Dave Norona's sled menage

Crazy Sled Day

Well it all started this week with over 100 cm in the backcountry and things were shaping up nicely for a Friday Powder Session. Simon Beller and I took off early Friday morning setting a track up to the cabin on Brohm Ridge. It was foggy, snowy and very deep and after a few stucks we arrived to get some really deep turns. After playing in the lower trees we made out way to the alpine and down into the lower bowls. As we entered the lower bowl the sky opened and a white palet lay in front of us. It was awesome!

We played all day and around 3-4 o’clock we made our way towards the back way out of the mountain. Neither of us had a watch, so we guessed at the time and decided to play a bit more. Soon we were down a gully I had never been but was sure it would pop us out in a place I knew. I was wrong and instead of taking the easy way out we decided to descend out to a big cut block I was familiar with in hopes we could skirt around the top and head down.

Upon reaching the cut block we decided it was much too steep to descend and so we began the hard work of skirting around the top at tree level with tons of wind lips etc…

Soon the sky began to darken and I knew we would be in the dark in just a short time. That time came and went very quickly and Simon and I found ourselves on a steep shelve, in the fog, in the total darkness and one dead cell phone….

We dug a bit to create a flat spot and took off to see if there was a way out. However with thick trees below and other hazards after about and hour we made the decision to abandon ship and walk out. This was hard and we spent another hour hiking around looking and hoping for enough vis to get us to where we needed to be. We had to make a fast call and so we did and decided to descend on foot through the trees to the road some 200-250 meters below. It was steep and waist deep. We finally dropped onto the road and began the arduous 14km trek down. First in knee and waist deep powder until we reached the main road where we had come up. This was at 10 km. We arrived at the cars to a waiting RCMP who had come to check out the parking lot after people had called to check in on us. We felt so bad for our amazing girlfriends and friends who were rallying a search party and Greg who had his heli on stand-by.

All was good and we celebrated over beers and pizza until 1 am trying to figure out how we would get our sleds out.

The next morning, Ole, Catherine, Frank, Mike, Brad, Simon and I arrived at the cut block with our skis and skinned into our sleds. The warm temps had made the snow much denser and so Brad and I were able to pin it up the slope traverse across the top and after a few dicey moments gets our sled out…Yahoo….!! A wild adventure to say the least.

I just want to say sorry for making people worry and thanks for caring so much and everyones help getting us out!