FAQ

A lot of this information is also available in the VOC Handbook and the brochure on our main page.

What is the VOC?

The Varsity Outdoor Club, or VOC, is a collection of students at UBC who love the outdoors, covering a wide range of skill and experience levels. We do trips of all sorts in the mountains, usually within weekend range of Vancouver. We focus on self-propelled wilderness adventure, although we often drive to the trailhead (if we can find a ride). Hiking, scrambling, rock climbing, mountaineering, backcountry skiing, paddling, and biking are the bread-and-butter of the club but we also do other stuff.

We think that through a mix of trips with more experienced members taking you out and organizing your own trips with other members at a similar skill level you can learn the skills you need and have the time of your life while doing it.

While most of the "big club trips" are aimed at introducing new members to the outdoors there are lots of trips and networking opportunities for more experienced people too. VOCers have undertaken some pretty serious stuff over the years - first ascents and traverses of many of the mountains and ranges on the Coast. The club has an interesting history, which dates back to 1915. But while there are some "legends" in the club, we hold pride in everyone's accomplishments be that a day hike, your first overnight, or a month long bike tour. Whatever you do in the club, people will support you and celebrate your accomplishments.

How do I join?

The easiest way is to stop by the clubroom during gear hours, but there's often people there during lunch time (more-or-less) at other times. You can also email us. Probably all the info you need to figure this out is located here.

It's $45 (cash only) if you're a UBC student (who pays AMS fees, most do) and $70 ("associate") if you're not. Check our constitution for full details on membership qualifications/privileges.

To join, follow this "How to Join" link.

What are the costs?

There are a few types of cost: membership fee, trip fees, and your gear.

• The membership fee covers your insurance, hut maintenance, our gear library, and yearly journals.
• Trip fees vary by trip. Most are free, but costs such as gas money for your driver, campsite permits, and ferries will come up. Our biggest trip of the year, Rock Party, has a fee which covers campsite fees, alcohol license, and other stuff.
• The last expense is funding your own gear. It is not required by any means to have gear as we have a large gear library and an awesome community of outdoorsy-people to borrow gear from. But over time, you might want your own tent, stove system, ski setup, or a bunch of others stuff.

Are VOCers professional guides?

No. We're all just volunteers, doing this because we love it. Sometimes it's disorganized, and sometimes we make mistakes. It's almost always fun, at least in retrospect. We think that this gives everybody on the trip, even the leaders, a chance to learn. If you want to hire professional guides you should look elsewhere, like Canada West Mountain School. But even they make mistakes, sometimes.

We do hire guides from Canada West to run our avalanche courses, since the dangers posed by avalanches are not necessarily obvious and it's easy to develop complacency.

Isn't this stuff dangerous?

Yes. Didn't you read the banner at the top of the message board, on the front page of the wiki and the long waiver you signed to join the club?

Disclaimer The VOC does not verify the accuracy of the contents of this website, and cannot assume liability for them. Trips organized on this site are not led by professional guides, and may be destined for wilderness areas where assistance is not available. Unexpected events can occur in the wilderness: please exercise caution!

VOC trips are organized by members like yourself, not professional guides. The trips go into wilderness areas where assistance is unavailable and unexpected events can occur. You could be seriously injured or die. You are responsible for your own actions. Please use caution.

Seriously - lots of things in life are dangerous. Driving along the highway the only thing separating you from oncoming traffic is a line of paint(!). Many of the activities the club participates in have inherent dangers, sometimes with fatal consequences if you screw up. To a large extent these dangers can be minimized by doing the "correct" thing, but sometimes bad things can still happen for reasons beyond your control (driving on the correct side of that line of paint works most of the time).

So when out on a trip be sure and discuss with everybody what the hazards are, what choices you're making to mitigate them, and whether or not this constitutes an acceptable risk to everybody. You should do this, even if you've hired a professional guide - who knows what choices they're making on your behalf!

How do VOC trips work?

Once you're activated as a member, you can sign up for trips on our trip agenda. Any members, even brand new members, can post trips on the trip agenda! Use the signup tools to sign up as "interested" or "committed". If you are unsure if the trip is right for you, reach out to the trip leader.

Can non-members come on a VOC trip?

Yes, but to an extent. Non-members interested in going on a VOC trip need to sign the waiver at a minimum. The easiest way to do this is to sign up. Priority on trips will be given to members. Non-members can only go on two trips before they need to pay the membership fee (but just sign up - it will be worth it!). Non-members cannot rent gear, so if the trip requires gear, then they need to be members.

Can I run a trip?

Yes, please do! Anyone can run a trip.

Akk, there's no rides for the trip I want to do!

We wish we could create cars out of thin air, we really do, but sometimes it's just not in the cards. We try to encourage people with cars to bring them out on trips with a suggested policy that passengers pay for gas. This means if you own a car you pay nothing! Well, except the exorbitantly higher costs of ownership and insurance.

If there are no cars, hopefully somebody will step up and offer to rent a vehicle. This is often more expensive for the unlucky people in that vehicle, but such is life. It's still probably cheaper and more fun than staying home for the weekend and a night of drinking.

Many trips are accessible but public transit. See car free trips for a list of ideas.

What's the difference between a big club trip and a member trip?

Sometimes the line gets a little blurry, but usually you can tell if an exec is running it, it has a wiki page, and it's advertised well in advance. You can always ask the organizer.

Is it true you rent gear for free? How do I get some?

Yes. VOC members can borrow club equipment at no charge after completing a workhike (a volunteer task, such as doing maintenance on a hut or trail). Check out the gear rental page for details.

What's Longhike?

Longhike, now called Rock Party, is our annual big party, to celebrate our new members and returning to Vancouver after the summer. Despite the name, we don't actually hike a long distance. We do go rock climbing and then have a big party. The name evolved from the early days of the club, when they did actually hike a long distance with new members as part of some friendly initiation. We've been around for a long time - since 1917 - so the activity has had a while to develop.

In case you should get the wrong idea, most of our trips are not like Longhike.

We have another "Winter Longhike" in winter after the holidays, which is a ski touring/snowshoeing trip. This is a lot closer to what most trips are like, but still mostly a party.

Your workhikes are never at a convenient time! How am I supposed to do one?

We're trying our best here, remember - we're all volunteers. If you can't make one of the organized workhikes you can always organize your own. We just want to make sure people are giving back to the club, or the general outdoors community.

Maybe you could simply organize a trip - that counts. Or maybe you have some special skill to make the club better in a way we never anticipated - perhaps you are a graphic designer and want to design a rad poster, or would like to hold a membership event in your building.

Much of our work in September involves letting the rest of UBC know that we exist, and what we do. Any help with this is greatly appreciated. You could type in new members into our computer. You could put in time at our Clubs Day booth and tell people what VOC is all about, or you could put up posters in Residence.

Later we will have ski waxing sessions where you will help prepare the Club skis for winter, and you can do your own at the same time if you want.

We all want to be entertained on weekends. How about you organize a trip? Or a party? To qualify, there should be at least some Club Members on the trip, and you should advertise it on the notice board so others get a chance to go on it. If you don't have a car, there are public transit destinations. See Car_free_trips for details.

How do I use the wiki?

There's a whole page dedicated to this topic!

How do I figure out how to do that cool formatting on the message board?

There's a whole page dedicated to this topic too! Note that there's a preview button you can push before you post to test if it worked.

How do I ski uphill?

Try one of our introductory backcountry skiing trips and we'll show you. People have been skiing for thousands of years, but ski lifts have only been around since the late 19th century. To ski uphill, you need something on the bottom of your skis to grip the snow - either climbing skins or grip wax. Climbing skins are like a long narrow piece of carpet that sticks to the bottom of your skis and has many small hairs pointing backwards. This allows the skis to slide forward, but not backwards. The original climbing skins were made of animal hides. Grip wax, also called kick wax, is commonly used by cross country skiers, but can be used for backcountry skiing in flatter terrain as well. The wax is soft, so snow crystals penetrate into it and stick.

I can't ever make the gear hours / the trip I wanted was full / you guys suck

This isn't actually something we hear a lot (but maybe because nobody tells us). In any case, we're trying our best - but we're all volunteers. Professional guides might offer better services, and MEC's rental program can afford to pay their employees so they have better hours. They also charge money for this service. But hopefully you'd rather see the next question...

I want to help make the club better

Awesome! We're always in need of more keen members who want to give back. If you've got an idea, especially if you've got the time and willingness to see it through, just let the exec know.

You've got a lot of information online, but it seems a little disorganized...

That's really a comment, not a question. Sounds like you've got an idea for a workhike, see above.

Is it true there's a VOC mountain and a UBC glacier?

Yes. They're spelled phonetically, so that they're not mispronounced and were named after the club. They're both in the McBride Range in Garibaldi Park, an infrequently visited remote area. Roland Burton (if you don't know Roland yet, you will) was in the first ascent party! Check out the bivouac page about it here.

Is it true that VOC Has a Climbing Wall?

The Aviary was started by the VOC and located in the Nest. As of recently it is no longer managed by the VOC, see the aviary website for details.

It is the only climbing facility on campus with roped climbs. There is a nice bouldering cave in the Bird Coop gym, but this requires you to pay the same as if you were using the gym ($25/term or $5 drop-in). 

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