FLY BY A Bit F in Girdwood Words and Photo Colin Wiseman WE’D ARRIVED IN GIRDWOOD, AK a day or two late, de-pending on who you asked. Still, we were optimistic. On the hour-long drive from Anchorage, a lingering sunset over the ice floe of Turnagain Arm to the right, Dall sheep clinging to the cliffs to the left, and stacked ridgelines across the water gave us hope. We had left a big year in the Pacific Northwest in search of something new, something bigger, maybe—the excitement of exploration overriding the sure things we had at home. I was with Marie-France Roy, skier Anna Segal and filmer Matt Bruhns. Despite local reports of “you should have been here yesterday” we made an early departure from town the next morning in search of road-accessed steeps. A cou-ple hours on the skintrack gave deliverance to the kind of AK terrain that’s usually reserved for those with sub-stantial heli budgets: a long valley with toothy panels on the left, a massive, cliffed headwall down at the end, rolling hills to the right, another similar setup over the horizon one would imagine. Unfortunately, those lines we were after face south-southwest, meaning you gotta get on them a bit earlier in the year than typical Alaskan steeps. And after a couple short laps near the front of the valley, we learned, the snow was less-than-ideal. By 2 p.m. a warming sun began sending fat, wet slides running down the guts of Plan A. That’s when Anna pointed to the back of the valley. “What about that?” It’s always hard to judge scale in Alaska. It’s kinda like walking down the Las Vegas strip. The sheer enor-mity of everything makes far-off touchpoints seem close, and what may look like a 30-minute jaunt can take a couple hours. Still, that deep wall with a bit of north in it had potential, and it would stay lit into the evening. So, we went. It was a slog to the top. Already 10 hours into the day, Anna and Marie skinned then booted, passing through a wind-stripped bowl and topping out amidst lengthening shadows. Marie dropped first. Fast, hard-packed turns down the ridge gave way to a quick bash on a windlip, then full throttle flow in consolidated, stable powder. In 15 minutes, the face would go dark. It would be a long walk out of the valley under alpenglow, a final run back to the road at dusk, a well-earned score. We were glad we were there that day and, despite reports to the contrary, found the best of it. As the saying goes, you never know until you go. Sometimes, you just gotta go a bit farther. 026 THE SNOWBOARDER’S JOURNAL
The Snowboarder's Journal The Snowboarder's Journal 21.2: Page 26
