On Thu, 02 Feb 2006 01:08:59 GMT, lal_truckee
wrote:

wrote:

Thanks for the input. This is something I have always wondered about,
as it seems there is a lot of out of bounds at most ski resrts. What
legal power do the resort have outside of the pistes? Most of them are
on national forest land, which persumably means that anyone is allowed
to enter this area. What rights do they have outside or inside their
area?


CLIP
This passage and your earlier talk of cell-phones, etc, makes wonder if
you have off-piste and backcountry skiing confused.

Off piste, loosely speaking, is inbounds terrain they don't groom.
Heavenly has lots of off-piste, including some lovely tree runs between
pistes right off the Cal side top (remember to visit the Bono Memorial
Tree.) Off piste is patrolled and avalanche controlled just like the
piste is, including rescue by the patrol. If it's not patrolled and
avalanche controlled, or they just don't want you skiing there, it will
be marked closed. No special prep required for off-piste.

Just go do it.

Took most of the words right out of my mouth (I can't speak to
backcountry, or out-of-bounds, hence the snip). The only part of
Heavenly I've skiied is up high on the Nevada side, where there was
abundant, forgiving, and very nice off-piste skiing, almost all of
which bottoms out on groomed runs which take you right back to the
lift (maybe a small percentage ends at the marked boundary, which THEN
leads you back to civilization). It's a real good place to improve
your skiing beyond what the groomed requires, getting used to deeper
snow, variable snow, and variable terrain.

There are a few new ways to get into trouble there, so it's a good
idea to ski with a partner if possible, mainly to cut down on the risk
of laying there injured for a long time before you're found. But if I
couldn't find a partner, I'd still go for it, although I might be a
little more conservative in my explorations. Skiing is inherently
dangerous, and I don't think going off-piste and into the trees up
there adds an appreciable amount of risk. Yeah, you might conceivably
get stuck in a tree well, but you're much less likely to get mowed
down by an out-of-control yahoo, too.

If you're concerned about being stranded overnight (highly unlikely,
but conceivable), you might talk to patrol, tell them where you'll be
skiing (and why you're concerned), and offer to check in with them
when you're done, so that if they haven't heard from you, they can
keep a sharper eye out when they do their sweep.

bw