TOP TO BOTTOM Welcome to the Valley of the Outsiders, on the unceded territory of the Nuxalk. A thriving First Nation of 30,000 before contact with European explorers, the numbers of the local Nuxalk Nation plummeted due to events the Canadian federal government is only beginning to reckon with. Yet the Nuxalk, their culture and their reassertion of traditional territorial rights are on the rise recently. Photo: Grant Gunderson Blower above, Bella Coola valley below, with stormclouds stacking in from the Central BC coast—Matty Richard finds his place in the vortex. The fog is a regular winter occurrence that shrouds the towering valley and its daytime-only airport runway in low vis. But this place can also be high reward for those who make it in. Photo: Blake Jorgenson WHILE THE HELI TENURE for Bella Coola Heli Sports is bigger than the Swiss Alps, Bella Coola Airport is a one-counter, one-employee operation. Still, it’s the key link for BCHS—a piece of critical infrastructure that facilitates the flow of as many as five Saturday charter flights from Vancou-ver’s South Terminal in peak heli-ski season. Skiing upon arrival is rare, but minutes after our charter flight landed, we were shuttled over to the operation’s on-site hangar. Behind the massive sliding doors, a gear tornado had exploded on the concrete floor as mostly mid-adult men swapped to dark goggle lenses and dreams of bliss. Steve Whittall, one of BCHS’ head guides, made sense of the chaos, shouting over the bluebird energy from a slightly elevated picnic-table perch. With a week of skiing ahead, the rush seemed too much, too soon. But the weather in Bella Coola is fickle. It had been 13 midwinter days since the valley saw full sun. A storm had just lifted and an approaching front was about to turn the coastal firehose back on. There was no time to waste. Alongside photographer Grant Gunderson and skiers McKenna Peterson and Sam Cohen, I rounded out a media crew on a favorable heli hours budget, affording us the last bump south. From the heli, the vertical relief of the place was heart-stopping, with mountains rising 7,000 feet vertically straight from the valley floor. The entire 2,500-resident valley of Bella Coola runs up-stream from saltwater to the margins of Tweedsmuir Provin-cial Park, one of the largest in British Columbia, preserving more than 2.2 million acres of wilderness. This corridor was the historical route taken by Alexander Mackenzie, the first European to complete an overland journey to the Pacific Ocean. He arrived not to emptiness, but to a thriving Nuxalk Nation living off the land, rivers and ocean in 10 distinct valley villages. Today that indigenous influence is still ever present in the region. The Nuxalk Reserve makes up one half of pres-ent day Bella Coola. Many of the town’s street signs still read in traditional Nuxalk and, thanks to a 2018 reconciliation agreement signed by the Canadian government, the Nation is one of 14 now receiving federal investment to increase its commercial fishing operation and preserve its local economy. We landed high on a commanding ridge to a dramatic panorama—the Bella Coola River below winding its way to the sea. As the sun slipped away, we clicked in and Peterson made one smooth, dusk-lit turn. The rest of us quickly followed suit, dropping into the shadows, flowing through chilled perfection and a sunset flight to the front meadow of BCHS’ Tweedsmuir Lodge. Bella Coola 077
The Ski Journal Volume 15, Issue 1: Page 77
