Younger guys can ignore this first paragraph. On the other hand, you might want to keep reading. That especially if you know the call of adventure, and already feel the reality of “so many mountains, so little time.” Because for you, now is the time. And if you have doubts about that, just pick up John Baldwin’s 447 page guidebook and start a gas money jar.
New edition of Baldwin guidebook.
Yes, when the mailman delivered Baldwin’s 447 page 3rd edition of “Exploring the Coast Mountains on Skis,” not only did Baldwin tweak the mail guys back muscles with the weight of the new tome. But the author made me laugh because I’m one of those guys who has faith in heaven, and if I didn’t NEED such faith before this book arrived I do now, since things like the SIX month complete Coast Mountains Traverse (page 443) are just probably not going to happen for me here while I’m in this earthly cuerpo — but if doing such a traverse is as special as I think it is, I’ll get another chance to pull something like that off. Yes, so many mountains…”
Replete with everything from a trip rating system to an extensive trip planning section, those new to the Coast Mountains of Canada and the northern U.S. will have an edge if they study Baldwin’s book. Likewise, dealing with weather that produces biblical snowfall is also covered.
And don’t let my mention of six month trips scare you off. “Coast Mountains on Skis” also includes enough day trips to keep a backcountry glisser happy for a lifetime — and beyond. Terrific gift.
Shop for John Baldwin guidebook here. Oh, and THANKS JOHN for all your hard work communicating about the mountains you so obviously love with all your heart and soul.
WildSnow.com publisher emeritus and founder Lou (Louis Dawson) has a 50+ years career in climbing, backcountry skiing and ski mountaineering. He was the first person in history to ski down all 54 Colorado 14,000-foot peaks, has authored numerous books about about backcountry skiing, and has skied from the summit of Denali in Alaska, North America’s highest mountain.
17 comments
Nice to see Baldwin’s guidebook get a writeup here. It truly is an exceptional book. Lots of useful details without too much hand holding. It’s basically the bible for this corner of the world.
This guidebook looks like the kind of book one could drool over for hours. I have written–or edited–a guidebook, with a touring partner, featuring “sidecountry” tours in BC’s interior mountains (just head inland from the coast and hit the Selkirks/Kootenays). The book. called the West Kootenay Touring Guide, is on the shelves now and is backed up by a companion website at http://www.backcountryskiingcanada.com –where you can also order the hardcopy guid. I think this guidebook may be of interest to your audience. I wish we’d seen Mr. Baldwin’s book before we published our little guide—looks like he set the bar very high!
On theTwitter network today is an excellent link to an article about climate etc. I enjoyed it, If things need to be enlivened here, Lou could blog about that topic. :cheerful: Or, blog again about snowmoblies! :devil:
Randonne, don’t scare me! 😎 :biggrin:
Randonnee – can you link to the article on climate? Twitter is a big network to peruse in search of one page of prose. Thanks!
http://tinyurl.com/yzddlwx
Joel, Lou put the link her on the right margin of Wildsnow, that is what I was referring to. I shoiuld have written “n the Wildsnow Twitter Network.”
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Personally, I highly recommend the act of ski-touring in BC’s coast mountains. John Baldwin was always a big inspiration for my own missions there. I look forward to the new version of his book.
Some of the greatest and most intriguing guidebooks I own cover places like those in this book, and though I may have very few chances to explore such places, these tomes hold a prized place on my bookshelves like few others.
I’m looking at five of the routes as I type this. And there has already been 5.5 meters of snow. Sorry. :devil:
Mike, your are hereby excommunicated for too much flaunting (grin).
If anyone’s curious, John is still out there killing it. Lou, you’d be also gratified to know that he just switched from tele (older T3 plastic boots) to Dynafits.
Ah, another pair of tele bindings gets hung above the fireplace. It’s almost sad… :angel:
LOL, I can confirm, as I saw john on a pair of Dynafits this weekend.
As for the book, it’s certainly convinced me to smuggle my teles across the border more than once!
The first and only time I had the honor of skiing with John was 3 years ago, up on Joffre. He had his antique thin tele’s and I was on 2-buckle dynafit boots, dynafit tourlites and the new carbon fiber Goode BC 95’s. He was drooling over the set-up for a couple of days. So it’s good to hear he’s finally seen the light . . .
Not only is his guide book great, but his photography captures the spirit of the coast mountains better than anybody (His Coast Mountains coffee table book is amazing).
Trevor, wow, if anyone had the setup to seduce a tour skier over to Dynafit you had it!
I just wanted to say thank you for existing. This site is amazing and it makes me happy to know it’s here. It makes me feel so much better that there are good jobs out there for people like me who care about making this earth a better place for our children. I can’t say thank you enough to you guys for all the hard work that you do. It means a lot. THANK YOU.
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