In the early days of the Ski School instructors needed the “check in” before taking any lessons into Heather Canyon. This simple policy was in place because at this time Heather Canyon was exclusively limited to people with sufficient abilities … and time to ski Heather Canyon.
During this period there was no Heather Canyon chairlift and the Hood River Meadows chairlift was a fixed grip double that took upwards of 20 minutes to ride. The time needed to make one lap in Heather Canyon was easily in excess of one hour.
Since that time the Hood River Meadows chairlift was upgraded to the fasted high speed quad at the time and the old HRM double chair was re-purposed years later into it’s new location and renamed the Heather Chair. Shooting Star was upgraded from a fixed grip quad to a detachable high speed quad.
All of these changes to uphill travel times allowed for more people to access this terrain because of the reduced time to access this terrain. Combine this with ski and snowboard equipment evolution has created a situation where more people are seeking to access Heather Canyon.
Changes to what was previously know as “permanently closed terrain” now know as Jacks Woods, Private Reserve and the Newton/Clark Canyon terrain now presents even more challenging terrain and warrants more specific protocols to reflect how guests and students wish to engage with this type of terrain.