April 2015 above Hayes Glacier, Tordrillo Range, AK
Photo by Thaddeus Cooke
My childhood buddy Caleb had an offer from Tommy Wilson’s dad to fly a crew out for glacier skiing outside of Anchorage. Needless to say, Erick and I jumped at the chance. We roped in our friend Katy and took off for most of two weeks.
After a 1 am arrival in Anchorage, we crashed with another college friend of Caleb's, woke up for sunrise and set out for a few hot laps of Anchorage to find fuel, air canisters, CO2, bacon, kielbasa, frozen vegetables, hot sauce, a sat phone, and equally exciting/disturbing quantities of boxed wine and nutella.
The deHavilland Beaver is a 6 passenger plane produced from 1947-1967 and it's one of the most beautiful machines I have ever seen. We had the deeply satisfying experience of filling it to the gills with our supplies, our gear and ourselves. After some mild concern, I sequestered the last piece of luggage (a large bottle of whiskey) in my chest pocket and we took off.
The next eight days brought the full spectrum of Alaska glacier skiing. Bluebird arrival, two days of steady but skiable storm conditions, two days of absolute inside-of-a-pingpong-ball whiteout, and finally three days of drop-dead bluebird skies with 46" of fresh, cold, consolidated Alaskan powder making for hands down the most memorable trip of my life.”
Words by Thaddeus Cooke
