Eagle Pass is one of the new "boutique" heli operators that has opened in recent years. This is their third year of operation, and some of you may have read about the ownership struggle between the 2 founders in one of the ski mags earlier this year. They are based at the Griffin Lake Bed & Breakfast 27 km west of Revelstoke on the Trans-Canada Hwy. Their tenure is in the Monashees just west of CMH Revelstoke's territory. Eagle Pass takes 12 skiers at a time in 3 groups of 4 in an A-Star. There were 8 Germans there for a week who had to leave by 10AM Saturday and 3 from Idaho for whom Saturday would be the last day of 4.
Fog had had prevented any flying on Friday so they wanted a very early start Saturday. Thus they called me Friday afternoon to say there would be no time for my safety briefing the next morning, so I drove out there on the spot to get it done before dark. I was back at 6:45AM for breakfast, and all 3 groups were in the mountains by 8AM. The first 3 runs were somewhat disappointing. The tree skiing terrain was somewhat confined and the snow was fairly heavy in most places. But we were in the very closest terrain to the lodge to accomodate the Germans' early getaway.
After 10AM we were a private group and the situation improved dramatically.
Bird's eye view of Trans-Canada Hwy, lake and summer Chateau resort.
Moving higher up there was 10cm new, and while it was not as fluffy as the 3rd day at Chatter, it skied every bit as well. First run was a clear-cut reminiscent of those at Chatter.
Our next drop was at 8,850 feet for glacier skiing.
Here's our group at the top.
View across the Columbia River of the new Revelstoke resort. Mt. Mackenzie above the resort is just above 8,000 feet, but note the Selkirks behind it rise to well over 10,000. Selkirk-Tangiers skis some of that, and the rest is in Glacier National Park.
Near the bottom of the first glacier run. This glacier is on the boundary with CMH Revelstoke, and the looker's left side of it just outside the picture is reserved for them.
Guide Matt and heli are waiting for us.
We caught a sunny break while skiing the glacier. We had 4 nonstop runs of 1,700 vertical with wide GS turns in hero snow. In their 3rd year Eagle Pass is still exploring its terrain. We flew over the terrain below the glacier but it drops off into rocks and icefalls. But a few hundred yards west they put us on new drop point just above tree line. This area had some windpack at the top, but then great powder in the subalpine and nicely spaced trees below.
There's a clearing at the bottom of this run where we had lunch.
We had one more run from this drop after lunch. Part of it was in a gully alongside the rock wall in the background, but in a small group there's enough powder to go around. With 10-12 skiers the later ones would be getting choppy snow.
The last 2 runs (it was supposed to be just one, but our group voted unanimously for an encore) were from a new drop closer to the lodge, but again just above tree line for outstanding snow quality. This pic is just of tracks. Unfortunately there is rarely time for decent pics in the trees, and I don't have any that do these last 4 runs justice.
Total was 12 runs and 23,500 vertical, an excellent day by anyone's standards.
This was a similar situation to the 2 days at Wiegele I skied 2 years ago, making the reservation just 3 weeks ahead. There is much more competition among the cat and heli operators in B.C. over the past decade, and the current economy is likely providing even more flexibility for skiers in the area. Most of these places only book half and full weeks far in advance, but the the bottom line is that if they have space many of them will accommodate you for a day or two on short notice if they think you're compatible with the groups skiing there.
