The only cloud in the sky this morning over Petropavolosk on the Kamchatka peninsula comes from the towering newly active Volcano of Koryaksky 3456m. A dark cloud billows from this Volcanic giant a spreads a high altitude thin dark line of ash across the horizon, a very ‘land that time forgot’ sort of senario.
The sky is once again completely clear, there is no wind today and the heli possibilities are unlimited.
Yesterday, our fourth day in a row of flying, we headed to the North, flying past the smoking cones of Koryaksky and Avachinsky to an aptly named mountain range known as the ‘Sharp mountains’. Very Valdez (Alaska) in appearance this range offers some great steep and deep terrain with exposed drops off on sharp peaks and ridges and big steep couloirs and faces that were covered in some of the smoothest, deepest, silkiest powder you could ever want to ride.
It was so much fun to fly around an unexplored range of jagged peaks just looking out and picking lines, seeing if we could land on tiny crests and corniced ridges then dropping into huge shaded faces that from the top look like they drop vertically into the shadowy void below.
Everyone rode real well this day and huge smiles filled the heli as we flew back to the base at the end of the day. This is what we came for, riding without limits, powder without a base and slopes that never end.
This is Kamchatka and this is a new day!
Neil.
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