Off-season
The glorious “in-between time,” when Elk Avenue is quiet, signs hang in windows that say “closed,” and the endless line of cars disappears. It’s a time when locals breathe deeply and soak up the quiet. The shift also promises freedom to seasonal workers: the work is done, and it’s time to travel.
But not everyone takes a break. In fact, a few local ski guides choose other work opportunities during the fall. Instead of heading to the desert or the tropics, they spend some of their coveted off-season working in Antarctica.
Dave Bumgarner and Zach Husted, two certified ski guides who live in the Gunnison Valley, set sail to guide with Ice Axe Expeditions. Every fall, the company employs dozens of guides from around the globe to lead over 100 clients on a 12-day ski expedition on the planet’s least visited continent.
Beyond their work in the valley, both have guided ski clients around the world, including Alaska, Europe, Canada, Japan, Chile, Argentina, and New Zealand. While working in New Zealand, Husted guided several scientists who work in Antarctica conducting ice-core research, and they told him about a guy who runs ski trips in Antarctica.
“It just intrigued me. I didn’t even realize there was skiing in Antarctica,” Husted said. “And it’s incredible to think of logistically what it takes even to get down there, let alone ski safely in heavily glaciated terrain amongst the wildlife, I didn’t know that it was legal to do.”
The founder of Ice Axe Expeditions, Lake Tahoe resident Doug Stoup, officially started guiding skiers in Antarctica in 2008. Stoup had ventured to the continent many times for personal and guided trips, and he saw the opportunity to do what no one else had done: create a skiing opportunity for the everyday athlete in the world’s southernmost continent.
The first Antarctic ski expedition was a flop. Stoup chartered an old Russian research vessel to chauffeur guides and guests across rough waters to the distant continent. Everyone was ready to launch from a port on the tip of Argentina, but when the boat arrived, inspectors deemed it unfit for travel. The trip was canceled, and everyone returned home. Since then, Stoup has found his groove and, more importantly, reliable ships, and Ice Axe Expeditions remains the only commercial ski-guiding operation on the continent. Stoup prides himself on 50+ trips to Antarctica and finds pure joy in spreading the unique experience with others.
The Journey
Traveling to the trip’s starting point is an adventure in and of itself. It requires a flight to Buenos Aires, and another down to the tip of the continent, to the resort town of Ushuaia, Argentina. There, clients and guides spend a few days on a glacier practicing how to safely maneuver Antarctica’s intense geography using ropes and crampons. The expedition requires glacial navigation and avoiding crevasses, so each group ropes up for uphill travel. The days in Argentina offer an opportunity to test the integrity of everyone’s gear and ensure no one’s forgotten anything.
“If people don’t have something or something’s not working, we still have access to ski shops in Ushuia,” Bumgarner said. “Once we’re on the boat, we bring some extra gear, but there are no ski shops in Antarctica.”
Once the ship launches from Argentina, it takes about two days to cross the Drake Passage, which is known for having one of the strongest currents in the world. The boat ride is described in one of two ways: 1) calm and pleasant, “The Drake Lake,” or 2) 20-foot waves crashing on the bow, “The Drake Shake.” Once through the lake or the shake, the ship makes its way to its first stop: Deception Island on the northern tip of the Antarctic peninsula.
The Skiing
If the boat makes good time on day two, Stoup asks the captain to anchor the boat and calls for an afternoon of skiing. Ice Axe Expeditions charters the ship from Quark Expeditions, a tourism company that manages all logistics other than skiing. Onboard, Quark staff lead education and safety lessons. Off the ship, they drive zodiac boats from the ship to shore. Each morning, Stoup navigates with the captain to find new and adequate landing zones with ramps that allow easier skiing access onto the glaciers. Some edges of glaciers plunge 100 feet or more into the sea.
October and November signal spring in Antarctica, making for long days and fun skiing. The trip welcomes never-ever backcountry skiers up to professional athletes and everyone in between. Ice Axe advertises a 4:1 client-to-guide ratio, and each group ropes up for the uphill ascents and avoids crevasses on the downhill.
“We can ski those nice easy, smooth, consistent pitch greens, or we can go up and rappel into a steep couloir and ski that,” Husted said. “So a broad range of skiers and certainly all the certified and qualified guides are able to cater to the range of abilities.”
Bumgarner and Husted said the ski conditions included a little bit of everything.
“We had powder conditions every day,” Husted said. “New snow fell overnight. We had the most phenomenal ski conditions I could imagine, let alone on the highest driest continent on the earth. Spring conditions, only a few hours of darkness, a lot of twilight.”
Bumgarner remembers passing under dramatic jagged peaks that rise from the sea up to 9,000 feet. The next day, he’d get to ski them.
“I think this is just one of the more profound things that’s so different from any other skiing and ski guiding that I’ve done before: traveling on the water to get to skiing, and then skiing to the ocean,” he said.
The ship cruises from island to island along the peninsula; weather and currents dictate where the boat will anchor for the next ski.
More Than Skiing
In addition to skiing, Quark Expeditions employees give presentations each night about the region’s wildlife, science, or human history. They also recap each day, providing a deeper dive into the area they saw on the water and the snow.
Ice Axe and Quark follow International Antarctic Tourism Board (IATOO) rules to help preserve the wildness of Antarctica. As tourism increased on the continent, tour operators created IATOO to protect wildlife and the unspoiled landmass by limiting the introduction of invasive species, respecting wildlife space and rookeries, and establishing speed limits in certain areas to protect whales and other marine life. When skiing, groups are required to scrub their boots before they exit the zodiac onto the snow and again when they board the ship. Guests are encouraged to wait to eat snacks until they return to the ship.
There’s no shortage of food or luxuries on the ship. Like a cruise, skiers and guides are treated to three gourmet meals a day, often with dessert. Bumgarner joked that the food was so plentiful and decadent on his last trip that he gained weight despite skiing for a week straight. Plenty of hot tubs speckle the deck, offering relief after a day of skiing. The trip also comes with a hefty price tag; the 12-day adventure with Ice Axe Expeditions will set you back $13,000, not including flights.
But Bumgarner says it’s worth it. He’s told his friends it’s something worth saving for, and he guided another trip in the fall of 2024.
“People sign up to go skiing down there, but that’s only half of the trip,” Bumgarner said. “Being on the boat going through Drake Passage, whales next to the boat, sea lions, skiing up to penguins — it’s one of the coolest trips and I’ll go back every year.”