After seeing this year’s offerings, I started out the season all hell-fired up about avalanche airbag packs and bought a BCA Float 30. Statistically, avalanche airbags are the most effective product available for surviving an avalanche (more than beacons), and I like the idea that you can do something to protect yourself, versus relying on partners and their beacons/shovels. I trust my partners, but if they get taken out as well or have a malfunctioning beacon, they won’t be much help. With an airbag, you feel like you have a bit more control over your own destiny.
My love affair with the BCA Float 30 was short lived. She had a fine personality, was well built and sleek, but put on too much weight. I used it about five times before deciding the entire package was just too heavy and sold it at a slight lost. The clincher for me was when I switched over to a superlight pack during a stable spell and then had a hard time getting motivated to take the Float 30 back out. An airbag system adds about 4-6 lbs to a backpack and when coupled with the Law of Luggage (the amount of stuff you carry will expand to fit all available pack space), it became a spirit crushing load that had me thinking about an exit strategy for the day on the first climb.
This led to a slash & burn weight reduction program which I’m still working on, but didn’t diminish my belief in the virtues of airbag packs. Fortunately, the three major players in the market all have 15-18 liter packs which will work for touring. Continue reading ‘Small Avalanche Airbag Review – Part 1′
Derail the Coaster Rally
Ever since I moved back to Utah 20 years ago, Snowbird has been aggressively pursuing physical expansion of the resort to the point that it is almost nothing new. On the Park City side of the Wasatch Mountains, most of the land is privately owned so development is a foregone conclusion, which has led to almost no free public access to the mountains on this side. You can exit out of the resort gates, but with no uphill traffic allowed in Utah, you need to buy a ticket first. In Little and Big Cottonwood however, the ski resorts are mostly on leased Forest Service land, so expansion is much more controversial and involves public input, which resorts must hate.
My first experience with the Snowbird expansion machine was about 15 years ago when they were proposing to put in a 50,000 square foot “warming hut” on top of Hidden Peak. It was billed as being architecturally sensitive to the surroundings, but from the artists sketches it looked like they wanted to construct the Sydney Opera House at 11,000 in the central Wasatch. I attended the public hearing which was standing room only and overwhelmingly against the idea. After an hour or more of comments against the idea, the Commissioners asked if there was anyone in the audience who wanted to speak for it, which is when I first met the Three Horsemen of Irrational Wasatch Development – a child, a senior citizen of European heritage and a person in a wheelchair. Five minutes later, the decision was made – in the name of doing it for the children, the handicapped, senior citizens and of course, to be World Class, it was approved. Thank you very much. Goodnight. Exit out the back to a roar of disapproval. Continue reading ‘Derail the Coaster Rally’