Glacier School

Introduction for Planners to Glacier School

What is Glacier School?

Glacier School is a 2-day (weekend) course intended to teach safe and efficient means of traveling over glaciers. The School is divided into two courses:

Glacier 1 is designed for beginners to snow and glacier travel. It is expected that you have previous backpacking and camping experience.

Glacier 2 is for students with previous glacier experience that want to learn more advanced skills or to climb a peak.

What Happens at DRY SCHOOL?

Please bring CASH for all expenses (preferably small change). There will be a brief introduction to glacier travel before we outline what’s to be expected for the weekend. Then, we’ll arrange transportation, stove and tent groups, collect your fee, sell prussik cords, possibly lend out VOC gear if there's any left (max of 4 items each), and finally we’ll teach a few rope skills that will come in handy on the weekend. If we can find a suitable place (tree) we'll practice prussicking.

Expectations

Students should expect to learn the following skills:

• Knots for mountaineering
• Traveling over snow and ice with crampons
• Self Arrest
• Snow and ice anchors
• Crevasse rescue
• Belaying techniques for mountaineering

The prerequisites for being a student at glacier school are minimal. Students must have overnight backpacking experience. Some rope skills (such as belaying, common climbing knots, etc) are desirable but not absolutely necessary.

"Instructors for glacier school are club members who volunteer their time, and are not professional guides. If you don't feel comfortable taking responsibility for your own life in the context of an informal course advised by VOC instructors, you should take a mountaineering course offered by a professional guiding service."

Time line for the organization

As far in advance as possible (just do it now):

• Decide WHEN Glacier School will take place. It is best if this can happen either the 1st or 2nd weekend of the fall semester, before people start getting too overwhelmed with school.
• Book a room for the dry school on a night the week before the trip (Ideally somewhere with a stairwell for prussiking - Buchanan A100 is a great room, however trees work find for prussiking as well)

2-4 weeks in advance:

• Decide WHERE you will be holding Glacier School. Based on this decision, decide if you want to hold both Glacier 1 and Glacier 2 at this location. Consider # of ppl, and if you want to cap numbers (this is important for high use areas, i.e. Cerise Creek, where other Backcountry users don't like to see big hordes of VOCers.) -post on other backcountry forums that a large VOC group will be in the area.
• Decide WHO you want for instructors. If you have no idea, ask other exec members, because they will have ideas from previous years. It is good to think about getting people who have a reliable reputation. If you don't know them, ask other execs what they think, sometimes there can be sketch issues.
• Decide WHAT you want to have taught at glacier school, and structure the groups and day accordingly
• If you are going into a high use area, it is good to check with the owners/maintainers of the area (i.e. Cerise Creek = Scott and Erica Flavelle, 8286 Alpine Way, Whistler BC, V0N 1B8 604 932 8904) to ask if it is ok to have a large group come in that weekend.
• If you are going to an environmentally sensitive area, you should think about 'pack it in, pack it out' in relation to ALL human wastes - biodegradable dog poo bags are about $4/50 or so from IGA.
• Advertise on the message board at least 2-3 weeks before the trip.
• Money - usually there is a small fee associated with Glacier school, this is used for poo bags, wine, photocopying etc. Decide what it will be in advance of Dry school, and DO NOT ACCEPT IOU's.
• Set a time for the Instructor meeting

The week before

• Usually there is mulled wine for saturday night - try and organize how many litres of wine you need, (250mL/person is a good rule of thumb) and get the mulling spices to go with it (usually a few cinnamon sticks, a small orange (use juice and rind), a handful of raisins and some TBLSPs of sugar is good for 1.5L of wine. Or make it up yourself.
• Buy the prussik cord
• Email out the information booklets or print them

Agenda for Instructor meeting

• Discuss what should/should not get taught at Glacier 1 and 2
• Pair up instructors (with experience in mind)
• Find out who can be there at dryschool
• Decide who is bring ropes, screws, pickets, lot’s of biners, slings, cordelle (or short rope)
• Other?

Suggested agenda for dryschool

• 7pm Everyone on the student sign up list can pay
• 7.10pm Waitlist people can pay if still more room
• Go over expectations
• Remind everyone about the gear they need
• Encourage everybody to read the handout before the weekend if they haven't already done so
• Go through the handout
• Practise knots
• Refresh leaving time and location
• Organize rides, tent and food groups
• Form groups for instruction)
• Practise prussiking

Past Events

2009

Glacier School 2009 was held at the Anniversary Glacier. Glacier (2) was at Mt Baker.

The Anniversary Glacier was pretty well snow-free, making bad conditions for practicing ice axe arrests. The weather was atrocious on Saturday but Sunday was sunny and warm. We had 40 people camped below the glacier. The Hut was being renovated and re-supplied with firewood, so we were not welcome there.

Glacier School 2009 Logistics

2008

Glacier School 2008 was held at the Anniversary Glacier. Glacier (2) was at Joffre Lakes. Weather was somewhat miserable both days.

2007

Glacier School 2007 was held at the Anniversary Glacier.

2006

Held at Anniversary Glacier on September 16^th - 17^th. Photos are available on the VOC Gallery.

2005

Held on Mt. Baker (Easton Glacier) on September 17^th - 18^th . 3+ hour drive SE of Vancouver. Dry conditions, and no snow patches for instruction and practice off the glacier. Weather was cold and wet.

2004

Glacier School was held at the Anniversary Glacier near Joffre Lakes on September 11^th - 12^th. In inclement weather conditions, most people stayed in Keith's Hut. There are only a handful of decent camping spots nearby the hut. This would have been a problem had the weather not been so bad that there were no members of the public wanting to use the hut. Despite dry conditions on the glacier, there were good snow patches below the SE face of Joffre.

2003

Glacier school was held at the Easton Glacier on Mount Baker in September.

2002

Glacier school was held at the Coleman Glacier on Mount Baker for the third consecutive year in September. We were fined by the US National Forest rangers for having a group larger than 12 people.

2001

Held at Coleman Glacier in September.

2000

Held at Coleman Glacier in September.

1999

Held at the Anniversary Glacier in September. We camped at the glacial lake formed by the terminal moraine, out of sight of Keith's Hut. Since the winter had seen record breaking snowfall, the glacier was still in "spring" conditions. I am not sure how good of a venue this would have been otherwise (where to self arrest when all you have is ice?).