Aidan Goldie-Ahumada used his CalTopo Adventure Grant to return to his home country of Chile to attempt several ski mountaineering missions. With limited information available, Aidan and his team were challenged to build their own forecasts across three distinct snowpacks. He left with a new perspective, and some of the best ski descents of his life. Below is his trip report- enjoy!

In the austral winter of 2022, I was afforded the opportunity to take a trip to Chile with the generous support of the CalTopo Adventure Grant. The goal of the trip was to ski remote volcanoes in the Andes range of South America. Our month-long trip gave us a little bit of everything, from extended ski tours in challenging conditions to some of the best ski descents of our lives. This trip report will highlight a few of the locations we visited and how we approached the process of trip planning for a variety of objectives.

This trip was particularly meaningful for me due to my Chilean heritage. I was born in Chile in a coastal town surrounded by the Atacama desert. After a few years, our family emigrated from Chile and ultimately settled in North America. Chile, for many years to come, was a country where I would visit to see family around the holidays, eat good seafood, and enjoy time on the beach. More than anything, this trip granted me the opportunity to see my home country in a new way. Through the lens of ski mountaineering, I was pushed into small mountain towns and remote locations that I never had the chance to experience otherwise. It is a privileged opportunity to feel like a tourist in your home country and witness the regionality of a country as diverse as Chile.

At the present moment, I live in the Roaring Fork Valley near Aspen, Colorado. In Colorado, we are very lucky to have an infrastructure to both access high-elevation mountains, and dedicated weather and avalanche forecasting. Every winter, I get into a morning routine that starts with the Colorado Avalanche Information Center bulletin quickly followed by a trip to CalTopo for the rest of my trip planning. This is a luxury that I, and other Colorado-based backcountry skiers, have because a lot of the burden of data collection falls onto other avalanche professionals. We have a talented group of avalanche forecasters around the state, and the American west, that post their observations online for others to see. These observations, along with user-submitted observations, are compiled in the form of an avalanche forecast that can highlight the critical avalanche problems that one can anticipate on a given day. This is especially important in Colorado as we will hold a tricky avalanche problem called a “persistent weak layer” throughout most of the winter. It takes many observations over a large spatial range to identify the nature of that avalanche problem so having that forecasting infrastructure is important for backcountry skiers in Colorado to recreate within appropriate margins of risk.

When you access mountains in remote parts of the world, that privileged infrastructure ceases to exist. In essence, you need to be your own forecaster. This includes tracking the season’s historical snowfall to predict the structure of a region’s snowpack, tracking weather patterns and conditions, and making field-level assessments to verify modeled forecasts. My professional-level avalanche certifications have given me a foundation to do this individualized forecasting but I have found CalTopo to be a particularly useful tool that compiles a lot of that forecasting data in one location to get a clear picture of both the snowpack and the day-to-day conditions that can influence the avalanche problems.

In this trip report, I will highlight three distinct regions of Chile that we visited and the three distinct snowpacks that we encountered. Each type of snowpack takes a different approach to trip planning and terrain selection. All of which necessitated the use of remote weather forecasting and high-quality mapping software such as CalTopo.

Los Lagos: Maritime Snowpack

Chile’s Lake District is defined by the many lakes and Andean foothills that lead into the Pacific Ocean. From these foothills emerge a chain of volcanoes birthed from a major tectonic subduction zone that created the Andean Mountain Range.

Our trip started in the heart of Chile’s lake district and the gateway to Patagonia, Puerto Montt. Settled in an ocean inlet with a topography that allowed the construction of ports that can accommodate large cargo ships, Puerto Montt is a bustling city with dramatic volcanoes on the horizon. With moisture-laden air quickly rising from the ocean and onto the peaks only a short distance from the coast, we found a heavy maritime snowpack. A maritime snowpack is characterized by the moist ocean air that will drop deep and heavy snow as it makes its way up and over the Andes. Throughout this district, we would see a distinct snow line as rain transitions to sleet and then to heavy wet snow as the moist air quickly rises in elevation and begins to drop that moisture as the air pressure decreases.

In terms of avalanche concerns, we would expect to see a stronger deep snowpack structure and avalanche concerns arising from newer storm snow.

The highlight of this leg of the trip was on the prominent mountain seen from Puerto Montt, the Osorno Volcano. When we first arrived, we took our rental around the large Lago Llanquihue with black-sanded beaches and marveled at the fresh coat of snow that had fallen only a few hours before. We drove on a road that snakes through a lush rainforest with a thick understory and dark volcanic soil. As we wind up the side of the mountain we quickly start seeing this rainforest transition into a snowy landscape as we reach the critical elevation where colder temperatures can support snow crystal formation.

The small patches of snow on the side of the road quickly turned to snow banks and then suddenly the road was impassable. We would later learn from a local that this snowstorm dropped snow at some of the lowest elevations in about 10 years effectively closing the road further down than it had closed in recent memory.

At the road closure, we were a couple of thousand feet below and a handful of miles away from our intended stay for the night, the Refugio Teski. We packed up our bags for a couple of nights and toured up to the Refugio which also serves as the base of the small Osorno ski lifts. We found the Refugio surrounded by drifted snow and a small staff waiting inside. The staff at the Refugio Teski was very accommodating as we dried our gear and got our packs ready for a long outing the following day.

From the Refugio, we climbed another 5,000 feet to the summit of Osorno early the next morning. The previous evening we watched strong winds take snow up and over the volcano as a prominent lenticular cloud formed over the summit. We would need to ski the windward side of the volcano and hope that the wind had not carried too much of the fresh snow over to the other side, otherwise a very firm and icy climb and ski descent awaited us.

As we started touring up the western flank of the volcano, we quickly observed the difference that a small aspect change can make in the snow quality. On the southern side of the mountain, the aspect that took the brunt of the gale-force winds, we found large swaths of rime ice-crusted ski-lift towers and ridge lines. Following the contour of the mountain towards the west, the snow softened up and revealed a nicely preserved, albeit slightly wind-buffed, western aspect of the mountain that would make for an excellent ski descent. We made quick work of the climb, skinning through the soft and supportable snow until the slope became too steep to skin the closer we got to the summit crater. On the summit, we found a clear and calm moment to eat lunch and enjoy the rarity of a calm Patagonian summit.

Our group transitioned our skis for the downhill and enjoyed a 6,000-foot ski descent along the western flank of Osorno with perfect and creamy powder turns along the way.

Araucanía: Intermountain Snowpack

With the great success of finding a long ski descent in great snow conditions we drove north to chase a storm in the Araucania region of Chile. Further away from the moist maritime air, the Araucania Mountains largely hold an intermountain snowpack, one that is characterized by greater temperature fluctuations than those found near the ocean-buffered maritime regions and therefore more variability in an intermountain’s snowpack structure. This variability is combated by a deeper overall snowpack that is needed to ski steeper objectives. We set forth to the mountain town of Pucon to catch a significant low-pressure system that was looking likely to deliver a monster snowstorm.

We arrived in Pucon late at night as the first snowflakes started falling and dropped 22 inches on the Araucania mountains overnight. With powder on our minds, we woke up early the next morning to pay a visit to the towering monolithic volcano above the town of Pucon, Villarica. As we started driving up the access road towards Villarica, we started seeing cars sliding on the steep road, a sign that we needed to stop and put on our chains. After wrestling the chains onto our tires we were only able to drive a few hundred more feet before a Chilean Police car made the call to stop traffic from going any further.

This is where we realized that a large snowstorm does not have the same effect as our Colorado Mountains. Here there isn’t the government infrastructure to plow the roads and make mountain roads passable for everyday citizens. This kind of investment is only made on select high mountain passes that truckers use to ship goods between Chile and Argentina. In the small town of Pucon, once the snow falls and makes a road impassable, that road remains impassable until the snow melts again. From this point we realized that our strategy of following storms would not be as effective as we imagined.

This poses a problem because a large snowstorm that would indicate a delicious powder day at home, only posed a great hurdle in accessing the higher mountains. At the road closure, we found an additional 5 miles and 2000 feet of elevation gain to ski on the Villarica Volcano. With that in mind, we decided to regroup and rest for a summit attempt the following morning.

Villarica is one of the few volcanoes in the Andes with an active summit crater. As a small child, I remember seeing the red glow of lava spurting out of the summit volcano during a particularly eruptive event. When the volcano is not spurting lava from the summit, one can still see a steady stream of vapor emerging from the summit crater. This vapor is a combination of carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide gas. Sulfur dioxide proves to be a nasty gas to interact with as it will come in contact with the water vapor in your lungs and create sulfuric acid and quickly tear away at your lung tissue if inhaled.

To make a summit bid, one not only needs a clear weather window but also a constant prevailing wind. It could prove dangerous if the wind, and the direction of the sulfur dioxide gas, shifted unexpectedly while we were on or near the summit.

With the threat of lung damage on the mind, we dug into the wind forecast for the area to determine the prevailing wind direction and strength and whether those variables would change during our summit attempt. CalTopo has a wind plot layer that displays current and forecasted winds and I’ve found it very useful in Colorado, particularly for forecasting wind slab avalanche problems in the event of a wind event following a snow storm. However because it pulls data from the National Weather Service, this feature is not available outside the continental US and thus was not a tool at our disposal for this particular objective. To learn more about wind plot as well as other weather forecasting layers, check out the Forecast Overlays section in the CalTopo user guide.

A PDF of Villarica generated from CalTopo with MapBuilder Topo and slope angle shading layers shown.

After a long morning skinning up the remainder of the access road and the southern flank of the volcano, we donned crampons and ice axes with the wind on our backs for the last 1000 feet to the summit of Villarica. With more wind effect and a ski descent on the windward side of the mountain, we did not get that dreamlike powdered ski descent that we got on Osorno but instead scraped down the icy and steep Villarica head wall before picking up some intermittent, chalky turns further down the flanks of the mountain.

Cajon Del Maipo: Continental Snowpack

After our time in the Araucania region, our group traveled north to visit one of the premiere ski-mountaineering destinations in Chile, El Cajon Del Maipo. We traded the comfort of skiing volcanoes for the thrill of making tight turns on long and steep couloirs.

Cajon Del Maipo is a mountain valley in the high-elevation Andes Mountains southwest of Santiago, Chile. Sitting on the border between Chile and Argentina, these mountains rise above 13,000 feet with the towering Aconcagua peak to the north. Here we found some of the most interesting and complex terrain of the trip that necessitated the use of a diverse skill set to both climb up and safely ski down.

This part of the Andes has less moisture than its maritime counterpart and some brutally cold high-elevation night-time temperatures. This yields a shallow snowpack that is particularly vulnerable to faceting. Faceting is a process of snow metamorphism that we are all too familiar with here in Colorado. In essence, faceting takes away the cohesive properties of snow and yields a snow crystal deep in the snowpack that is easy for the snowpack to slide on- think of a cutting board resting on the bed of marbles. Continental snowpacks are a staple of regions with comparatively shallow snowpacks and cold nighttime temperatures and pose unique avalanche problems.

One way to combat the persistent weak layer that readily forms in this type of snowpack is to focus your attention on solar aspects that will sinter the snowpack and potentially melt away some of those faceted snow crystals. While we would seek out south-facing aspects in our home Colorado mountains, in the Southern Hemisphere we would seek out north-facing aspects. CalTopo’s sun exposure overlay proved useful in our search for solar aspects, allowing us to not only find solar-radiated slopes but also allowed us to get an idea of the way that a region’s topography affected snow as well. To learn more about using this layer, visit the Sun Exposure overlay section of the CalTopo user guide.

This tool helped us to predict that the long and steep apron of the line we were planning to ski had experienced a significant amount of solar radiation, and could be consolidated to a point where we could safely skin up that vulnerable portion of the line in the cold early morning hours. The tight couloir above is sheltered from the day-to-day sunlight and would require small-scale decision making as we navigated. The ideal conditions would be to ski chalky and supportable snow in the couloir and then catch sun-softened snow on the apron.

As we made our way beyond the apron and climbed into the couloir above us, the scale of the line quickly became apparent. This peak holds three parallel couloirs that each are roughly 3,000 feet in length and would require a couple of hours of delicately placing our crampons on the firm snow. We navigate the couloir, alternating from side-to-side to find slightly softer snow while making careful assessments of the snowpack. We step wide of panels of wind-drifted snow considering the snow slab that could have developed.

Finally, we rest at the top of the line where the continuous snow ends and gives way to an overhanging rocky ledge above. We carefully remove our avalanche shovels from our packs and dig benches in the 50-degree slope to step into our bindings. We begin the careful dance of meticulously orchestrated jump turns, edge to edge, rotating our hips with our eyes firmly locked down at the 3000 feet of edgeable but firm snow below us.

Closing Thoughts:

This project offered significance in two different areas in my life. This project represents an elegant progression in my career as a ski mountaineer, as well as a rare opportunity to not only return to my birth country but to rekindle intimate cultural connections through travel and exploration.

From a ski-mountaineering perspective, this project is an opportunity to climb and ski in a region that is largely ignored by western climbers. As a ski mountaineer, I needed to rely on my ability to draw on a wide library of refined climbing systems to safely access this terrain. This trip challenged my experience as an avalanche professional to forecast conditions remotely and with limited remote sensing data. This expedition represented the union of a lifetime of mountain skills and a key test for myself in my climbing progression.

Most importantly, this project represents a reunion with my cultural roots. As an immigrant to the United States, my parents and I left Chile with tremendous sacrifice knowing that their children’s outcomes can improve with the abundance of resources an American has access to. I am thankful for the life I have been able to live in the United States and the opportunities to grow as an ecologist, educator, and ski mountaineer. As any immigrant will find, the opportunities opened up can’t fill the hole left by the trauma of leaving family and culture behind on a different continent.

I was born in the Altiplano of Chile, not the mystical Patagonia that is so often romanticized by western media, but the vast, high-elevation, salt-encrusted earth at the northern end of Chile. There is a strong foundation of culture in Chile, one that intimately ties people and the Earth.

This a reminder that we are not a species removed from the earth, but part of the biosphere. Throughout this trip, as we made our way from snowpack to snowpack, from ecosystem to ecosystem, I saw a culture that was fundamentally Chilean, but distinct in the way that different communities were tied to their natural surroundings. A fundamental contrast from the life I have built in the United States. Chilean communities shape their lives around their home ecosystem rather than trying to change the natural space around them to fit their lives.

As Chile grapples with the lasting effects of a military dictatorship and modern neoliberalism, communities tucked away in remote and ecologically diverse regions of the country best exemplify what it means to be Chilean. A community-centered culture that shows love through food, family time, and an intimate connection to the environment they belong to. I am grateful for the many people that made this trip possible. Thank you to the CalTopo Adventure Grant for supporting my trip and others in their exploration of under-explored parts of the globe.

Aidan used CalTopo’s international base layers to plan his ski mountaineering objectives. CalTopo offers worldwide coverage for the MapBuilder Topo, MapBuilder Hybrid and Global Imagery base layers as well as more limited international coverage for Scanned Topos. These layers can be downloaded for offline use on your mobile device with a mobile, pro or desktop subscription. Visit our Individual Accounts page to learn more about the features and pricing of CalTopo’s individual subscriptions.

Miles Knotek is a 2022 CalTopo Adventure Grant recipient. Along with one other partner, he attempted to traverse Montague Island in Prince William Sound of Alaska via a 60-mile long spine of mountains. Below is his trip report- enjoy!

The engine of the Cessna increased in pitch and volume as the small plane accelerated down the beach and lifted into the air. It climbed above San Juan Bay and curved behind Stair Mountain, leaving only the sound of waves crashing on the sandy beach. My partner and I looked at each other and laughed nervously. We’re here now, nowhere to go but forward.

Unloading the plane on the beach of San Juan Bay.

My partner Ben Americus and I had just landed in San Juan Bay on the southern tip of Montague Island in Prince William Sound of Alaska. Our goal: to traverse the length of the island from south to north along an approximately 60-mile long spine of mountains. Until 2010, when the US Coast Guard decommissioned their base on Attu Island in the Aleutians, Montague Island had the distinction of being the largest uninhabited island in the country. Now the second largest, it’s home only to salmon, coastal Alaskan brown bears, and Sitka blacktail deer.

Our route, including bail/shelter options, probable campsites, and our intended route along the spine of mountains. 

With the plane gone, we turned and headed for the forest to start our journey. The initial half mile was our only portion of trail for the entire trip as it led to the San Juan Bay Cabin. From 1988 to 2018, my father came here every year deer hunting. I joined him in 2009 to help fill the family freezer. The cabin was just as I remembered it, and flipping through the worn log book was a walk through time. I read past entries each with a similar theme of bear, deer and weather, tracing my father’s past trips back to the early 2000’s. The October 2009 entry was written in my scrawling script as 14 year old Miles described a 5 day storm and sparse deer. After appreciating the cabin, we had a quick lunch and pointed ourselves towards the ridge, just visible above the towering stands of spruce and hemlock.

We crossed open muskegs with high bush blueberries and salmon berry bushes bending under their late summer bounty. We grabbed handfuls of the sweet fruit as we hiked up. In typical Alaskan style, we very quickly found ourselves in a thick ravine of brush and were soaked in minutes. Although the day was blue and bright, the vegetation held onto the previous day’s rain. For an hour and a half, we battled our way through the coastal Alaskan jungle, grunting and cursing as we occasionally lost our footing and slid back down the slope. After a futile foray into a hemlock thicket that we thought was a shortcut, we finally burst onto the ridge, blue sky above and the expanse of the Pacific Ocean stretching unbroken to the South and East. To our North and West lay the myriad of islands, inlets and coves of Prince William Sound crowned by the high glaciated peaks of the Chugach Range brilliantly white against the blue sky. We couldn’t believe our luck at the weather and with our spirits buoyed by being out of the brush, we started North along the ridge.

Sitka Blacktail deer on the ridge.

At an elevation of about only 1300 feet, the beginning of the ridge was just barely above treeline. We weaved back and forth on and off the crest to avoid more thick hemlock clusters that straddled the crest. We bumped in and out of small bowls, spooking deer out of each one we entered. With the ridge trending up in elevation, soon the trees were left behind and we were greeted with open tundra. Prince William Sound is among the wettest places in the country. Averaging over 200 inches of rain and 250 inches of snow a year, Montague Island is a place dominated by water. The tundra was unlike any I had seen elsewhere in Alaska and more closely resembled a bog even on the rocky ridge. Shin deep sphagnum moss and deer cabbage blanketed the slopes and even on a warm and sunny day, our feet were soaked all day long. Small pools and ponds lay in the bowls and muddy puddles clung to shelves on the ridgeline.

From carefully examining the latest satellite imagery of the route with the Sentinel Weekly layer, we were able to see how much snow and melt water to expect on the trip. Initially we were worried about access to water, but thanks to this recent imagery layer, we were able to see that there would be plenty of places to fill up our bottles. To learn more about using weekly satellite imagery, check out the Sentinel Weekly section of the CalTopo user guide.

Looking South towards our start at San Juan Bay.

With each summit and point crested on the ridge, we were met with the ever increasing realization of the enormity of the task that lay ahead. The range we planned to traverse is vast and rugged. At times, we walked on cat walks the width of our shoes as the ridge fell away to either side. The terrain was incredibly engaging and breathtaking and easily one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. But as the day wore on into the evening, we realized that the movement was much slower than we anticipated. The slippery and ankle breaking tundra, loose scree and occasional fin of rock warranted slow and careful movement to avoid falling and we moved with care. We averaged about 1.5 miles an hour with each mile containing large climbs and descents.

Ben and our route looking North.

During the planning phase of this trip, I used the Global Imagery and Scanned Topo layers to identify potential campsites along the route for each day. It was really satisfying to spend so much time looking at the imagery at home to then recognize the location in real life. The accuracy and pin point detail of the layers meant we could quickly and easily find a place to set up camp. We called it a day after 12 hours and settled into our tent on a bench overlooking the Pacific Ocean, sun setting on the peaks around us.

Having access to different base layers, such as the Global Imagery shown above, made it easy to pinpoint potential campsites ahead of time.

I was awoken abruptly sometime in the early hours of the morning by heavy rain hitting the tent. I carefully unzipped the tent to look outside and was immediately greeted by a wall of white clouds. We knew that we had weather coming in, but the storm came in fiercer than forecasted. Perched up on the ridge, the Pacific Ocean stretching unbroken until Hawaii below us, the storm slammed our little tent. My partner’s tent, although super light and packable, meant that I was unable to stretch out fully so I was left in a half fetal position as the water started to pool in the tent at our feet.

Pushed in the zipper seams by the wind, the rain puddled and we used a gallon Ziplock bag to bail out a liter of water at a time. Ben used that time to catch up on sleep after a stressful previous week moving back to Alaska. Unable to get fully comfortable in my half curled position, I slowly felt the damp of the tent saturate my sleeping bag and tried to distract myself with a book. The winds picked up in the afternoon and we traded turns holding up the tent with our arms. 

Getting weird after 30 hours in the tent.

As I held up the tent with an outstretched arm, wind pushing back and fabric snapping in the wind, I was struck with the most intense feeling of exposure and vulnerability I’ve ever experienced in the outdoors. With nothing but a not so waterproof layer of nylon between us and the storm outside, I suddenly felt very small. I tried to make myself as comfortable as I could and focus on my book, but the feeling didn’t let go of me until the storm abated 30 hours later.

After the storm broke.

The next morning after 2 nights and one full day of storm, we awoke to a brilliant blue sky again. We commented on how quickly this place would go from heaven to hell and back again. Checking weather data after the trip, I found that it had rained 2 inches on us. Less than one percent of the annual amount. We felt humbled indeed.

We pulled out our wet sleeping bags and turned the tent upside down, water gushing out. Having only gotten out of the tent twice in 30 hours, and spending most of that time in the fetal position, I felt aged and stiff. We packed our bags, wet gear hanging off our packs and continued North along the ridge again.

Checking the weather forecast on our Garmin InReach, we knew we had about 48 hours before another even larger storm rolled in again. This storm looked to extend beyond our forecast range and promised even more rain. We communicated with our pilot and planned a pick up for the next night before the storm. We felt motivated to cover as much ground as possible. 

Our campsite on the ridge with blue skies after 30 hours in the tent. 

It felt like we had crossed some sort of invisible geologic line as the ridge suddenly became more knife edged and the slopes to either side steepened. The terrain was constantly engaging as we crested summits, dropped to saddles and traversed incredible ridge lines. Some sections required short scrambles of what we called “tundra-neering”. Short almost vertical sections of tundra required using our trekking pole tips almost like ice tools to gain purchase in the slippery tundra. As we continued along the ridge, bowl after bowl opening before us, we received a disappointing message from our pilot. Due to the incoming weather, and schedule conflict getting other flights out before the storm, he had to pick us up that night. We sat for a moment in disappointment. We had about 8 hours left in the trip, and we were determined to make the most of it.

Drying gear while hiking North

We quickened our pace but could see in the distance the terrain becoming more rocky and technical. It appeared to be our technical crux thus far of the trip. Knowing we had to find a landing zone for our pilot in his helicopter, we tediously continued, making mental note of possible landing sites. A couple hours later, we reached a point that continuing on meant moving into more technical terrain and risking our ability to find a spot for our pilot to pick us up. We were in no way going to risk getting stuck on the island for a week or more in bad weather. The thought of repeating the 30 hours in the tent, but stretched out to the length of a week-long storm was enough motivation for us to end our Northward progress on the ridge and find a decent site for the helicopter.

An alpine tarn looking South the direction we came.

With a full day hiking already behind us, we found a beautiful alpine pond situated on a bench with the perfect landing zone. We enjoyed the late afternoon sun, swam in the snow melt pond and made dinner. With the sun setting on us, we tried to enjoy our last hours on Montague Island. The disappointment was palpable, but it was hard to be upset given our beautiful location. With the sun setting on us, we sat on a moraine and reflected on the trip. I feel like I’ve never learned as much on a trip as I had the past three days. The remoteness and ruggedness of the terrain pushed me in ways that I had never experienced. 

Beautiful views on our route.

As our pilot picked us up, and we lifted into the air around 10 pm, the lingering late summer Alaskan light painted our route on the ridge line in reds and yellows. The pilot took us back North along the ridge in our intended direction and we were hit with just how far and ambitious our goal was. In two days of walking, we had covered about one third the distance. The entire route would take at least 6 to 7 days of walking barring any bad weather. Having just walked a section of the ridge, we sat with a new found awe of it as we flew north. It was an awe born of having already spent hours navigating its slopes and peaks getting to know each foot step intimately.

Flying North along the ridge looking at the rest of our route to be completed.

While we certainly tasted defeat, I in no way felt like the trip was a failure. The amount of learning done on this trip will be carried forward with me to every other I embark upon. I feel truly grateful to have experienced such a wild and remote place under the power of my own two feet. This island still remains large in my mind as a place of intense beauty, mystery and challenge, just as it had growing up hearing my father’s stories before me. Now, having taken my own journey, I can add my stories to the anthology of beauty and ruggedness that is Montague Island.

Until next time, Montague Island.

Miles brought useful layers like Global Imagery and Scanned Topos with him by downloading them to his mobile device. Offline downloads are available to mobile, pro, and desktop subscribers. Visit our Individual Accounts page to learn more about the features and pricing of all of CalTopo’s individual subscriptions.

Rain Felkl is a 2022 CalTopo Adventure Grant recipient. Along with three partners, she attempted to ski traverse the Lyngen Alps in Norway in late April. They also identified possible side trips for additional ski descents along the way. Below is her trip report- enjoy!

Our team of 4 – Clay James, Lisa LaCampange, Freddy Mondale and myself set out to complete the Lyngen Alps Traverse and with research beforehand we mapped out multiple ski objectives along the route.

Freddy and Lisa had recently moved to Zurich, Switzerland so it was helpful to use a shared CalTopo map for all four of us to add potential routes, ski lines and campsites as we read through the guide books. By using a shared CalTopo map, everyone could view the map and newly added objectives on their own schedule. To learn more about how to share and collaborate on the same map with your partners, check out the Map Sharing page in the CalTopo user guide.

Although we planned to tent camp for the entire route we mapped out the location of huts as shown in the map below. These are first come, first serve backcountry huts throughout the alps. They were much lower in elevation than our planned traverse route, however, a good escape option if weather were to come in. These huts came in handy and I was happy we took the time to map their locations beforehand.

CalTopo map showing the Lyngen Alps Travese (Scanned Topos and Slope Angle Shading layers)

We were going to complete the traverse in two legs taking about a week each with the ski objectives, the south side first and the north side second. In between the legs we would take a restock and rest day in the town of Lyngseidet. 

Once we arrived in Tromso the weather forecast was looking grim. The 10 day forecast consisted of mostly new snow and wind. We opted to give it a shot anyway knowing there are a handful of drainages to exit along the route. 

Bus stop to the start of the traverse. Photo by Rain Felkl.

Once we hit the high alpine on the first day it was white out and we continued forward navigating through until our first camp. That night it snowed a foot and winds were higher than forecasted. We checked the weather religiously that morning with no hope in sight for the foreseeable 10 days and the storm worsened for the next 4 days. We decided to swap our heavy packs and dehydrated meals for lower elevation tree skiing from the multiple backcountry ski huts within the Alps.

Low vis on day one. Photo by Rain Felkl.

Once we exited we caught the bus and made our way to the Magic Mountain Lodge in Lyngseidet. Freddy had stayed there a couple years back and knew it was an incredible location and place to stay for ski access complete with the friendly owners Patrik and Henrika. From here, we calculated our next moves. Regardless, we were going to be riders of the storm.

Next moves. Photo by Rain Felkl.

We decided on a ski hut with great access to trees for visibility, Kvalvikhytta. We made the hut home for the next four days surfing all the fresh powder! Our entire stay no one else came to stay in the hut, although we had two parties come in to warm up after a day trip up the drainage to ski. The hut caretaker told us to make it to the high pole he pointed out on a map and that the ski down from there was some of his favorite terrain during a storm, so naturally we made it to the pole. Great riding!

Fred and Lisa at the pole. Photo by Clay James.

After our stay at Kvalvikhytta, we traversed under Kavringtinden peak and Goalservarri peak back to Lyngseidet for a restock on food. That evening we caught the bus to our next drainage, staying at the Steindalhytta. The terrain around Steindalhytta had trees, beautiful large avalanche paths and access to Steindalsbreen glacier which led to large alpine peaks like Imagáisi and Nállangáisi. It seemed as though there could be a break in weather within the next couple of days so we wanted to set ourselves up in a position to access larger peaks if the weather did break.

As the storm continued we rode the glorious avalanche paths lined with trees and blanked in fresh new powder. One morning the weather was clear and we were ready. We rode a remarkable south facing couloir, then headed out to the glacier to potentially ride the NE face of Imagáisi. As we wandered up the glacier the clouds began to roll in once again, visibility rapidly decreased and the snow and wind began again. We descended the glacier back to the hut without riding Imagáisi. It was glorious to get up higher and finally get a view of potential terrain.

Lisa staring into the south facing couloir. Photo by Clay James.

After a couple days exploring the terrain around Steindalhytta, we exited to catch the bus back to our base in Lyngseidet at the Magic Mountain Lodge. From there we explored more terrain around various backcountry huts cross referencing CalTopo maps and Lyngen guide books for our next zone. With only a few days left in our trip and the weather windows being at very odd times of the night, we figured the best option would be to be flexible and stay in Lyngseidet and rent a vehicle instead of relying on the bus schedule.

With the snow continuing to fall we heard of a unique tree skiing zone in Tamok so we decided to take the bus/ferry to Tromso, rent a car and stop in Tamok to ride on our way back to Lyngseidet. Once we arrived, we realized the Øksehøgget Couloir was in the area. We decided to go give it a look and potentially ride it bottom up. No dice on the couloir as the wind picked up rapidly. It was a beautiful feature to come back to in the future. 

Øksehøgget Couloir. Photo by Rain Felkl.

Finally the late night weather window we had been waiting for appeared in the forecast and we were ready! We decided on Ellendaltinden’s inspiring west couloir. Since the sun wasn’t setting in Northern Norway at this time we really didn’t have a time limit and began walking at 3PM. The snow was pristine and deep. Lucky for us Patrick let us borrow his homemade verts before we left that evening. They were made with shovel blades and vollie straps, these saved our energy and worked fantastic. We swapped leads setting the 700 meter boot pack. We stopped just shy of the summit due to a hard wind slab formation. I had the best conditions and ride of the season surfing down Ellendaltinden.

Ellendaltinden west couloir. Photo by Freddy Mondale.

The boot pack. Photo by Freddy Mondale.

It was 2am when we arrived back at the magic mountain lodge, Freddy and Lisa went out for another ski around Goalsevarri while Clay and I went to rest. Our final day was clear but temps were high and there was no refreeze overnight, we tip-toed checking out a final zone out of Koppangen and didn’t get too far until the heat became overbearing.

The following day we left back to Tromso to collect our excess luggage we left at a hotel and spend the final night repacking before the flight. We hit the town and met some locals who had nothing but great things to say about Northern Norway and the access to inspiring terrain looking over the endless fjords. We are thrilled to make our way back to this land and give the traverse another shot when weather allows.

Lisa and Clay hyped. Photo by Rain Felkl.

Rain and her team used CalTopo’s international base layers to plan their ski traverse and objectives. CalTopo offers worldwide coverage for the MapBuilder Topo, MapBuilder Hybrid and Global Imagery base layers as well as more limited international coverage for Scanned Topos. These layers can be downloaded for offline use on your mobile device with a mobile, pro or desktop subscription. Visit our Individual Accounts page to learn more about the features and pricing of CalTopo’s individual subscriptions.