Mountain Life
  • Daily Content
    • Trips & Expeditions
    • Climbing
    • Mountain Biking
    • Mountain Lifer
    • Multiplicity
    • On The Trail
    • Paddling
    • Photography
    • Skiing
    • Snowboarding
    • Stay & Play
    • Surfing
    • The Great Outdoors
    • The ML Interview
    • Travel
  • GEAR
  • VIDEOS
  • STORE
  • Magazines
    • ML Coast Mountains
    • ML Rocky Mountains
    • Vie En Montagne
    • ML Blue Mountains
    • ML Annual
    • ML Subscriptions
  • ABOUT
    • What is ML?
    • Our Team
    • Newsletter
    • Adventure Grant
    • Distribution
  • Podcast
  • Contests
  • CONTACT
    • ML Agency
    • Advertising
    • Contribute
Subscription Form

Get notified of the best News

Social Links
Instagram 22K Followers
Facebook 25K Likes
Twitter 5K Followers
Pinterest 1K Followers
Vimeo 34 Followers
LinkedIn 0
22K Followers
25K Likes
5K Followers
1K Followers
Mountain Life
Mountain Life
  • Daily Content
    • Trips & Expeditions
    • Climbing
    • Mountain Biking
    • Mountain Lifer
    • Multiplicity
    • On The Trail
    • Paddling
    • Photography
    • Skiing
    • Snowboarding
    • Stay & Play
    • Surfing
    • The Great Outdoors
    • The ML Interview
    • Travel
  • GEAR
  • VIDEOS
  • STORE
  • Magazines
    • ML Coast Mountains
    • ML Rocky Mountains
    • Vie En Montagne
    • ML Blue Mountains
    • ML Annual
    • ML Subscriptions
  • ABOUT
    • What is ML?
    • Our Team
    • Newsletter
    • Adventure Grant
    • Distribution
  • Podcast
  • Contests
  • CONTACT
    • ML Agency
    • Advertising
    • Contribute
  • CLIMBING
  • In This Issue
  • Skiing
  • Snowboarding
  • The Great Outdoors

Squamish Exposed: Notes on Coastal Steep Skiing

  • December 31, 2015
  • Ben Osborne
Total
0
Shares
0
0
0
0
0
0
Total
0
Shares
Share 0
Tweet 0
Pin it 0
Share 0
Share 0
Share 0

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” —Albert Einstein

Exposure is an arena for the mind. Mentally, skiing above a 500-foot cliff is scarier than a one-hundred-foot cliff, yet if a mistake is made, the resulting reality will be very much the same.

Words and photos: Trevor Hunt

Squam2

 

Contemporary society has woven itself a very tight safety net to allow us to live comfortably within our own reality. Make a mistake, or overstep our abilities, and we’re whisked off to the hospital for a second chance. Absolute exposure on a mountainside forces a momentary respite from this persistent illusion — faced with the Reality, honesty is recommended.

Numerous guidebooks and a well-marked trail system make Squamish a world-renowned mecca of rock climbing, mountain biking and hiking for locals and tourists. No one comes for the skiing though, and for good reason — lurking in the wilds above town are pockets of terrain unfit for the local tourist guide and a two-week holiday won’t unlock the logging road labyrinth that leads there. Home court advantage is key: a winter’s worth of observations, snowpack evaluation, and years of interaction with the terrain on foot, only begin to expose subtle possibilities for a descent on skis.

 

Squam3

 

Screw the action sports stereotypes — this adrenaline isn’t addictive. No one yearns for these types of scenarios. And yet they exist. However improbable, they sit there just begging to be skied . . . patches of snow among the vertical world. For me, their close proximity to Squamish only further reduces healthy excuses, whereas that line overseas can always wait due to life commitments and a lack of funds.

 

Squam4

 

Like any established ski community, the Sea to Sky Corridor has its classic couloirs and faces, lines of obvious beauty that get multiple descents each season. But as generations of skiers pass, it becomes almost impossible to find untouched lines that fit these criteria. As fate would have it, what my hometown lacks in ski line classics, it more than compensates with un-skied lines more akin to circus freaks. These geological anomalies have slopes so steep and exposed that they will never be skied on a regular basis, or attract skiers from elsewhere. Each of these lines were fleeting events for me, momentary escapes that were only meant to be experienced once. – unreal memories for the alter ego.

“. . . up there, with a split-second of indecision, the difference between survival and its opposite, right action and right thought, and the very nature of life is absolutely clear.” —Mark Twight

Total
0
Shares
Share 0
Tweet 0
Pin it 0
Share 0
Share 0
Share 0
Related Topics
  • backcountry
  • Sky Pilot
  • Squamish
  • Trevor Hunt
Ben Osborne

Previous Article
  • CLIMBING
  • The Great Outdoors

Trailblazer: Peter Croft, Getting Out There and Getting After It

  • December 30, 2015
  • Ben Osborne
View Post
Next Article
  • CLIMBING
  • Skiing

Hub of the Wheel: Pemberton Nurtures a New Big Mountain Identity

  • January 2, 2016
  • Mountain Life Media
View Post
You May Also Like
View Post
  • Mountain Lifer
  • Skiing
  • Snowboarding

End of an Era: Another Double Chair Bites the Dust

  • Sarah Bulford
  • March 28, 2023
Skiing at Hudson Bay Mountain in Smithers
View Post
  • Skiing
  • Snowboarding

Where Eagles Dare

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 27, 2023
Powder-Highway-BC-ski
View Post
  • Rockies
  • Skiing
  • Snowboarding

Powder Highway Revisited

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 21, 2023
natural-selection-Redbull
View Post
  • Snowboarding
  • Videos

Friday Flick: Natural Selection Tour Highlights

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 17, 2023
Uncertainty-mountains-Rockies
View Post
  • CLIMBING
  • Rockies

Facing Uncertainty: The Role of Chance in Mountain Adventures

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 13, 2023
rope-tow-Vancouver-Island
View Post
  • Skiing
  • Trips & Expeditions

Poached Winter

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 7, 2023
Ryan-Osman-ontario-splitboarding
View Post
  • Ontario
  • Skiing
  • Snowboarding

Off-Piste ON

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 6, 2023
Skiis-and-Biikes
View Post
  • Mountain Lifer
  • Ontario
  • Skiing
  • Snowboarding

Skiis & Biikes Looks to the Future

  • Mountain Life Media
  • March 6, 2023
Featured Posts
  • 1
    End of an Era: Another Double Chair Bites the Dust
    • March 28, 2023
  • Skiing at Hudson Bay Mountain in Smithers 2
    Where Eagles Dare
    • March 27, 2023
  • Mountain-Life-20th-showreel 3
    20 Years of ML
    • March 24, 2023
  • Mustang-Survival-WOMENS-HELIX-CCS 4
    Gear Shed: Our End-of-Winter Picks
    • March 23, 2023
  • natural-selection-Redbull 5
    Friday Flick: Natural Selection Tour Highlights
    • March 17, 2023
RECENT POSTS
  • Powder-Highway-BC-ski
    Powder Highway Revisited
    • March 21, 2023
  • AleTrailsSouthernInterior_Vernon_MikeGamble_LookoutTrail_BenHaggarPhoto
    Ale Trails: Southern Interior Part 1, Vernon + Shuswap
    • March 20, 2023
  • Elements-Outfitters-Filson-cabin
    Elements Outfitters Partners with SALTS to Protect Alberta’s Incredible Landscapes
    • March 16, 2023
Social Links
Instagram 22K Followers
Facebook 25K Likes
Twitter 5K Followers
Pinterest 1K Followers
Vimeo 34 Followers
LinkedIn 0
INSTAGRAM
mountainlifemedia
22K Followers
No one called me Feet Banks back in 1987. In those days, most people called me by my given name—except for my ski buddies, to whom I was known by the most badass moniker to ever schuss the slopes: Twinkle Toes.
We’re celebrating 20 Years of Mountain Life!
From The Gear Shed: Last Monday was the official start of spring, but we know there’s still some winter to be shredded. So ML staff and partners have picked the latest jackets, lanterns, bindings, mugs and drysuits for winter-spring.
Exploring the sights around beautiful Sutton, Quebec with ML creator @adv_bird ❄️🫶
Back on the road with three generations, dancing lifties, best-on-planet pizza and elusive-but-exquisite pow days.
Live It Up EP 24 is out now!
The Southern Interior region of BC holds an ecological cross-section of the province with alpine meadows, arid Douglas fir grasslands, damp cedar and hemlock forests of the Columbia Mountains and the warm expanse of Shuswap Lake.
Do Not Disturb mode activated ✅ #mountainlifer
Conceived by superhuman snowboarder @travisrice, the @naturalselection Tour highlights earth’s premier riders, from big-mountain mavens to Olympians, all competing on the most stoketastic—and unpredictable—terrain known to humankind.
Built upon a shared desire to enjoy, respect, and advocate for Alberta’s incredible landscapes, it was a natural fit for @elementsoutfitters to work with a local conservation organization @saltslandtrust to highlight the province’s rugged beauty and outdoor apparel to match.
Follow

Subscribe

Subscribe now to our newsletter

No one called me Feet Banks back in 1987. In those days, most people called me by my given name—except for my ski buddies, to whom I was known by the most badass moniker to ever schuss the slopes: Twinkle Toes.
We’re celebrating 20 Years of Mountain Life!
From The Gear Shed: Last Monday was the official start of spring, but we know there’s still some winter to be shredded. So ML staff and partners have picked the latest jackets, lanterns, bindings, mugs and drysuits for winter-spring.
Exploring the sights around beautiful Sutton, Quebec with ML creator @adv_bird ❄️🫶
Back on the road with three generations, dancing lifties, best-on-planet pizza and elusive-but-exquisite pow days.
Live It Up EP 24 is out now!
Mountain Life
  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Subscribe
  • Advertising

Input your search keywords and press Enter.