Daily Vert: 835m
Total Vert so far: 32,100m
As Friday was Jessica's birthday we decided to go for a heli drop on Rainbow. The usual agenda would be to ski either the East or North face and then exit via 19 mile creek to Alpine Meadows. Most of the people on the trip had done these variations before, and that exit to Alpine is bit of a pain, so we decided to try something else. I'd always liked the look of the big south gully on Rainbow that you can see very clearly from the Roundhouse on Whistler, and we had it on good authority from my friend Rob that there was very enjoyable terrain on the north flank of Tonic Peak, so we decided to combine the two.
Skiing the South Gully is all a matter of timing. The whole run is one giant terrain trap as it starts out huge then funnels in on 3 sides to a pretty small gully at the bottom. This means you only want to ski it when the stability is good. The flip side of this is that as a south aspect, it does not maintain good snow for a very long time after a storm, especially during a sunny period.
On this particular day we were comfortable with the stability, and although we knew the north faces would ski better, we decided on the exploratory option.
The skiing turned out to be just fine. It started off about boot deep at the top and got deeper and softer as we went down. The entire run is pretty big and an fairly consistent pitch the entire way. Good times.
After a quick snack in the creek we headed up the drainage in between Gin and Tonic Peaks. To get to the top of Tonic Peak is a fairly long was around horizontally this way, but the skinning is super easy, we barely had to make a single switch back the entire way.
The North Face of Tonic did indeed ski very nicely, although there are some big cliffs at the top that you have to poke your way around to get in. Once back in the creek it was pretty easy to pick up the Rainbow lake summer trail and ski out to the Cemetery.
As Friday was Jessica's birthday we decided to go for a heli drop on Rainbow. The usual agenda would be to ski either the East or North face and then exit via 19 mile creek to Alpine Meadows. Most of the people on the trip had done these variations before, and that exit to Alpine is bit of a pain, so we decided to try something else. I'd always liked the look of the big south gully on Rainbow that you can see very clearly from the Roundhouse on Whistler, and we had it on good authority from my friend Rob that there was very enjoyable terrain on the north flank of Tonic Peak, so we decided to combine the two.
Skiing the South Gully is all a matter of timing. The whole run is one giant terrain trap as it starts out huge then funnels in on 3 sides to a pretty small gully at the bottom. This means you only want to ski it when the stability is good. The flip side of this is that as a south aspect, it does not maintain good snow for a very long time after a storm, especially during a sunny period.
On this particular day we were comfortable with the stability, and although we knew the north faces would ski better, we decided on the exploratory option.
The skiing turned out to be just fine. It started off about boot deep at the top and got deeper and softer as we went down. The entire run is pretty big and an fairly consistent pitch the entire way. Good times.
After a quick snack in the creek we headed up the drainage in between Gin and Tonic Peaks. To get to the top of Tonic Peak is a fairly long was around horizontally this way, but the skinning is super easy, we barely had to make a single switch back the entire way.
The North Face of Tonic did indeed ski very nicely, although there are some big cliffs at the top that you have to poke your way around to get in. Once back in the creek it was pretty easy to pick up the Rainbow lake summer trail and ski out to the Cemetery.
Runar and I looking over to Tonic Peak from the top of the South Gully
Looking back at the South gully (lookers right) from part way up Tonic
Postcard shot of Blackcomb from Tonic Peak
GPS track. I forgot to turn on my GPS to this track was recorded by Travis, who skied the Ridge of Tonic peak on the way down instead of the main bowl. Both lines are good.
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