Over the years, I’ve gradually pushed my sights further afield from my home range of the Washington Cascades. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I discovered the vasty beauty of the Sea-to-Sky in BC. But after a few trips, I still had not been past Whistler. I started to hear about a great ski linkup of Matier and Slalok on the Duffey Highway, and friends visited the area earlier in the season. It seemed like an area I should check out in spring powder conditions.

Wyatt, Chris, and I made a weekend trip to BC, skiing Rainbow Mountain the first day. We stayed the night in Pemberton and drove up towards Joffre Lakes the next morning. We knew we would exit the Joffre Lakes trail, but friends had recommended approaching up Cerise Creek instead. While we only had one car, we figured that it would be pretty easy to hitchhike on the way back.

Despite starting around 4k ft, the snow coverage here was hilarious. The Duffey is much drier that the Whistler area, and they had a particularly bad winter. The trail consisted of about an inch of compacted snow and ice on dirt. Once again, it was “thin but in”.

After a few miles of skinning, we entered a strange open valley. It did not seem to be a clear-cut. Giant boulders were strewn everywhere. Wyatt and I began to surmise that there had been a giant rockslide. Indeed, in May 2019, there was not just one, but two massive rockslide off the north face of Mt. Joffre that ran many miles down this valley, destroying everything in its path!

The skintrack to Keith’s Hut was pretty awful – a refrozen, booted out mess winding its way up a tight creek drainage. If this approach was better than Joffre Lakes, like our friends said, then we were terrified for what Joffre would bring.

Finally, we reached Keith’s Hut and started climbing efficiently. We could see 20 or so people ahead of us, nearly all of whom stayed the night at the hut.

I was feeling pretty slow on this day, and heel blisters were giving me trouble, affecting my stride. The east facing Anniversary Glacier climb was an oven, but when we started to get a cold breeze near the top, I started to feel better.

From Anniversary Col, the route climbs up the north ridge of Matier. There was a minor traffic jam of parties ahead of us, but it seemed like one group was pioneering an easier route around to the right of a cliff band. I’m not use to seeing so many people on my ski adventures, but it was pretty nice to have a bootpack and skintrack to follow!

I could see the North Ridge of Matier as a wonderful mountaineering objective in itself, even if you were not skiing. It was a fun easy alpine climb, with steep snow and a very scenic summit ridge. There were quite a few snowshoers out, in addition to skiers, and they actually were the first ones to the summit!

At over 9k ft, Matier is one of the highest peaks in the Southern BC Coast Range. It is an incredible vantage for peaks and glaciers in all directions.

It was a calm, almost windless day atop Matier. We took a lunch break, then began the crux of the day: a short downclimb to the the top of the NW Face ski line. This involved downclimbing up to 45 degree steep snow and rime. It was not difficult, but a little intimidating considering the exposure was pretty bad.

The snow was chalky and decent up high. The NW Face was the first steep thing I’ve skied in a while, so it took a moment to get adjusted. But once we got a few hundred feet down, the snow became excellent powder!

Once at the bottom, we cruised down the glacier over towards Slalok. There was already a nice skin track that contoured around onto the North Ridge of Slalok. After a brief booter, it was an easy skin to the summit.

While Matier is the more technical descent, Slalok is the pure fun descent – nearly 3,000 ft of fall-line skiing at a moderate pitch down to Upper Joffre Lake. The snow on this aspect was great powder, and the face was wide enough for abundant fresh turns.

Lower down, the terrain funnels into a few different gullies. The snow was a bit tracked out here, so our legs were feeling it by the time we finally reached the lake.

Our exit was the popular Joffre Lakes Trail, which had plenty of Asian snowshoers, making Chris and I at home. The trail was actually a delightfully fun and engaging luge track. Coverage was thin, but we never hit any rocks or stumps. It went way better than we expected, and was certainly much faster than the way we came in.

I was able to flag down the first car we saw to hitchhike back to our start. After picking up Chris and Wyatt, we were on our way back to the states after another successful April smash-and-grab in BC!

Notes:

• This is a really high quality linkup, with great views, skiing, and access. It is popular for a reason.
• For simplicity sake, I would just recommend approaching via Joffre Lakes. The Cerise Creek approach did not seem to be more efficient, although it was scenic to travel through different valleys and see the giant rockslides.
• The down climb from Matier to the NW Face was the crux of the route. We managed with aluminum crampons and a single ice ax, but you need to be solid on snow. Some people might want a belay from above.