Course & Dates

How the course works

The course runs for 6 weeks. There are five in-person evening lectures, three weekend tours, and one cabin weekend.

Lectures

In-person lectures are given by local industry professionals. Lectures cover various topics, including risk management and decision making, navigation, mountain weather, and end-to-end-trip planning. Each lecture is 2.5 hours long, and involves both slide deck presentations as well as interactive participation and demonstrations. Attendance at the in-person lectures is required.

Cabin Weekend

Cabin Weekend is a 2-day, overnight event at the Washington Alpine Club's Guye Cabin. We will be outside all weekend, but we'll be doing almost no skiing. We'll cover beacon checks, coarse and fine search techniques, single burial and multi-burial rescue, snow science, and snow shelter building. We use the weekend to put in the hours and repetitions for the fundamentals, so that we can all start the tours on the same foot. Attendance is required.

Weekend Tours

We guarantee at least 3 single-day tours. Prior to each day tour, you'll be assigned to a tour group and set of instructors. You will plan the tour as a group, and will use the material learned during the mid-week lectures to inform your planning.

On each tour, all groups will go to the same "area" (e.g. Mt. Baker backcountry, Alpental valley, etc). However, each group will ski different zone in that area, depending on what your group planned together. You'll rotate groups and partners for each tour.

Our goal is to increase the degree of independence that students have in planning the day tours as the course progresses. Instructors will be there to help you along the way and answer any questions or concerns you have.

Safety is our number one priority for the course. Because snow and avalanche conditions are variable, we often do not know whether a day tour will occur on the Saturday or Sunday of the weekend, until near the end of the week. We ask that you keep both days of the tour weekend open.

**Regarding an overnight tour

Historically, our goal has been to schedule one of the three weekend tours as an overnight, 2-day event. This means that we will be snow-camping. This event typically occurs at the Mt. Baker Artist Point backcountry area, and is often one of the most enjoyable events of the course for students. However, this event is very conditions-dependent -- snow-camping comes with its own risks and considerations, in addition to the avalanche conditions. As such, we cannot guarantee that the overnight event will occur. If the conditions allow for it, we will schedule this overnight event. If not, we will proceed with a day tour.

**Regarding a backup weekend

Sometimes, conditions are too dangerous or too miserable to venture out. If we end up in this scenario, we will leverage a backup weekend as a replacement for the rescheduled tour.

Dates and Events

Material

Learning material will be provided to you at the Meet & Greet. Reading is assigned each week from these two books.

• Backcountry Skiing: Skills for Ski Touring and Ski Mountaineering — Volken, Schell, and Wheeler
• Avalanche Essentials: A Step-by-Step System for Safety and Survival — Bruce Tremper
• AIARE Blue Book