Bam
Its funny yesterday morning was poring rain. It was pelting down onto the windshield as I drove to eagle pass guides meeting. My partners for the day were waffling and it really looked like a doozy of a day. I had looked at the weather forecast and it was supposed to get better. But as huge raindrops bounced off my windshield I wondered?
I knew that once I was done it was going to be sunny and nice for a few days. The eagerly awaited sun, that never really came for me all month, was going to show up once I no longer needed it. But at least give me a banger of a last day.
Eagle Pass Heli-skiing was going to drop us in the alpine so we could get some great footage with Sherpas cinema and Bruno long could get some good finishing photos. Which would make it a challenge to get my 10 grand in but also document the end of this madness. We flew up into the clouds and managed a high drop near where I was hopeing to shred. It appeared that Danyelle was having issues closing the compartment door on the back of the heli, so I went around, precariously stood on the skid and reached up and closed the latches. I gave the pilot the “OK” and he flew off. As he flew off, I realized the issue was not in closing the latches but in opening the door. So he flew away with Brunos, touring gear and more importantly his camera gear. Not a good start if you want to document the day!
The clouds stayed thick and heavy on the mountain so I banged off a few thousand feet of short runs, getting a little footage, and once the heli flew back, with the camera bag, a shot or two. But the whole time I was dreaming of this line.
Over ten years ago, Dan Treadway came to town for a magazine article on this sleepy town called Revelstoke. Scott Newsome and I took them up and dropped Dan off on top of this line. It was his first ski run in Revelstoke and he shredded it. I have wanted to lay some turns down it forever.
The weather began to break and we headed directly to this line, and shredded it. My instagram greg_hill_ski has a few seconds of the fun I had carving down this face.
With that run in the bag and the skin track back up, it was session time. Over the next 5 hours, I lapped this north facing ridge a total of 6 times. From wide open ramps, to sketchy rock entrances under huge cornices. It was all there and the skiing was off the hook deep.
The clouds rolled in and out all day and finally cleared completely for the last up of this March Madness. To hit 100 km I neeeded to tour a 10 000 foot day. So at 5:23 pm I hiked my final feet
to watch my number
And bamm I had successfully completed the biggest human powered powder month ever. 328,000 ft of effort, a 100 vertical km of wild powder skiing.
Leo, of Sherpas cinema asked me for some wise words. My first were ” judge me by my actions and not my words, but eventually I had a few words of wisdom.(maybe)
The biggest thing is that uncertainty in life is a good thing, not knowing what can happen is important. Trying to do things that you may not succeed at, digging deep and really finding out what you can do. I was full of doubt this whole mission, but I was also full of belief that if I worked hard, really hard, I possibly could achieve my goal.
Its another totally pointless greg hill goal, yet its the challenge that is important, the desire for more and the willingness to work hard towards something.