A Christmas day tour traversing from Zupjok Peak to Alpaca Peak. This was a really nice tour in the sun, with spectacular views. Baldwin’s definitely right about saving this one for a sunny day when the snow is more suited to touring than yo-yoing. Another great trip in the Coquihalla!
After skiing along an old road for a kilometer and a bit, we climbed steep trees on the SW ridge of Zupjok, and gradually made it onto the broad summit.
From the summit of Zupjok, it’s a long gradual ascent up to Llama and finally Alpaca Peak, with some up and down along the way. It was pretty warm out, and the heavy snow made travel a bit slower.
Wind swept ridge
Paul demonstrating snow plow technique in the highly variable wind swept terrain along the ridge. We didn’t bother taking off our skins since the descent wasn’t very long.
Justin traversing along the ridge, towards Llama Peak. I really like the light and shadows in this photo.
Paul skiing up, with a sub-peak of Zupjok behind him.
Justin, and the Anderson River range.
Some awesome granite domes. The Anderson River Range. The Anderson River Range. Steinbok, Ibex, Les Cornes, Chamois
Sunny touring
Bluebird
Looking towards Vicuna Peak. A few of us scrambled up the other side earlier in the fall.
Justin at the summit of Alpaca.
Evening light. This was at 2:30pm, it sure gets dark fast.
Group shot. We were a little bit concerned about time, since we really didn’t want to ski down the icy steep trees in the dark.
A go go go kind of day.
On the way home, still a long ways to go. A few more up and downs to go.
Evening glow on Yak.
The highway below
Justin skiing down from Zupjok, after having done the traverse to Alpaca on Christmas day. It was a race against the sunset to make it through the steep trees in the light.
Justin sideslipping down the icy trees. This was actually alot better than snowplowing the mashed potatoes higher up.
A few more photos
Nice blog Rich! It provides a fast way to scroll through your best pictures. – Krystil
Thanks Krystil, that was basically the idea of setting up the blog, and making it so non-vocers can read the same trip reports that I put on the VOC message board