Author: Ekai J
General area: Cariboo Mountain Hut
Trip start date: 2021-01-03
Number of nights: 1
Spent a nice night out at the Cariboo Hut. Despite living in the area for a long time, I’d never even heard of it before this year!
Snow conditions were not bad, considering the red/red/red avalanche forecast. To keep it safe, we stayed below treeline, sticking mostly to 20-30 degree slopes. Cabin is in good shape, with lots of firewood.
Unfortunately we could only drive to KM 28 (https://goo.gl/maps/VvpjgPLxynoXVGXf8) (52.917052, -121.772507). The road had been plowed past there in the past but there was no recent activity, and sledders have made it more or less impassable even to 4x4s. So we unloaded the sled, popped in the earplugs, rigged up the tow rope, and the little m7 dragged 3 people and overnight gear all the rest of the way in. For those who dont know, at km 35 there is a fork to the right to ‘M’ road, then at ~M40 is the cabin. I was instructed by a very helpful Cariboo ski touring club (of course after purchasing a membership!) that there would be a ‘NO SLEDDING PAST THIS POINT’ sign at km 39.5. Either we did not see it, or it has come down. Parked the sled at km 40 marker, then went in search of the cabin, armed with some gps coordinates (52.871028, -121.651194).
Because I’m no wuss, I did not pull out the GPS until we got lost, and it turned out we were in the right creek gulley, just 200m above the cabin, which turned out to be ALMOST right on the side of the road…
We dumped our (excessively heavy) overnight gear and headed up to the treeline, where we scoped lines for another day. In situ tests along the way triggered nothing but surface slough. There was slight settlement feeling but no whoomphing or any cracks. Did a bit of skiing, and found ourselves (the two snowboarders) wishing they had installed the hut ~400m up the creek to keep a nice grade right to the door. Ah well, pipe dreams. Had some beers, cranked the heat, dropped our resident skiier off at the vehicles, sledded back to a nice hot meal, and played card games late into the night. The trip back to the cars involved some of THE MOST INCREDIBLE stars I have ever seen. No moon, perfectly clear skies, the milky way was vibrant to the naked eye… That night we went out again on skiis to try and get another look, but it was already lighter from moonrise and there were clouds moving in. During the night, exactly zero mice bit my toes, which was incredible. The flies slowly awoke as we heated the place up, and we did our part to cull them.
Huge props to the club. Cabin I understand is an old pirate cabin, and I’m so SO glad it exists. A word to the wary though: there is no insulation and the stove is an ancient beast. Plenty of sparks out the chimney, and it takes quite some time to heat the 600lbs of steel its made from, let alone the interior of the hut. However, the hut was still relatively warm by morning despite overnight severe winds and snow.
Following day we headed up a western shoulder as high as we could without hitting alpine and did one long lap. Dug a pit higher up (~1770m) and found nothing too unsettling. On the way down I went first and my follower described setting loose a small surface slab (8-10m wide) which held together alarmingly well.
Honestly, I was out to feel the bad snow, and in the end I was a little disappointed it was so good… Part of me suspects the ‘electric’ buried hoar/reactive crust problem described by Avalance.ca only exists further west on the Valemount side… Had a long lunch and delayed and delayed and puttered around bleaching all the surfaces and eventually sledded out at dusk with the snow coming in hard and horizontal.
All in all, a fun, ‘event’ free trip, and I cant wait to go back with some better avvy conditions and ski some of the lines we scoped!
Sounds like a fun trip! Thanks for the story!