WHITE PLANET
leslie anthony
white
planet
A MAD
DASH THROUGH
MODERN
GLOBAL SKI
CULTURE
D&M PUBLISHERS INC.
Vancouver/Toronto/Berkeley
Copyright © 2010 by Leslie Anthony
First U.S. edition 2011
10 11 12 13 14 5 4 3 2 1
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the publisher or a license from The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For a copyright license, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1-800-893-5777.
Greystone Books
An imprint of D&M Publishers Inc.
2323 Quebec Street, Suite 201
Vancouver BC Canada V5T 4S7
Cataloguing data available from Library and Archives Canada
ISBN 978-1-55365-479-7 (pbk.)
ISBN 978-1-55365-646-3 (ebook)
Editing by Lucy Kenward
Copyediting by Lara Kordic
Cover and text design by Jessica Sullivan
Cover photograph © Chase Jarvis/Getty Images
Printed and bound in Canada by Friesens
Text printed on acid-free, 100% post-consumer paper
Distributed in the U.S. by Publishers Group West
We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Canada Council
for the Arts, the British Columbia Arts Council, the Province of British
Columbia through the Book Publishing Tax Credit, and the Government
of Canada through the Canada Book Fund for our publishing activities.
For Myles, who has the keys to the kingdom.
CONTENTS
THE REVOLUTION WILLN OT BE TELEVISED
5 | The Motherland
6 | A Scattering in a Cold Wind
7 | A Scattering in a Warm Wind
8 | Last Salami, Last Pilgrim
THE REVOLUTION MAY BE TELEVISED AFTER ALL
9 | Icecapades
10 | Just Say Cheese
11 | X Marks the Spot
12 | Just Shoot Me
ANOTHER GATHERING STORM
13 | A Death in the Family
14 | Invasion of the Powder Snatchers
15 | Space, the Final Frontier
Epilogue: Legend
Notes
“There is nothing ordinary about the mountains, nor
about the people who seek meaning and beauty in them.”
—THE MOE BROTHERS, co-founders of POWDER magazine
T HANKING everyone I should be thanking is a daunting prospect. After twenty-plus years of trekking the globe with dozens of ski freaks, meeting hundreds more wherever I’ve touched down, and being helped daily in this ever-more-fractious quest by everyone from ski areas to tourist bureaus to people apologetically pointing guns in my face because, well, they were just doing their jobs, the task is clearly impossible. So I’ll just do what I can.
My mother, as you will read, sent—OK, forced—me to go skiing for the first time. The experience I had that day could have turned into a lifetime of resentment. Fortunately, it went the other way.
Merl, Rat, Cleary, Skihoe, DeCaen, Kalisz, Altec, and Motz were my high school ski buddies, meaning they most frequently formed the phalanx of frozen jeans, wine, and weed that was my alpine baptism. I met Mary Eberle, my first love, on a ski trip, and my best memories of our times together—whether the posh trappings of Aspen or sleeping in the snow at Tuckerman Ravine on Mt. Washington—revolve around skiing. My biology teacher, Roman Fedorowicz, ski-trip organizer and delinquent ski-team coach (tasks taken on, in true ski-bum fashion, solely to afford more skiing), influenced the course of my life in more ways than, in retrospect, even I am shocked to recall. Stephen “Merl” Connolly was the good friend and co-conspirator in pretty much everything of consequence—from art to music, rock-climbing, streaking, and various other forms of subversion—that I launched into the ski abyss with. In Waterloo, Christopher J. Hart, who otherwise supervised my lab work in an aquatic entomology course, opened the doors of perception when he introduced me to telemarking.
Stuck knee-deep now, I’ll cover the rest in categories. These are people I’ve benefited from knowing or traveling with, or who have delivered me of something important— whether insight, influence, understanding, admiration, or a simple laugh in the snow. There will be many oversights for which I pre-beg forgiveness.
Jackals, powderhounds, athletes: Mark Abma, J.P. Auclair, Jenn Berg, Micah Black, El Fucking Bobby, Rob Boyd, Darian Boyle, Wendy Brookbank, Sarah Burke, Greg Campbell, Sammy Carlson, Danny Caruso, Johnny “Foon” Chilton, “Sergeant” Jim Conway, Chris Davenport, Claudio y Orlando Dias, Vinnie Dorion, Mike Douglas, Simon Dumont, Chris Eby, John Falkiner, Wendy Fisher, Dana Flahr, Alison Gannet, Sebastian Garhammer, Shane Gould, Tanner Hall, Hugo Harrisson, Mike Hattrup, Drew Heatherington, Chad Hendron, “Coloro” Herman, Jeff Holden,