get a pair. Every build comes with a satisfaction guarantee and a two-year warranty.

When Jordon Grano, founder of Folsom, was asked what types of skiers are ordering his skis? He said “It’s been interesting because our customer base is so diverse. We’ve had the customer who finds out about us and saves up money to buy a pair. We have competitors and professional athletes. One skier has enough money to go on a number of heli trips each year and wanted a heli-specific board. So, we get the whole spectrum of skiers; even telemarkers and jibbers.”

Do-it-yourselfers (DIY) are more like a garage band, home winemakers, or bathtub beer brewers. They are finding some instruction, buying materials, and winging it on their own. SkiBuilders.com is a Seattle, WA based website and on-line store that, in its own words, “contains information about how to build your own ride, and a forum

is available for sharing information with other builders around the world.” Although skibuilders.com is mainly focused on backcountry skis to be mounted with telemark bindings, you can build alpine skis or snowboards using the same process. The equipment needed to build skis includes: (i) a ski press, (ii) a core (usually wood) profiler, and (iii) an edge bender (you can do this with a pair of pliers, too). There are three main types of ski presses: (1) clamp press, (2) vacuum press, and (3) pneumatic press. The sky is the limit on the money you can spend. Although this all seemed intimidating, from my novice perspective (kind of like the first day in high school shop class) the more I read the forum section the more I understood the allure.

In a two-part, on-line article for Lou Dawson’s Wild Snow website, blogger Clyde Soles explores the emergence of handmade ski makers and eventually orders a pair of custom skis from Folsom. He says, “Hand-built ski makers claim a level of quality and durability that is rare in mass-produced planks.” Although Clyde has yet to test and review the skis he ordered (we’re still waiting for part 3), his comments about better quality raise many questions and brought on some terse banter in the blog comments.

The mass-market vs. handmade durability and quality debate raises the ire of traditional ski manufacturers, too. When I asked Mike Hattrup from the K2 ski Corporation about quality, he rolled his eyes and replied, “The millions of dollars in testing equipment used by K2 insures the highest quality and the most consistent skis made. Every pair of [K2] skis is tested for flex . . . the handmade guys can’t say that.”

Voile Equipment, who has been making skis since 1994, has moved beyond the small producer stage, but I asked Mark (Wally) Wariakois, owner and ski designer, about his testing methods and whether the average skier knows the difference in a little flex variation. Although he doesn’t test every ski, Wally says, “The chance of a dud happening is pretty rare. By offering a good warranty, I am able to cover any problems that a customer might have by replacing the skis immediately. That is pretty hard for the custom guys to do.”

Are handmade skis a higher quality product? The jury is out, butthe debate is very lively. The quality debate aside, handmade skis are unique and provide an exotic alternative to the buffet of massproduced boards on the ski shop wall. The handmade ski movement is stimulating innovation, changing how skiers relate to what’s connected to their feet, and making their skiing experience more personal.

I wrote a three part series on three types of Western U.S. skiers back in 2011. They are caricatures, probably, but the truth often hides in plan sight.

A friend once observed while climbing a skin track in a popular touring area that backcountry skiers are like cats: they tolerate, but rarely embrace one another’s presence. I’d never really thought about it like this before. Sure, everyone is a little protective of their ski line, especially after working a skin track to reach it. But given our situation, Northwest-based skiers out for a tour in the Wasatch Mountains, his remarks hit home. Arguably, we were out of our element and unlikely to know any of the people touring in our little slice of the range. Regardless, we had very little interest in trying to meet the other skiers we saw, nor did it appear anyone was too keen on getting to know us. We simply coexisted with as little overlap as possible, like cats.

If collectively we are like cats, how do backcountry skiers break down by region? There are certainly some regional stereotypes out there. Well, this four part series explores various backcountry skier composites. We present regional backcountry personalities including the Northwest, California, the Rockies and the East by interviewing a stereotypical skier, albeit a fictitious one, from each of the four regions.

Our series begins here, on our home turf, in the Northwest:

Meet Joanie (not her real name, but it could be). She has been backcountry skiing in the Pacific Northwest for 20 years, ever since she moved to Portland, OR, from Michigan when she landed a human resource job with a big shoe company. She has spent every winter weekend hitting those Cascade volcanoes with mustard and relish ever since. Joanie packs up her 10-year-old Subaru on rainy Saturday mornings, balances a cup of coffee in her lap, rendevous with various ski partners and heads up find whatever Mother Nature

serves up that day. She is in the unofficial WTR (Women That Rip) club and is not prone to waiting at the top or bottom of powder shots. I caught Joanie at a microbrewery on a misty P-town night and we jawed about backcountry skiing and her Match.com prospects. She stuck around since Off-Piste was buying.

Off-Piste: Word on the street is that we are due for another La Niña winter. Are you ready for another full-bore storm cycle season?

Joanie: Definitely. Better cool and wet than warm and wet, I say. We deserve some kind of reward for enduring the gray skies and perpetual mist down here in town. A nice extended fall season of blue skies would sure be nice though. Summer was a bit late to arrive here this year, if you hadn’t noticed.

OP: I noticed. Speaking of storms, do you wear your gaiters over your shell pants?

J: Real funny. My shell pants have built-in gaiters, thank you.

OP: How about long johns? Do you wear them under your shorts for spring climbs?

J: Hell no! I’ve had soft-shell pants all this century. And I’m not telling you what’s under those.

OP: Are you still skiing fat telemark skis or has your boy posse talked you into an Alpine Touring rig, so you can keep up?

J: They’ve tried, but I bend the knee, squat to pee and still wait for them at the bottom. There might come a day, when I’m your age, that I’ll lock that heel but it’s a ways off.

OP: Ouch! You seem kind of defensive about your old school telemark stance despite the upside argument to the contrary?

J: It’s not what or how you ride, but why you’re riding.

OP: Ok, that’s way too deep for my dim bulb. How about where you ride. Do you have a ski pass or are you backcountry purist?

J: I like the easy access of a ski pass, but I spend plenty of days earning my turns, too. Around here, especially given a La Niña year, there are plenty of days when you‘re better off at the ski hill, but I rarely mix the two, except maybe at Crystal, but it all gets tracked so fast nowadays.

OP: How about dogs or no dogs in the backcountry?

J: Depends on the dog…I don’t care what it does on the up-track, but if it gets in my way on the down-track we’ve got a problem, Houston. Next question?

OP: Ever worn a garbage bag on a rain day?

J: Maybe, back when I was loading butts on weekends at the local resort my first year here. But I was generously compensated for the privilege by that corporation. I’m too old to ski in the rain now. Those days are for movies, books and other stuff that requires a dirty mind.

OP: Snow camping or fully catered hut skiing?

J: Totally different hits, duh! I like the full meal hut deal in those interior British Columbia ranges in winter. Especially, if it’s blower all week and then the chopper is weather delayed and I get a couple extra days of those steep BC trees. Best skiing in the world that is . . . screw Utah! And if it’s catered and you can slide up at dark with cold ones, hors d’oeuvres and a hot sauna awaiting, all the better. But that starts to put a dent in my pocketbook. But who doesn’t like a high camp on a volcano and a sunny, mid-day filled with plowing corn run after corn run. Best feeling of all time is tipping off a summit and hitting, hopefully not missing, that first turn and knowing that there is nothing but a good time and a bunch of turns between you and your car parked down by the creek, where cold shining cans bob in the eddy. Doesn’t suck.

OP: Cascade crud, coastal powder, fracture-in-the-making, redi-mix or morning oatmeal - how do you deal with the moisture content of PNW snow?

J: Modern ski technology has taken the sting out of it. I can float above the badness like never before, but being a storm rider is the best. If you are not willing to endure the blizzard, then you won’t receive the prize that is only given out when your neck gator, hat and goggles look like a snowy tree, and you haven’t seen your ski tips all afternoon.

OP: What’s your dream ski trip?

Joanie: We kind of covered that under hut trips. Interior British Columbia is the place I dream about. Just when you think the season is winding down around here, and you’ve got your ski legs under you, I dream about heading north for some powder skiing in March and April. The dream is back-to-back fly-in hut trips, bookended by a little roadside touring at Rogers Pass. Long days, deep snow and big mountains, could it get any better than that?

Meet Tobey (not his real name, but it could be). Tobey is a tan, sprightly fellow in his 30’s with shaggy hair sticking-out from under a ballcap with a bill as straight as a ski edge and some creative facial hair. We are sitting outside, eating big plates of breakfast in the brilliant Sierra sunshine at a rustic diner by Lake Tahoe. Tobey’s big, shaggy dog, Crampon, lies at our feet.

Off-Piste: Last winter was sick, and it looks like the forecasted La Nina may yield a repeat. Thoughts?

Tobey: I couldn’t be more stoked. Let the sickness begin! But I got kinda tired of shoveling decks for dough last winter, but it was a good afternoon job. I guess the drought is officially over, so that’s cool.

OP : Nice goggle tan.

T: Right on. Thanks for noticing. It’s a badge of honor in these parts. Speaking of, your pale Northwest skin looks like it might be getting burned here in the land of plenty.

OP : Thanks. We did not see much sun this winter or spring. Where do you live?

T: In a South Lake Tahoe garage/bedroom, but I travel for the kind snow when need be: Squallywood, Rose, Alpine, DP. It doesn’t matter as long as it’s going off.

OP : DP?

T: Donner Pass. Or Donner party, if you’re less lucky. Ha ha!

OP : Yeah, I should have gotten that. The Tahoe “check me out, bro” attitude is well known, world-wide, but there is also a selfdeprecating side of the scene led by the late, great Shane McConkey and the movie G.N.A.R. Where do you weigh in on the bro-brah scene?

T: I grew up around that ‘tude, both real and ironic, but when I stopped shredding under the lifts at Squaw and started to spend my days earning my turns, the only people I had to impress were my bros. And believe me, they got over me a long time ago. But bringing the fun back to skiing is cool. Fun is what motivates folks, and it’s the beating heart of skiing. The rest is just fashion and corporate bottom line.

OP : Have you ever skied BN [butt naked] for G.N.A.R. points?

T: Dude, I wish I could say yes, but the sad truth is no. BN takes some serious cajones. There’s the obvious fall factor, but you can also get your pass pulled. One of these days I will do it. I’ve got my line in the Palisades picked out; it’s sick.

OP : Do you think Squaw Valley, sorry Squallywood, should put in backcountry gates?

T: That’s a rough one, dude. It’s a totally rad bonus for the prepared dude to access the goods on a pow day, but I feel for the patroller that misses dinner with their kids because he or she is out looking for the lost, cold and lonely. I would totally use ‘em though, and be sicker than you!

OP : What’s your dream ski trip?

T: Leave Tahoe? There’s no real reason to. But if I was a sick pro rider, which I should be, and someone else was footin’ the bill, I’d be all over the AK scene. You know, test the metal - Go big or go home, bro.

OP : Freeheel or Alpine Touring?

T: I started as a snowboarder. You know, surfer roots, dude. But I moved to tele once I saw how rad it was. More recently, a blown knee and the lighter rig have swayed me to the dark side of the fixed heel for the sick and steep, but when you live in the “range of light” it’s all good. Bardini [the late Alan Bard] was famous for his “redline” traverse of the Sierra on tele gear, and that was probably the right guys, the right time and the right terrain for tele. But if you aren’t a tele God like Bard and Carter, locking it down is the kinder way.

OP : You’ve got heavy Sierra cement and the finest cream corn in the world? I guess both yield good skiers?

T: Hey Man, we get our fair share of the kind. But you gotta love it all around here. You don’t get the killer corn season without a little cement in the recipe. Spending the winter pushing an up-track through the goo isn’t easy, but it’s eventually rewarding. Carving ruts down that spring corn on the eastside chutes with a healthy snowpack is the shit. And nothing says “center-punch-me-baby” like a firm yet ripe chute on a spring morning.

OP: Jeez, it’s a wonder you can hold onto your slippery poles?

T: True that, I’m a lucky little dude. Plus, the approaches are so easy compared to Northeast and Northwest bushwhack fests. The Sierra rule the roost, man: It’s cheaper than AK, you can kook-out in the hot tubs and springs après ski and those legendary California girls of song still abound.

OP: It’s good to be you! Any regrets?

T: Crampon can’t talk or ski.

 A friend once observed while climbing a skin track in a popular touring area that backcountry skiers are like cats: they tolerate, but rarely embrace one another’s presence. I’d never really thought about it like this before. Sure, everyone is a little protective of their ski line, especially after working a skin track to reach it. But given our situation, Northwest-based skiers out for a tour in the Wasatch Mountains, his remarks hit home. Arguably, we were out of our element and unlikely to know any of the people touring in our little slice of the range. Regardless, we had very little interest in trying to meet the other skiers we saw, nor did it appear anyone was too keen on getting to know us. We simply coexisted with as little overlap as possible, like cats.

If collectively we are like cats, how do backcountry skiers break down by region? Well, this four- part series explores various backcountry skier composites. We present backcountry personalities of the Northwest, California, the Rockies and the East by interviewing a stereotypical skier, albeit a fictitious one, from each of the four regions. Our series continues with a skier from the Rocky Mountain state of Colorado:

Meet Ann (not her real name, but it could be). Ann grew upin a tidy Denver suburb, was a Breckenridge ski bus kid and pays for her Boulder life as a nurse. Judiciously fit, with short dishwater-blond hair, Ann is hitting her stride in her mid-40’s and has been in and out of bounds all of her outdoor life. She is single with a gaggle of friends, makes time for yoga, has stacked-up a pile of thoughtful adventure travel trips and is, in her own words, “complicated.” She agreed to meet me for an interview following her evening yoga session, and we are having our first margarita at a high-dollar taco joint in Boulder.

Off-Piste: How was yoga? Feeling refreshed?

Ann: Refreshed? It’s Bikram Yoga. It’s more of a workout than a refresher. But it was great; thanks for asking.

OP: Do you spend a bunch of money on outdoor clothes, because you look good? Those are some pretty nice outdoor duds. Do you consider yourself a gear head?

Ann: A gear head, compared to whom? Where the necessary outdoor clothes stop and fashion starts is hard to gauge, especially here in Boulder. I always have the 10 essentials stowed in my pack, and I like updating my clothes just about every season. Hey, I have to keep up with my girlfriends, and they have to try and keep up with me! Actually, I’m due for some new skis. It’s time for this girl to get some rocker – got anything in the Off-Piste test fleet I can try?

OP: If only. I don’t hold those keys; I’m just the interview guy. What’s your preference freeheel or fixed?

Ann: I got my start on alpine skis as a kid and love the feel of the heavy metal gear at the resort. Of course, I had my love affair with the telemark turn and the requisite pinner boy in my twenties. I matured out of the boyfriend, but kept my heel free until I hit 40. I still like to tele, but all my time skiing bumps at Mary Jane over the years has taken its toll, and I fix the heel more often than not now.

OP: You know what they say: “AT is short for Already Telemarked.” OK, on to the tough questions … How about motorized vehicles in the backcountry? You are a member of the Backcountry Snowsports Alliance (BSA) and were around the conflict on Vail Pass in the 1990’s, what’s the update?

Ann: The posted division of motorized and non-motorized access has eased the conflict, and I can get away from the buzzing noise, but it takes some slogging. Nobody ever gets all they want in a fight like that, but it was the best deal available.

OP: How do you feel about the growth of snowmobile use for skiing in the backcountry? Would you ever do a snowmobile assisted trip? Even if the sled delivered better food and beverage to a 10th Mountain Hut?

Ann: No, I prefer the silence of human power, even if it comes with a sore back. Besides, snow machines breakdown and then you’re left standing around in the cold, scratching your head. I’d just as soon be self-contained. You know, one less variable.

OP: That is kind of an apt metaphor for you, “self-contained.”

Ann: I guess I am, but satisfactory backcountry skiing usually means joining a like-minded crew to be safe in the steeps and that justifies being a team player. If I want to ski a shot and everyone else thinks it’s unsafe, then I’m out-voted, and we don’t ski it. It’s spared my life, and I know it’s true.

OP: Do you think guys are more prone to skiing risky stuff because of ego, especially in a “dog pack” group?

Ann: Sure, I’ve had to talk a few off the barking boys off the ledge…definitely seen the human factor lead to team testosterone decision making. Fortunately, I’ve never been involved in any bad situations. Are you looking at my crossed finger nails?

OP: Jeez, who wouldn’t? How many 14ers have you climbed?

Ann: A majority, but I’ve stopped tracking that kind of thing. I’ve definitely returned to the ones with good skiing multiple times. Climbing the 14ers is a nerdy badge of honor around here, more for transplants and one-uppers than this home girl. But yeah, skiing them all doesn’t interest me. Just give me Holy Cross on a nervous sunny morning; I run it from the cornice to the creek, and that’s way more than enough for me!

OP: How about dogs or no dogs in the backcountry?

Ann: I don’t have a problem with well-behaved dogs. I’ve got several friends who bring their dogs, and I want to be with them, so I just deal. I’m not shy. I’ll let the dog owner know if they need to reign in their pet.

OP: In the Northwest, we like to joke that they call it Rockies [not the Snowies] for a reason. Is Rocky Mountain snow the best on earth?

Ann: Not so far, this season, ha ha. But on a good day, standing on top of your shot with that cold, crisp air, untracked fluff below and unreal blue sky above … yes, it beats out most everywhere else. I guess what we lack in snow volume, we get in snow quality. Quality over quantity, there’s another saying to live by.

OP: Favorite ski destination?

Ann: CB [Crested Butte] is my preferred locale when I have the time to get away for multiple days. The resort has great terrain, and there are plenty of touring opportunities, too. The quick-fix from the Front Range is more complicated than it used to be. Summit County is an obvious choice, but it is just so overrun these days, and with Breckenridge looking to span the full Tenmile Range with lifts, the day trip access is shrinking. I haven’t been to Silverton but plan to load the van up for that trip if the snow picks up this winter.

OP: What’s your dream ski trip?

Ann: The Haute Route, no question. Europe is one of the few places I have not skied, and I love the thought of cappuccino and pastries while parked on a bench outside a stone-built European hut, sun shining and surrounded by tempting ski shots. I’ve been saving my pennies and working to put together an all-star crew.

OP: Best song? John Denver “Rocky Mountain High” or Joe Walsh “Rocky Mountain Way?”

Ann: Hand me that air guitar, buy me another drink and get outta my way!