An extreme skier's book offers advice

Cindy Hirschfeld, Special To The Rocky

Published March 20, 2007 at midnight

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Vail-based skier Chris Anthony, a former extreme-skiing champ who teaches clinics internationally and has appeared in 17 Warren Miller films, co-authored (with Bill Wanrooy) the new book, Dream Season: Worldwide Guide to Heli & Cat Skiing/Boarding.

Anthony’s first heliski trip was out of Valdez, Alaska, in 1990, for a film shoot.

"We went up there, and we got our own helicopter," he said. "It was very cowboy. There was a guy with a heli, and you paid him $25 and he flew to wherever he could. Everyone was very green."

Since then, Anthony has flown numerous times, including a stint guest-guiding for Chugach Powder Guides and, for the past half dozen or so years, guiding and hosting ski camps through Points North Heli Adventures in Cordova, Alaska.

In the book, Anthony writes about heli operations he has skied with in Alaska, Canada and Chile, with a goal of managing readers’ expectations so they’ll have the most rewarding trip possible. He also includes some background info on how the Alaskan operations started.

"That’s the main reason I wanted to be part of this book," Anthony said. "I really wanted to have an arena to start documenting that history."

His enthusiasm for heliskiing is hard to resist. "There’s nothing quite like flying around in a heli in a remote land and landing on top of a mountain," he said. "Even if you remove the skiing from that, it’s going to be a dream for most people. We live in a lucky time to have these opportunities.

"I think anyone who’s an upper-intermediate to advanced-expert skier should put it on their list of things to do before they hit the grave."

Tempted to book a trip? Read these suggestions from Anthony — in his own words — first.

Choosing an outfitter

Try to talk with people who have already gone to the operation, not necessarily someone who works with it. You want to get the most unbiased opinion.

Find out as much as you can about the guides — who are they, what’s their history?.

Don’t be surprised by the accommodations. Research them so your expectations aren’t too low or too high. A lot of the best skiing in the world isn’t necessarily near the best hotels.

Find out how the operation will approach the terrain. There’s a big difference between Alaska and Canada. Alaska is not conservative, Canada is. Go to Canada, and you’ll get a ton of skiing in. Go to Alaska, and you may not get a lot of skiing in, maybe two or three runs, but you’ll never forget them — they’ll blow your mind away.

Alaska’s maritime snow pack, in theory, has better stability. Hopefully you’ll be able to go to steeper lines. In Canada, things are not as stable, and taking people out to super-radical terrain is risky.Regarding heli safety, in America and Canada, you can rest assured that the equipment is up-to-date. But for operations outside the U.S. or Canada, you should ask questions and ask them seriously. In Russia, for instance, they fly the helis till they fall out of the sky.

Paying to play

Some operations charge by vertical (feet skied), some give unlimited vertical. (The former) may be so concerned about pumping out vertical that not all of the vertical is quality. Some charge by the heli hour. To me, that’s the most fair. You’re paying to go up and not paying to ski down. It’s also a safer way to run an operation, especially in a place like Alaska. If the clients want to look more at what they want to ski, then the heli pilot will hover longer; otherwise, with the most vertical, (the goal is to) get people up and down as fast as they can. But everyone has their opinions.

Friends on a powder day

Always put your own group together. The chemistry of the day can be so dependent on if you’re with people you want to be around. Even if it’s a bad day out there weather-wise, at least you’re with your buddies.

Yes, Alaska is rad

I give a very honest opinion about the Alaskan operations and what you can expect as a paid client. I definitely don’t sugarcoat anything. (In the past) there’s been so much focus on the wonderful parts of what these operations have to offer that a lot of times people come in and their expectations are so high that they’re disappointed.

There’s a quote about how the greatest things in life are the hardest things to achieve. That’s Alaska. It’s the best skiing on the planet, but you aren’t going to go up there like you go to Vail and just go skiing. You’ll probably experience a few days of horrible weather, and all these things are going to happen before you hopefully get that magical day. The van that picks you up may not have a working heater, you may not get into where you need to go because roads are closed, the phone lines go down, there are gaps in cell phone service — it’s Alaska.

But after you have that magical day, you’ll be coming back for the rest of your life.

Just guts, not glory

Fat skis have opened up the doors to everybody. People say, "I have to be a expert to do this." That’s a misconception. Despite what you see on the videos, they all have intermediate terrain.

A lot of guides love getting those people to come up — it’s a safer group of people to be guiding. You can go to an intermediate slope that isn’t as exposed to avalanches.

My father has come to Alaska several times, and he’s perfectly happy to ski a 2-mile-long run with a 25-degree pitch to it. He doesn’t need to land on a peak where your heart rate is going through the roof.

Weather, or not

(Skiers) who are disappointed are the ones who have been given the wrong info off the bat. Remember that for those beautiful shots that Warren Miller gets, the film crew will be there for a month to make that happen. It looks like one beautiful day by the time they edit it, but it’s a lot of work to get there.

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