Lost boys' lost boy

The second bus was not an option today, although some of us would have killed for a lie in, but we had a meet arranged with Steve Kuijt, backcountry boss and all round master of the mountain. Steve doesn't need GPS, Steve decides where he is...

Once we met up and had a tranceiver check etc, we headed up Timber and White Pass to drop into Lost Boys and skin up to the pass. First off we needed to learn how to use them however, which was a challenge in itself. After a while we were all plodding around the base area in blissful ignorance with no real technique, trying to get up the little hill in front of us, and ski back down. Eventually Steve showed us how to decend with more stability by doing it telemark style, which really helps!

Before long we were climbing up towards the pass and going well. It was then that the bad luck (or karma?!) struck when Martins binding broke, forcing him to bow out and head back into the ski boundary. Although it sucked for Martin, at least we hadn't dropped over the other side of the pass, otherwise it would have been a long hike out. Lost Boys had claimed its first lost boy...

The rest of the climb went smoothly and after a pit stop for a quick spot of tiffin (Tea + thermos + ski touring = winning) we decended down Lost Boys. Before long we stumbled on a snow camp, presumably dug by the university students. It was pretty impressive the amount of work that was done, especially the 8-10 man iglu at the far end!

Ruben in the iglu

James makes like a meerkat

After a pretty crusty decent down into a gully, we were then faced with the task of skinning up and climbing back out again, which was about a 1h20 ascent. All was well until the gradient got a bit steeper. When the skins can't hold on anymore you need to reduce the approach angle to the slope. The idea is that you do switchbacks all the way up the mountain. This means you have to be able to do kickturns - spinning your uphill ski 180 degrees then horse kicking your downhill ski to keep the tip high when you swing it round. Most of us were ok, some even getting it down to a fine art. And then there was Leon. It was like our personal comedy roadshow, with entertainment on every turn! We made it up with no falls though, and after a quick blast down some untracked snow, we skinned up and out through Lost Boys pass to finish a good day in the backcountry. 

Skins on and ready to rock and... well... slide...

I never really felt myself lagging throughout the day, and even coming off the slopes, my body still felt surprisingly fresh. That was definately a good thing, as cat-skiing for tomorrow didn't look too promising. There would almost certainly be a hardcore mix of wind crust and sun crust to deal with making it very difficult skiing. Then came the moment we've all been waiting for. A quick glance out the window during dinner showed the whole town being blanketed in fresh snow. As the smiles and excitement grew among us, we went to bed praying to Griz to keep it coming...