How Big is the Terrain?

During the second week of April, I had a chance to spend some time skiing at Last Frontier Heliskiing. Never having been there before, I was pretty curious to see the single largest heliski tenure in the world and see what all the hubbub was about. Now I’ve spent a lot of my life in the mountains and skiing has been the main activity but lifting off out of the helipad in Stewart, BC at Last Frontier’s Ripley Creek location on our first day of skiing…it was something to see. Nestled deep in one of the longest fjords in the world, Stewart sits in the heart of some seriously big country. As the helicopter crested the first ridge line, the enormity of the coast mountains in this part of the world was evident. This is a big place.

On that day, we skied relatively close to Stewart, smashing lap after lap (16 of them) of boot deep fluff under bluebird skies. Some of the guests grumbled about skiing so close to the base (are they trying to save fuel?) but those concerns were dispelled after our first drop: a 4500ft run down one of what seemed like a never ending supply of glaciers in the tiny corner of tenure we were planning on skiing that day. And it was a tiny corner. Looking on the map at the full scope of Last Frontier Heliskiing’s 9000 square kilometers, we spent the day on a dime sized spot. But just in that little spot was some of the coolest terrain I have ever seen. Glacier runs as far as the eye could see; steep, treed skiing that in January or February would have rivalled anything I’ve skied over the years and couloirs, chutes and wide open alpine bowls to taunt even the burliest of big mountain skiers.

For our ski day, we stuck mostly to the big, wide open stuff, skiing 25-35 degree slopes in boot deep pow that glistened with surface facets. After our 40,000ft of skiing that day (that’s the equivalent of 20 top to bottom laps on Whistler), on approach to the helipad, I wondered what it would be like to spent an entire season up here. The skiing is limitless, and that was just in the terrain we saw that day. Thinking of the rest of the Last Frontier Tenure, well, there’s enough terrain there for a lifetime of fun in the snow.

We spent that week skiing around Stewart and then a couple of days at Bell 2 and barely even scratched the surface of full tenure. There’s so much terrain, in fact, that guests have been known to bang off first descents on their ski weeks. With that tenure, though, comes some challenges. The logistics of flying into such a big area can be daunting. But after years of perfecting their system with remote fuel caches and various staging areas around the tenure, Last Frontier has it down to a science. On the guide front it’s a challenge as well. Most of the guides up there spend the majority of the winter at Last Frontier. The typical guide life of moving from operation to operation throughout the winter season isn’t the norm. Because the area guests can ski is so vast, it’s important for guides to really get to know every little corner of the terrain. There’s a lot to know. Even now, new lines are being skied every year as the exploration of what is one of the snowiest places on earth continues. Because of that the crew of guides up there is tight knit, knowledgeable and as skilled as they come.

But the true blessing of having so much choice really shines through when there are challenging conditions. Bad weather? Move deeper into the terrain. There’s almost always something to ski. No new snow? No problem. There is always somewhere untracked and untouched. For my trip up there this year, it was the second week of April; warm temps and low snow in the lower elevations. So it’s nice to start your drops high up and make the most of the skiing above treeline. Having a limitless supply of north facing glacier and high alpine runs was awesome for that. The flip side to that is during January, because of the abundance of tree skiing, there is lots of storm skiing terrain. And believe me, after seeing what’s on offer, it’s epic. Being the biggest does not always necessarily mean you’re the best, but in this case I’d have to say it comes close. The terrain at Last Frontier Heliskiing is big. Huge mountains that seem to go on forever. But don’t take my word for it. Have a look for yourself.

Be safe, ski hard.