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So, I travel around a lot in the BC bc looking for new places to ride, like I'm sure lots of us do. I've recently found this plowed road that leads up near a snowcat operation, and I'm wondering what kind of trouble they could cause me if I'm up in their area poaching a line or two. This would involve sledding in and skinning up, no highmarking bs or other hooliganism.

My understanding of tenure is that it gives the holder exclusive right to charge money for guiding in the area. Does that mean that I can hit up their zone unguided and not get hassled?

You are correct on what most cat skiing operations have for tenures. I work at an operation and though we discourage it due to safety issues, it is public land and people are allowed access to it for recreational purposes (not conflicting commercial use).

One thing to remember though is without the snowcat roads, sled access to many of the areas wouldn't be possible, so be respectful. Try talking with the operator to find out what area they are using on that particular day, which roads you should avoid and don't completely fuck up their runs. Some guides are cool and may even let you know which areas they're worried about avalanches in too. A big thing to watch out for is the down roads the cats are using, as most of the time they can not stop once they've committed. Getting in a head-on collision with a 20000lb toboggan would not end well.

If you're respectful, I think you'll be fine.

By the way, which operation are you looking at? I'm in Vernon and have had my eye on one not too far away, but have faced the same dilemma since I don't know them and in this case, they maintain the road all winter for their own access.

and if you can find someone who will rent you a heli you can do drops in tenured area

Thx speedy. I had planned on making a call up there to be polite, but its always good to know the facts incase someone starts b.s.ing you over the phone. We're probably thinking about the same place - MPS? Who do you work for BTW?

" and if you can find someone who will rent you a heli you can do drops in tenured area"

Lol wouldn't that put me into "supreme asshole" category ? I wish I had that kind of fundage though.

It's been my experience that a lot of operations will try and discourage you from doing this. Although there is nothing they can do (legally) as long as you're not charging money, that won't stop them from giving you a hard time.

Island Lake Lodge in BC bought Powder Cowboy (which used to be Snowmuchfun) and they were legendary for being total a-holes about guys using sleds to access their terrain. First hand I have seen and been a part of:

- sleds getting buried by the cat
- getting yelled at by the operators
- threatened physically
- body checked mid run by one of their guides

and so on. I can see their point though; they were cutting and maintaining roads for cat skiing, only to see guys on sleds bombing 2 or 3 runs to every 1 that a cat can do. Kind of hard to charge $500 a day when you can rent a sled for less, get 2 guys on it, and get more vert.

Until they closed Powder Cowboy, there was an understanding with the local sled club that they would keep sleds off the terrain until March 1st (when they closed). Naturally, the guides carried this over to no skiing "their" runs until March 1st, and they were pretty quick to tell you that if they saw boards on your sled.

We just avoided the areas they were running on, it's typically not worth the argument.

I think safety is one huge factor to consider. The media shit storm that would result if there ever was an incident caused by wildcard 3rd parties that had a negative impact upon the clients & employees of such an operation (that's putting it lightly). The guides are making terrain & slope choices based on the conditions for the day and I would hazard a guess that that they don't include random splitboarders accessing their tenure in their decision making.

Mattfdc, that sounds like some ugly relations! Hopefully I can avoid that if I ever choose to head up to this area.

Maniacdave, I will not be the guy that drops in on a crowd of cat skiers. But I hear you, if they had to come and save me or someone in My party there would definitely be a media heyday.

This is a very good topic. As the law stands there is nothing stopping a recreational user from accessing and public land regardless of who holds the tenure. so far public sentiment is on the side of the recreational user when it come to accessing public lands. this could change, and if you pay attention to the wordage in the media around avalanche accidents it may well change.

in some places in B.C. almost every square inch is under a recreation tenure. so the choice may not be do I or do I not access some one business to recreate but maybe how you chose to use that land. If you want my 2c, using cat roads to sled ski is gay as aids. using a sled on those same road to access ski touring might be in your best interest.

this is worth a read.

http://kmcmag.com/features/KMC16_featureI.pdf

Wow, the map in that article just blew my mind
. I had no idea there were THAT many tenures on the go in southern bc. One thing they didn't mention was range leases. The original tipi site was covered by both an unused rec. Tenure, and a range lease. I am friends with the lease holder, and the tenure holder didn't care what I got up to out there.

Sled access touring is the name of the game for me for sure. My machine isn't cut out for "lapping" anything, lol.

Funny thing is, I have several different sled access areas I can go and not see a skin track all winter, but everytime i find somewhere new I just have to check it out....

that comment was not aimed at you libtech. more a general comment on a trend, and sled skiing as a whole.

Some friends were using a cat road for access to skinning last year and got the passive aggressive treatment from a cat driver. It's in their best interest to front the hard ass approach as they have no legal recourse to keep people out. I'm in agreement that to do sled laps in their zones is super detrimental to their business and disrespectful as they are paying to open the roads. Folk gotta work. Play it cool and keep off their radar as much as possible, use the skins and terrain they can't get the cat to.

I went up with a catskiing group last year and there were 3 types of people using their land that day.

1) A few guys with climbing skins who were walking up. One of the tour guys just flat out said "If they want to put the time and energy into hiking up here, they are welcome to use the land!"

2) Guys on snowmobiles using the road. They were pretty neutral about each other. The sleds were polite and tried to stay out of the way of the cat. And there were a few times when the cat driver made an effort to move over so sleds could get past (if there was room on the road).

(NOTE: The sledders were using the road to gain access to terrain further back. At no point did we cross pass with the sledders during the day while riding... save for a few old sled tracks left in the snow from previous days).

3) There was a guy on a double tracked snowmobile type of thing. And one of the guides said/implied that they were pretty sure that guy was charging money to drive people up the cat operations roads... and if/when they caught him, they would nail him to the wall.

So don't be an ignorant jackass on their land, and you should have a good chance of not hating each other.

-hps