For many skiers the prospect of heliskiing is the dream of a lifetime. As the name suggests, heliskiing involves transportation of skiers by helicopter to mountain terrain to which they would not normally have access. The ideal quality and consistency of snow for heliskiing is a light dry powder.

A helicopter will usually take a group of around a dozen, plus a highly qualified guide. Two or more groups are usually handled in a shuttle system, whereby one group is being dropped off at the top of the mountain the other group is skiing and arriving at the bottom. All groups depart from and return to their lodge via helicopter on skiing days. This system has the wonderful advantage of no bus rides and no extended waiting times from one run to the next. Each day is begins and ends via helicopter. This means more skiing, more vertical runs and more powder with less waiting around. The average vertical per group is around 25,000 feet per day.

Packages usually range in length from two to seven days, with the amount of skiing determined by several factors: the skiing ability of your group, the amount you want to ski, the weather and the snow conditions. Heliskiing has become a wide spread sport in the last two decades , and can now be found all over the world. Although nervous souls may have reservations about helicopter transfer and uncharted skiing, there is really no cause for concern.

The pilots that fly the helicopters are carefully selected based on qualifications and their experience flying in the mountains. The ski guides are all certified mountain guides , trained in a stringent process that takes between three and six years. One aspect that truly takes a bit of getting used to is the concept of bottomless snow; unique in that there is no base under your feet supporting you. Push your ski pole down and it keeps going!

This type of skiing is much easier with a "fat ski", which is twice as wide as a slalom ski. Falling in bottomless snow is an interesting experience as the lack of ground leverage makes it so damned hard to get up again, and it's this, not the skiing, which will tire you out. For this reason, before you embark on your heliskiing adventure, you should be a strong blue-level skier who has had some experience in powder snow. But once you go once you'll appreciate that heliskiing offers the true essence of skiing. They beauty and serenity of the scenery combined with abun dance of virgin, bottomless snow is truly an experience that you can only imagine in your dreams until you live it firsthand.