NORTH AMERICA
O’ER THE RAMPARTS
Slip through Whistler Blackcomb’s gates for a multiday backcountry roller coaster on the Spearhead Traverse.
I stand on the edge of the world with a lump in my throat as big as Decker Mountain, the squared-off summit that sits between me and Whistler Blackcomb, about four miles away. Peaks smeared with chewing-gum-blue glaciers pock the horizon. Beneath the tips of my skis: about 10 feet of gravity and then a majestic flute of snow that unfurls the length of a football field to a flat spot, our camp for the night.
“Dropping!” I announce, before pushing into the couloir, where I land with a light thump. The snow is soft—the result of Mother Nature slow-cooking it all day—and I link a few easy turns before coasting to a stop. I’ve been backcountry skiing and winter camping for a decade in the Rocky Mountains, but this is the only time I’ve ever skied into camp. In Colorado, you have to climb up, up, and away to get anywhere good, which means you’re usually pulling into your hut or tent site on skins with leaden legs.
The Spearhead Traverse is different. The roughly 21-mile, horseshoe-shaped circuit, which links the Whistler side of the British Columbia–based resort to the Blackcomb boundary, starts on a chairlift. With the Epic or Epic Local passes, you cut out 2,500 vertical feet of climbing before you’ve even started the tour. Then you undulate through the glaciated Coast Mountains, hanging between 7,000 and 8,000 feet of elevation for most of the journey.
Plenty of backcountry guides lead clients along the route, whose climbs come in short but intense bursts, but you don’t need their services if, like my crew, you’re handy with a compass and topographical map and can comfortably negotiate—and gear up for—glaciated terrain and maritime snow conditions. So after ticking off a bucket list’s worth of descents inside one of North America’s largest resorts (32 lifts!), my six friends and I had loaded our overnight packs and left the frontcountry behind at the top of the Symphony Express.
We’d spent night one at the Kees and Claire Memorial Hut ($50 per person; reserve online 60 days in advance), just southeast of the ski resort, above Russet Lake. The shelter—which opened in 2019 as the first of a planned three-hut system—has propane cooktops, USB ports, toilets, space for 38 guests, and see-forever
