BEING A BETTER BACKCOUNTRY CITIZEN
A Checklist For The Modern Backcountry User
A note from the organizers of the Raven Backcountry Festival:
Despite a strong inaugural year in 2020 with multiple sell out events and clinics, we have decided to once again postpone the festival in 2022 due to COVID-19 provincial health orders and restrictions. As we are not able to host our usual assemblage of backcountry clinics, speaker events and après celebrations, we’ve decided to continue to focus on spreading some backcountry knowledge and wisdom.
This is The Raven Guide to Good Backcountry Citizenship
It’s no secret that the 21/22 winter is once again seeing significantly more backcountry traffic than ever before. Folks were (and still are) equally afraid of ski resort closures and of the long, glacially-paced lift lines that result from socially distanced gondola uploads on a weekend powder day. Many have turned to the backcountry as a sanctuary from the pandemic. While we think it’s awesome that so many more people are getting out to enjoy the Pemberton wilderness, we have witnessed impact to trailheads, backcountry huts and every backcountry user’s experience.
And so, in 20/21, the Raven Backcountry Festival spoke to a few wintersport professionals in an effort to find out how we can all become and continue to be better backcountry citizens; on the slope, on the skin track, in the parking lot and even when you get home and want to share your adventures with others.
RESPECT - LIL'WAT TRADITIONAL TERRITORY
“We are the Líl̓wat Nation, an Interior Salish people. We live in a stunning and dramatic landscape with a rich biodiversity — a mysterious place of towering mountains, ice fields, alpine meadows, white-water rivers, and braided river valleys that run to a milky colour due to the silt and clay deposited by glacial melt. Líl̓wat is a separate and distinct nation with cultural and kinship ties to the St̓át̓y̓emc. Our geography — between two formidable mountain ranges — ensured our important role in the early regional economy. We were traders. For centuries, we bartered and exchanged all manner of goods with many other First Nations, and later with non-aboriginal fur traders, miners and settlers.“ — From the Líl̓wat Fact Book
DONATE TO PEMBERTON SEARCH & RESCUE
The Pemberton District Search & Rescue team is a diverse group of volunteers who invest countless hours away from family, friends and work to train for, and provide, critical life saving services to those in need. The area covered by Pemberton SAR is one of the largest search and rescue coverage areas in the province, representing over 20,000 square kilometres.
Pemberton SAR is funded by contributions from government bodies and donations from corporations and individuals. If you would like to show your support, click the link below to donate. Please be sure to add ‘The Raven Guide’ in the Message Box on the PSAR donation page.
The Raven Guide is Supported By:
info@tourismpembertonbc.com
PO Box 602
Pemberton, BC V0N 2L0
Canada
