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to •• 'III th. livllll tOOIJl Of G IJIGllnloll. On about day seven, we decided it was time to head into the back country by helicopter. The splendid sun sat just above the mountains. Jeff was busy trying to thaw his contact lens case on his little Primus lamp. Soon our determined thumbs waved above the road and minutes later we pulled into Alaska Backcountry Adventures at Mile 27 on Thompson Pass, next to Worthington Glacier. Here, the grandeur of heli-skiing starts in a small dirt parking lot with a carniva l-like feel. Raw anticipation and the aroma of hotdogs and espresso fi lled the air. Dogs ran around loose with sk i-movie .. heroes. Ski wear fashion ran the gamut: folks decked out in nine-hundred-dollar suits mingled with die-hard ski bums held together by duct tape and dental floss. Everything seemed temporary, inc luding the sunshine, which had everyone scrambling to get a group of five together for the next avai lable ride. We picked up a snowboarder from Salt Lake City and a telemarker from Tahoe, making an especially happy quintet. Our pi lot and our guide drilled us about our desires and abi lities. "We want to go ski the lines you want to," Travis said with a childlike grin. The adrenaline rush of being on the edge of a dream intensified with the roar of the bird and the sensation of weightlessness. A ride in a high-performance helicopter is alone almost worth the money. We flew into an area in the Chugach known as the Is lands, tight groups of peaks surrounded by oceans of ice. After our third run, our guide, feeling comfortable with our abi lities, asked the pilot if he was wi l ling to push the limits a litt le. The pi lot agreed and we flew deeper into the mountains. Our guide pointed to a line starting on a ridge that looked impossible to land on. We gave the pilot an enthusiastic thumbs-up, then scoped our line. Although it was a nice consistent pitch, it looked too steep to ski. It was a 1,200-plus foot face with one rock band at the bottom, rolling out to a pitch perfect for high-speed open-powder turns. The pilot pointed the nose into the wind and gently touched the skids to the peak. We carefu lly moved our bodies out of the half-hovering and half-balancing helicopter, and crouched into a huddle in the safety zone, about six feet away, facing the skids. The noise was deafening, the wind pow erful. There was no place for hesitation or mistakes. We unloaded the gear, then lay on top of it as the helicopter rocketed off, leaving us in infinite silence. From the peak, the slope descended about 20 feet then rolled out of sight, leaving us with a whole lot of air. Wanting to savor the moment, I sat down and watched my team mates fly away. Then I spread my arms and fell off the edge of the world. Perfect powder flew into my face as I glided down my own private run. The beauty of our group was that we wou Id stand on a peak together, then each of us would go down our own way: huge arching turns, hundreds of tight turns, floating big air or figure elevens straight down. Back in the parking lot, after we'd spent all our money and checked our pockets twice for a last heli-token, we were ready to set out on the most mysterious part of our adventure. Our plan was to hitchhike to Homer, catch a boat across Kachemak Bay, then walk into the Kenai Mountains in search of a cabin we knew existed-we just didn't know exact ly where. We traveled back through Anchorage and on to the Seward Highway. We were dropped off in the small mountain village of Girdwood, then we took a bus to Homer. Across the Cook In let, two ancient volcanoes, Redoubt and Iliamna, rose from the salty water 10,000 feet into the thin blue air. In the distance, the snow-covered Kenai Mountains stretched across the horizon then dove into the ocean. We stood with the waves crashing at our feet and stared across Kachemak Bay, fantasizing a hundred unturned turns. I n Homer Harbor, bald eagles swirled overhead and congregated along the narrow beach. Teenage fishermen, who came from the lower 48 hoping to make big bucks on commercial fishing boats, had set up plastic tents among the driftwood. We negotiated a watercrossing that would put us on the beach late in the evening, at high tide. The 30-foot tide swing could mean a long slog through muddy tide flats at low tide. The water calmed as we neared the small bay. Evergreens came down to meet pebbly beach. Low hanging clouds left just enough of the Kenai Mountains exposed to stir our excitement. On a spongy shore of seaweed and mussels we made a small mon ument of gear. The boys skinned up their skis, and I strapped on my snow shoes. A friend of Jeff's had a cabin in the region and he said that if we could find it, we could use it. Jeff pointed vaguely toward the woods and said, "The cabin is that way." We packed up our sleds, took a few deep breaths, then, like pack horses, we lowered our heads and started trudging into the Kenai wi Iderness. After about three hours it began to snow profusely. We plodded into the darkness, pushing on toward the elusive cabin. Spruce trees began to close in. Large shadows moved in the darkness. We took turns breaking trai l, testing snow bridges and picking the safest possible route. We stum bled through the night, fa lling to our knees, laughing, cursing, crying. Early the next morning, in a dreamy state, we arrived at the cabin nestled in dense forest, surrounded by moss and the white �oise of the river. Beyond the cabin, the mountains rose up into the clouds. We spent the first few days trapped in the cabin, singing the