Can We Make it Up Cloudburst?

Friday, April 18, 2025:

Who would turn down one last spring ski tour hurrah? In the midst of finals and formulating summer plans, Duncan Macintyre decided to post a ‘beginner-friendly’ overnight ski tour trip to Cloudburst Mountain. The idea was to introduce elementary ski tourers into the land of winter camping and minor suffering. A prerequisite, though, was everyone had to have their AST-1. This little detail might have saved the trip from complete disaster, despite the lack of avalanches.

Duncan, Tristan Lefferts, Kat Krupova, and myself piled into one car and left UBC at the ripe hour of 2:30 pm. (Prior commitments caused the trip to have quite a lazy start.) Simon Tsianikas, Justin Lau, and Eleanor Hsiun drove up in another. Our first hurdle was traffic. Advice for the future: maybe it’s a bad idea to try to drive up the sea to sky in the afternoon on Good Friday. But alas, as the fearless leader Duncan said, “We’ll get there when we get there.”

And so, we got to the giant hole in the road at approximately 5 pm. Now, in doing research for this trip, there was no indication that it should be difficult to ascend this particular FSR. And yet, it seemed Duncan’s Mazda was having trouble. The hole was wider than his car and encompassed most of the road, with slivers of a smooth path on both sides. We all got out of the car and directed him as he tried going to the left. Tires spun out. Then to the right – tires spun out. Left again. And, tires spun out. Shit. Our next plan of attack was moving rocks to fill parts of the hole on the sides and hoping that would provide the necessary support for the car. Result? Tires spun out.

Thirty minutes later, we stood there contemplating our plan. It was already 5:30 pm and we had no idea if Justin’s car was ahead of us or behind us. For all we knew, his car would not be able to pass this blockage even if we could. And for all we knew, the road ahead would prove to be unpassable. A certain resignation came across us. Maybe we should just call it a day and go back to swim in the river.

Left PC: Tristan Lefferts | Right PC: Sonali Das

What if we just tried one more time with twigs instead of rocks and packed in the dirt really hard? With a determined face and a foot clamped on the gas, Duncan did it. We literally cheered and hope was renewed. We were gonna make it up no matter what.

The road after was bad, but negotiable. As we drove up through the evening light, we saw the river descend below us as the mountains crept up to the sky. “This made the trip for me, even if we have to turn around right now,” Tristan laughed, as we all experienced that fulfilling sense of awe and beauty only the sight of the peaks can evoke. Finally, our radio signal caught and we learned that Justin’s car was ahead; they had not suffered the same problems that we had. And so we traveled on together, crossing a river and putting on our snow chains when conditions got deep.

10 meters later, the tires glitched out. Duncan went to investigate. There was a steep-ish uphill slope, deep snow, and no way we would make it. We were still kilometers away from the point Duncan had thought we would be able to drive up to and it was late – almost 8. But we had no choice. We reversed the car, parked, and got our ski gear on. Time to skin up.

That lasted for about 3 minutes until the road became brown again. We carried our skis until the white patch came, put them on, only to take them off again. We walked and walked, and began to wonder when we would stop. It seemed the road would stay dirt for a ways. Our spirits low and our minds cranky, we gathered in a circle and decided we should make A-frames. Except, problem. Two people hadn’t brought their hiking boots from the car and we were expecting to be bootpacking for 2 hours. “Honestly at this point, we could just camp here and go up tomorrow,” Elanor suggested as Duncan ran back to the cars to get their boots. Everyone was trying to maintain good spirits, but it was becoming quite a chore to patch a smile on the descending evening.

PCs: Sonali Das

Duncan returned and we started moving. Our packs were heavy, but our spirits climbed high as we actually made progress for what felt like the first time all day. We were doing something, despite our constant lamentations that we totally could have driven this road and this was all a waste of time anyways. At 10 pm we hit snow again, strapped on the skis, and began the ascent that Duncan planned to arrive at about 5 hours earlier. At this point, our plan was definitely adjusted. We knew we probably would not be able to sleep in the alpine like we had hoped, but we just wanted to cover as much ground as possible. At around 10:30, however, we were feeling quite beat and found a bubbling waterfall next to a stretch of flat land. We decided to make a somewhat unconventional camp. Duncan, Kat, and I squished into Duncan’s two-person tent for warmth, while Simon slept right next to the river, preferring the blaring rush of water as a soothing source of ‘white noise.’ Eleanor and Justin were normal people in their individual tents.

What time should we wake up tomorrow? “I prefer not to be too early. Maybe 8:30?” Simon said. I laughed. “What kind of VOC trip have you been on? We should wake up at 7.” 7 was vetoed, so we compromised for 8 the next day. I passed out cold.

Saturday, April 19, 2025:

I woke up at 8:20 and the irony was not lost on me. Simon was up at 7:30, for God knows what reasons. Duncan had snoozed his alarm, and I had slept through it altogether. So, the morning was not early. We set out for the summit at about 10 am. We were making good progress at the beginning, with much lighter packs since we had left our tents and night gear by the streams. The sky was sunny and our conversation was light and flowing. Some minor obstacles came in our way, like a river crossing that we had to shuttle our packs across, but it was pretty smooth sailing. After some time, we saw the summit from our vantage point. It looked miles away. Would we make it? We forged ahead.

Left PC: Tristan Lefferts | Middle PC: Sonali Das | Right PC: Sonali Das

At around 1, the clouds started to roll in fast. We sat down for a snack break and the sunny skies disappeared. Visibility was low, and we questioned the safety of the avalanche conditions. Would we be able to see? We couldn’t assess where we were. After a series of unfortunately difficult kick-turns for people like me who cannot quite figure out how to stand on one leg and kick out with the other, the skinning became a slog. Justin and Eleanor were great teachers, giving me tips and trips, but the going was still slow. The visibility was close to zero and we passed by a couple of skiers who had just been to the summit. They said they couldn’t see anything. Our hopes to get to the top were looking less and less likely. Maybe we would have to turn back. At least we’d gotten that far. It had been pretty, we’d seen good views. Summit fever might have to wait for next time.

We decided to hunker down in this convenient tree well, taking shelter from the wind and eating our lunch to see if the clouds would pass. It was 1:30 pm. We would probably be able to make it to the top if we left soon and still make it down in time to get to the cars and down the shitty FSR before dark, but only if we were fast. We gave it half an hour. If it hadn’t cleared up, we would bail.

Luckily, blue skies peaked out from behind the grey masses and we decided to give it a go. Approaching a series of rather steep hills, we had to kickturn our way to the top. I once again struggled, but Elanor gave me a hand. Justin congratulated me on every well-done turn, though I eventually fell behind the group when the steepness factor exponentially increased. So this was the ‘minor suffering’ Duncan had spoken of. I was tired but didn’t want to admit it, hopelessly behind, frustrated, and a tiny bit scared. Despite it all, I knew I should continue to push forward. I wasn’t at my limits. I could do this.

PC: Sonali Das

Eventually, I caught up with the rest of the group. We’d made it! Almost. As we looked out at the
Summit close by, we marveled at the massive cornice hanging precariously off its edge. The AST-1 alarm bells were ringing in my head, and in Kat and Eleanor’s too. Imagine if at the end of all that, we decided to defy the odds and ended up dead. It seemed too risky to be worth it.

PC: Duncan MacIntyre

Duncan suggested we go on a little bit farther and see if there was enough space on the left to safely pass by. We agreed that that would be wise and upon further investigation, realized we had identified the true summit wrongly. It wasn’t at the top of the huge cornice, but rather was farther across and to the left. There was also plenty of space to pass by the cornice without it being risky if we stuck to the previously bootpacked path. So, all of us decided we were comfortable giving it a go. After about five minutes, we arrived at the tower. What a sight it was. We had made it up Cloudburst.

PC: Justin Lau

Staring in awe and reveling in our championship, we rejoiced for a journey well-spent. Photos were taken. Hands were shaken. Sorry, I meant we gave each other high fives. I wanted to rhyme though to assert the epicness. Trust me, it was epic. You can’t capture it in the photos, but there was almost a panoramic view of the Tantalus range on the left side all the way over to Garibaldi on the right. The mountains soared over the valleys as the ___ river ran through. Clouds burst through the sun, or was it the sun burst through the clouds? I can’t remember. But one thing is for certain: a smile burst through our eyes as we looked over the sheer majesty that lay before us. This was it.

PC: Duncan MacIntyre

At 3 pm, we began our descent down. The adrenaline of the summit fell off as I struggled to keep my skis in line down the ice. They slide all over the place, seemingly out of control, and I wondered if getting down the mountain would be harder than getting up. Coming to the place of extreme difficulty kick-turning up, I bootpacked down with Duncan. There was just no way I would be able to ski down that terrain in that ice. Luckily, the ice stopped soon after and it became gentle powder. I got my footing, more or less, and we whooped down the slopes. Still, progress was slow and we were not super sure we would get back to the cars on time. Weaving through the trees and forest, we tried our best to keep it quick. Yet when we arrived back to the tents, darkness was already encroaching. We packed up fast, skied down until the dirt, and began the long road bootpacking. Our favourite refrain from the previous day reappeared: we could have driven this whole thing. But instead, we walked it.

There’s a point when your A-frame is hitched upon your shoulders and you can feel them collapsing under the weight. That was about how we were feeling when we finally found the cars. Once again, jubilation struck as we removed the heavy packs and felt our aching shoulders breathe. “Was this a beginner-friendly trip?” Duncan asked. A conclusive no. Had a true beginner come on this trip, it would have been a miserable time. Requiring AST-1 luckily prevented that from happening. Cloudburst is tricky. Including just getting there. But despite the troubles and turmoil, we packed into the cars with that content VOC trip feeling of soreness and accomplishment. We achieved that one last spring ski tour hurrah.