Mt Emily ski ascent (8900ft), June 28, 2001

On the morning of June 28th, we had intended to climb Thunderbunny Peak, immediately across from camp. It looked like a fun 2000ft ascent straight up moderately steep, unglaciated snow, although some of us admitted it was not a very aesthetic climb. We had hoped top traverse the ridge line to the east, and come down a scree slope back to camp.

Thunderbunny Peak is on the right. It would probably make a good ski descent, it is not quite as steep as it looks from this side.

The morning of the 28th however, was quite windy, and Dave thankfully ignored our 5am alarm. Thunderbunny was just a goal in its own right - something to do - seems we had run out of things to do here, so we had settled on peaks that were really weren't so excited about.

Anyway, the alarm went ignored, so yet again, we slept in late. When we awoke at 10, the wind had died, and it was warm. We decided to go ski the narrow canyon glacier Dave, Greg and I had scoped out the day before (we first saw it from Three-Faced Peak). At 11, we were off.

20 minutes later, we had descended 1000ft, and over 3 miles of glacier to the base of the ski route.

The route went straight ahead, then up to the left.

From around the 7000ft level, we began the ski up onto the tongue of the side glacier, passed a few covered crevasses, and then entered the canyon proper. It was a very beautiful, rather hidden slope, less than a quarter mile wide. Though the angle was significant (25-30 degrees), it was remarkably uncrevassed. On the way up, I spotted tracks on the south side of the valley. More bear tracks. This time, they traversed a steep slope, crossed a bergschrund, and headed up the 45 degree slope above, mere inches from the lip of the 'schrund! That's some bear! He sure was intent on getting over the ridge!

Marcus cranking turns on the descent. Faintly visible bear tracks enhanced with big red line.

We reached a col behind the Thunderbunny-Hudson massif, and had awesome views to the east. From here, it was a straightforward ski north to the cap of this icy peak, and then the skis came off for the final hundred feet of loose class 2-3 rock that led to the exposed east summit.

Looking down from the summit towards our skis. We really had to try hard to squelch the desire to ski off that quadruple cornice behind that rock butress.

We could finally see Mt Logan - we think. About 30 miles away, it looked like a high lumpy massif from this side. The view of the north side of the Thunderbunny-Hudson massif was impressive to say the least. Steep snow, Steep rock, steep ice, including a narrow ice runnel that wound through the rock.

On the summit. Marcus, is too sexy for his cat, too sexy for his cat, too sexy by far. Greg, behind him, tries to imitate the sexy Marcus pose, but fails, and looks like dweeb. Dave, behind Greg, is too dorky for himself, too dorky for himself, too dorky by far.

Dave named this peak "Emily" in honour of his (still-living!) girlfriend. It was most likely a first ascent, since not many people have been in this area (and would be a first ski descent too).

Dave skiing off the summit plateau. The face in the background is the backside of the Thunderbunny massif. There is an ice runnel route for Marc Twight somewhere in there.

Dave skiing. In the background is the Hudson massif, a little more imposing from this side.

It was warm and windless, but eventually we figured we should descend. So we downclimbed, hopped back into our skis, got out the cameras, and settled in for one of the best ski runs of our life! The snow was damn near perfect the whole way down, marred only by the occasional deep sun cup near the bottom.

Zippin' down smooth corn snow.

Lean back Marcus, lean back! Ok, the snow wasn't all perfect - on this section, some deep suncups appeared. All you needed to do was ski around them, or avoid them in some other fashion like Marcus.

We had timed our descent perfectly, and we were all smiles when we reached the base of the run, and spilled out onto the flat Baldwin Glacier. Then it was a three mile slog back to camp. The whole thing took us 5 hours car-to-car. I mean camp-to-camp.

The next day, the 29th, Paul stopped by in the afternoon with some recreational guests from Florida and BC - they'd been doing some scree hiking nearby somewhere.

Recreational guest (upon seeing our skis) "You been doing some skiing?"

We tell them about the great ski we had yesterday, in the valley around the corner.

"So you just hiked over there then you skied?"

We explain that we skied over there too.

"Was it extreme?" We knew Paul must be laughing at these guys more than he was at us. However, the "recreational tourist fee" must compel him to keep his mouth shut.

We asked Paul if other climbers in the range had been having any success. Not really he said - except for this group that tried to climb Mt. Bona (16500-feet - 4th highest peak in the US). They summitted in a whiteout. Then the clouds cleared - and they realized they were on its neighbour, Mt Churchill (15638-feet)!

Also, Marcus tried to be friendly by forcefully laughing at stuff.

Paul imitates Emily wondering when we're getting a flyby.