1st Chatter Trip 2008
Did someone say sick? Well they should have. I know you’ve all heard me rant about how amazing, cool, huge, etc Chatter Creek is, but no matter how many times I go there, and no matter how many times I talk about it, I just can’t explain it well enough. Our trip started off with a calmer then normal energy, having all been there before we knew to conserve our energy. The long drive out was shared this time with one of my best boyz Adrian who is also one of our mechanics here at GSR. As we rolled around the corner at the infamous “Rock Cut” we see something on the road… I HUGE boulder. The only way around was a sneaky goat path near a 300 ft. drop. I jam the truck i 4 wheel drive and roll out around the rock. Thinking of the other trucks behind us we decide to try and tow this rock… to make this long story short… couldn’t budge it, other trucks made it around too.
We load up the skiffs, leave the parking lot and head up the 17km long trail to the lodge. As we check in we get the not only the low down on the lodge itself, what room we are in etc. we also get the current avalanche reports danger warnings…
Yep, DANGER Warnings. This has been an extremely unstable winter here in Golden, and in Chatter where the snow pack is much fatter, there is more load. As the spring temperatures warm up the snow pack we were told to keep looking up, and stay away from suspect slopes.
These guys know there stuff! We witnessed multiple slides on this trip, some ranging from little soft slab, and sloughs, right through to some class two + and debris from larger ones that must have happened before we arrived! Real terrain!
We took it pretty easy the
first day exploring and boondocking around, and playing in a few fresh feet of
coastal type snow. Exhausted we returned to the lodge just in time for
‘snack time’ and a few caesars.
Before we knew it, time
for dinner so we headed up to the dining room ate an incredible steak and
potato dinner with I killer desert… (I actually ate two of them… ssshhhh).
Back down to the bar for
some more beverages and of course the odd story about how much better our day
was then the guys sitting beside us at the bar… or something like that!
We woke up to a cloudy sky
so we took our time after a HUGE breakfast getting ready. We ended up playing with Leo (son of
owners Dale and Isabel). First we
played ‘zoo’ on the breakfast table, and then headed out to the yard to shred
on his Kitty Cat. This three year
old can seriously hold his own on that thing!
The sky started to break
so we loaded up the gear and headed to the Chatter Glacier for a photo/video
shoot.
After a few tech airs and
some pow slashin’ we ate lunch (also provided for us by Chatter) and did about
1000 more donuts in the powder on the Glacier.
After our fairly mellow
morning of shooting we found a few features that had some consequence. After taking some long looks at them we
decided they were good to go. I
hit the drop first going a mellow speed to check the landing. Felt soft, and was fairly steep, so
someone through out the covenant “GAME ON”. BAM BAM BAM Mike and I put on the man boots and smacked it. Bigger bigger bigger, it was a contest
of drift until finally we simply ran out of landing. We were pretty amped at now so we found another jump right
away. This time a hip. BAM BAM BAM hitting this hip one after
another destroying the landing, crashing, whipping out, over whipping, chaos…
After a few more jumps and
a few more photos, it was game over. The riders were bagged, the photogs were either out of film, or their
fingers hurt from pushing the trigger, so we shut er’ down and headed back to the
Lodge.
Caesar time once again and
this time ‘snack time’ was a homemade pizza!
I’m telling you, it really
is the best place on earth!
A few more beverages, and
an amazing pork dinner, a few more beverages, and a few more beverages and I
guess we all went to bed… I think we even played pool for awhile in there
somewhere too… I think.
It was another cloudy
morning, and the weather was cloudy too so instead of going for a sled ride, we
decided to just relax around the lodge and wait for the sky/head to clear.
Eventually we simply
decided to pack up and head back to the trucks.
Chatter you never let us
down. Even when the ‘weather’
doesn’t cooperate it is still a trip to remember!
I can’t say enough “Thank
Yous” to the staff for having us, and to the owners for making such an amazing
trip possible!
To everyone who has been
to Chatter and can relate to this story CHEERS, and tell us your versions of your trip in the
forums, I’d love to hear it! And
to all of you that haven’t had this dream vacation yet, check out at www.chattercreeksnowmobiling.com
