Coast Mountains – UpFront – Let them Cut Runs

Hike to spots like this. Photo: Garrett Grove

Up Front

Let them Cut Runs

Province fights economic downturn with new backcountry ski area

By Amanda Follett

Smithers, B.C., like many mountain towns, is full of skiers. Skiers who gaze hopefully at the sky in anticipation of snow. Skiers who thrash and curse and ski-tour their way through alder and dense bush in their bid for open alpine. Skiers who always fantasized about busting out chainsaws to clear a path to treeless slopes above … until a provincial grant gave the thumbs-up to do exactly that and fantasy became reality.

Last year, the Job Opportunities Program pumped $408,480 – money aimed at helping the province through the economic downturn  into developing a backcountry ski area on the northeast flanks of Hankin Mountain, about a half-hour drive from Smithers in northwestern British Columbia. Employing more than 20 displaced forestry workers, the resulting ski runs and up-tracks offer easy access to treeline and beyond – chutes, bowls, gullies, soft powder and frequent sunshine on the Coast Mountains’ eastern slopes.

“To the best of my knowledge, nobody’s gone out to construct a community backcountry ski area before this,” says Brian Hall, a local diehard skier who, for more than 20 years, battled dense bush on skis while dreaming about developing a non-motorized area specifically for backcountry skiers. “Previously, most of the skiing was in the alpine. When it’s blowing hard or poor visibility or high avalanche hazard, that alpine terrain isn’t available.”

What is available, now, is a provincially designated non-motorized area with an up-track that winds gently through snow-laden balsam and hemlock forests, offering spectacular views and taking the average skier to treeline in about two to three hours. Eight cut runs up to 20 metres in width provide skiing for a wide range of abilities in terrain with very little avalanche hazard. The runs range from 500 to 600 vertical metres (1,000 to 1,500 vertical feet) in the trees with nearly another 450 metres (1,500 feet) of accessible alpine above.

“A group of mixed ability could go here and still have fun,” Hall says. “Even someone that’s not a strong skier could feel comfortable there.”

Kevin Eskelin, a local recreation officer with the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and the Arts, says he’s had inquiries from across the province about the newly developed area. Combined with new mountain bike trails also developed last summer, the area’s new outdoor opportunities could put Smithers on the map for recreational tourism, he says.

“The backcountry skiing has been going on in undesignated areas, which is fine, but this really legitimizes it. That legitimacy helps them secure further funding for enhancements and stuff like that,” Eskelin adds. “It’s gaining a lot of attention.”

A six-kilometre access road is kept plowed through contributions from local skiers and businesses and the Bulkley Valley Backpackers’ Society has secured additional funding to further develop the area next summer, with talk of more trails, a day-use shelter at treeline and additional signage. Plans are also in the works to upgrade the nearby Hankin Lookout, a fire lookout and overnight cabin that sleeps five.

“The feedback I’m getting is that it’s seen considerable use, considering it’s early season and the first year,” Hall says about the project. “People are absolutely ecstatic.”

Now Smithers skiers can stop spending their winter evenings plotting random arson attacks on the subalpine or sharpening their chainsaw blades in anticipation of a midnight lumber massacre, and start planning their next assault on a thousand acres of fresh government-provided powder.