From Russia with love!

The perfectly shaped volcano Koryaksky 3456m fills the horizon along side its partner in crime Avachinsky 2751m. Both are active volcano’s, smoke pores out of their perfectly formed craters. Koryaksky, the bigger of the two was last active in 1957 and after lying dormant for the last 50 years became once again active last December.

Both these active giants tower over the city of Petropavolosk here in Kamchatka but no one seems very worried about the newly active Koryaksky. There again, no one seems that worried about anything here, it seems that they measure the danger of an volcanic eruption by the amount of hot lava that is falling from the sky and at the moment seeing how the Koryaksky is only filling the sky with a sulphuric cloud of hot ash the cause for concern is only limited.

We are 2 days into our stay here in Kamchatka. 2 days in and two great heli days are already in the bag. This already equals our annual average for flying days and the forecast is also looking good for the week a head.

This year we are staying an hour from the city of Petropavolsk at a thermal spar center, nearer to the heli base and only 10 minutes flying time from the Volcanic Giant Vilyuchinsky 2173m and the range of lower mountains that surround it and stretch from the middle of the Peninsula right out to the Pacific Ocean.

Vilyuchinsky is a perfectly shaped volcano that offers some great riding when the conditions are good and is greatly complimented by the endless range of smaller mountains surrounding it all around 1000m high with descents down to just above sea level.

It has been quite windy high up and so for the last 2 days we have focused our attention on theses smaller mountains finding some great terrain and although it there isn’t an abundance of deep fresh powder everywhere if you know were to look it is there to be found.

Alan on a big fresh Kamchatka style descent.

Run by run we are getting better at tracking it down as we tune into the terrain, the wind effect and the aspect of the slopes. Run by run the snow is getting better and the turns deeper, steeper and fresher.

Jon digging deep in some Kamchatka fresh.


Jim gets the goods in the Kamchatka wilderness.

Our last run before our picnic by the Pacific today offered us a long descent of deep perfect turns overlooking the ocean, a Russian Nuclear submarine had just surfaced in the bay below , a sea eagle circled overhead and a bears den on the slope below threatened us with our first bear sighting of the trip. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) the bear stayed in his den but 2 out of three isn’t bad and the turns were great and the ambiance amazing!

Lunch by the pacific.

Seb hard at work in Kamchatka.

Simon getting fresh lines on another big descent.


Alan, McNab and Simon relax in the hot spring.

We finished our day with a run down to the natural hot springs for a beer and a relax before flying back to base to prepare for (with another good forecast) another big heli day tomorrow.

We have so far done 14 heli drops and ridden some 12000 vertical meters.

Whilst the wind and snow conditions have restricted us to the lower smaller peaks the terrain on these peaks is great fun offering steep faces, half pipe shaped gullies. Wind lips and rollers over the place.

This is how Kamchatka should be. This is why we come thousands of miles to heli here and the trip has really only just begun.

Bring it on!

Another day in the office!

Neil.