Corina had seen a nice gully she wanted to ride, but Janis didn’t feel like another day of ski touring, so I jumped in and we went for the Gully.
It was a nice and sunny morning when we arrived at the Asulkan parking area. Because the Asulkan valley is not a part of the avalanche controlled areas, no permit is required. It was Sunday and the parking lot was pretty busy but once we left, there were not many people around us. The skin track leading into the valley is a wide highway with a couple of junctions. But there are sings and the way is obvious.
On the way we already saw the gully we wanted to ride. Once we were in the Mouse Trap, a area where three avalanche paths come down, our way was clear. So we cut into the left slope and ascended. For some parts we could use old skin tracks but there were also some parts were we had to put a new one in. When we were half way up some local guys passed up and put a track in. The last half was partly boot packing and skinning. In some parts it became very tyring because the snow was deep and soft. We continued our way up until we reached the top of the big gully. But on the way up we discovered that the snow in the big gully didn’t look very promising to us, so we decided to go first for the wide open face which was untouched and than drop into a smaller gully.
At the time we were at the top we saw some guys coming up our way. They stopped some meters below us and dropped into the slop just a few seconds before us. In my opinion a very rude thing to do, when you consider that they used our skin tracks and we saved them a lot of effort.
The first part was an enjoyable ride in the sun. At the top of the smaller gully we were very happy about our decision because the snow looked fabulous and the gully even a bit steeper than the big one. The ride down was just fun. We were the first ones to put in tracks which made it even greater. At the bottom of the gully we had to follow the creek through the trees in order to get back to the main valley. It was not very steep but offered some nice spots. Back at the bottom we were happy about a nice run.
Now there was the hard part, especially for me as a splitboarder. The Asulkan Valley is long and quite flat, so a terrible spot to ski out. But if you take your time it is not to bad, just don’t hurry.
Tour information:
Ski Touring in Rogers Pass by Eric Dafoe and John Kelly, Revelstoke, Reviewed 2010, Page 45
ju4splitboarding 