Stories and Stoke

Cypress Peak? Tricouni Peak? Make That Blackcomb Pre Season Instead

| by Mike Traslin, G3 Athlete

The very same bluebird weekend that G3's President Oliver Steffen and the MEC boys were getting the goods on Brohm Ridge, G3 ambassadors Mike & Andy Traslin were busy finding their own patch of powder elsewhere.

But where to go? Cypress Peak? Tricouni Peak? Blackcomb? We'll let Mike and the photos fill you in. My brother Andy sparked the original plan to hike and ski Tricouni after a friend had bailed on his other plans for the day. As is the case when trying to hit early season ski objectives... it is not always easy to find ski partners. So Tricouni Peak in Squamish was the goal for the day, or so Andy told me.. he can be somewhat of a sanbagger at times.

I was wandering why he had Matt Gunn's Scrambles book, bookmarked at Cypress Pk. Sure enough, after two hours of random driving, Andy finally admitted we were in the wrong drainage, and that he intended to ski Cypress Pk. "Oh Great" I thought, "What a way to waste a perfect sunny day". Trying to keep the mood positive... I suggested we hike to the top of Blackcomb Mountain, since the resort itself wouldn't be open for another couple of weeks. I remembered seeing photos on facebook of snow to the valley bottom of Whistler. Relying on my hunch we proceeded to drive North. After four and a half hours of driving we arrived at the Base 2 parking lot of Blackcomb (normally about two hours from North Vancouver). I was a little nervous at first, but releived when Andy said,"Oh cool, look there is enough snow to skin right from the car." And so it began. Just over three hours of skinning had us at the top of the resort, where we took a little water and food break. At this point we decided to have a look at the conditions on the Hortsaman T bar line. "OH BOY, untracked and cold smoke. Let's do it." After a few laps of fresh, we decided to use what daylight we had for some fresh turns down the classic Saudan Couloir Extreme. One of the better November ski days I can remember in rescent memory. Good times, became a foreshadow of anouther great day, a few days later.

Disclaimer... watch out for rocks lower down...bring your rock skis!

Author: Mike Traslin

Hailing from G3's backyard in North Vancouver, BC, Mike Traslin has been deep in the mountains for decades, summer or winter, on skis, feet or wheels. On snow he raced for the Canadian Ski Mountaineering team for 9 years, qualifying for the World Championships in 2008 and 2010, and landing on the Alpental Ski Mountaineering podium 6 times. His mountain bike career took off when he was the youngest (18) to qualify and compete in the first World Mountain Bike Championships. On snow he raced for the Canadian Ski Mountaineering team for 9 years, qualifying for the World Championships in 2008 and 2010, and landing on the Alpental Ski Mountaineering podium 6 times. Setting his sights deeper into the mountains, he scored first descents of Mt Chris Spencer, Waddintgon Range, new lines in the Mt Logan St Elias region, and all sorts of adventures in between. His global ski wanderings have taken him on adventures into the Coast and Interior of British Columbia, Alaska, Washington, Oregon, Yukon, and onwards to wide open spaces in South America, the Steeps of Europe (La Grave, Chamonix, Switzerland), the Tetons of Wyoming, the Sierras of California and many states and provinces in between.