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Written by The Editors
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Wednesday, 31 January 2007 |
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Page 6 of 7
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Margaret Wheeler
Washington
Home: North Bend, WA
Abode: Hoping to build a green one someday, even though solar panels only work three months of the year in western Washington.
Work: Ski, Rock, and Alpine Guide; AIARE Instructor, AMGA Ski Discipline Instructor
Range: Cascades
Tool of choice: AT
Age: 31
Weight: 155
Height: 6’
Backcountry Days: 50 (guiding and personal together)
Resort Days: 20
Climbing days on ice/rock: 40…and counting.
Ideal b.c. group size: 2 or 3
Favorite apres-ski event: Disco dancing. Techno dancing. Both.
Interesting facts: I own a disco ball…and I work as a mechanical engineer part-time.
Theme music: Remember the Barbie Song from Aqua?
Big-Day Breakfast: Those country-style breakfasts, where you get two of each food group; i.e. sausage, eggs, pancakes, potatoes. Except the truth is a guiding breakfast usually falls way short and lands somewhere in the oatmeal/breakfast bar regime.
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Last Season’s Best Day: “Last season was rough in the Northwest—winter showed up for three weeks in April and then we went straight into spring touring season. However, we did manage to reap some rewards. Guiding a ski mountaineering trip in the North Cascades on a bluebird day in May, we hit perfect corn all the way down the Quien Sabe Glacier…so sweet that fellow guides saw our tracks a week later and coveted them.”
Body Climate: “I warm up quick and cool off even quicker—High Metabolism Girl strikes again. I’m somewhere between perspire and glow in the ‘horses sweat, men perspire, women glow’ spectrum…meaning I don’t sweat too much. In the winter, I don’t ever travel without my down puffy, even in the Northwest, and in this climate if I can keep my fingers and toes dry I have no problem keeping them warm.”
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Prescription:
To help keep the High Metabolism Girl balanced between high exertion skins or at rest, we’ll start her off with Ibex’s lightweight Woolies Top and Bottom base layers (ibexwear.com). And since she’s in the Northwest where staying both warm and dry is often a major challenge, she can stash away the synthetic-filled Red Point by The North Face (thenorthface.com).
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Ibex’s Woolies Top base layer
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Ibex’s Woolies Bottom base layers
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Red Point by The North Face
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Mountain Climate: “Early mornings in the mountains are never much colder than 30ºF if I’m doing day trips because we start at relatively low elevations. Often it will be raining when I leave the house and snowing when I get out of the car at a trailhead or parking lot. Even then it is a humid cold—we have no dry sub-zero temperatures on the west side of the mountains. Temperatures can fluctuate drastically in the Cascade Passes, and warming/cooling trends can happen in a matter of hours during a given day.”
Prescription:
The Synchro by Mountain Hardwear (mountainhardwear.com) will provide Margaret with the versatility to handle both the wet and cold she encounters daily. If it’s not pouring, Ibex’s Neve Soft Shell (ibexwear.com) can be left on all day. And the 66º North’s Askja Hard Shell (66north.com) is great for when the weather isn’t.
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Ibex’s Neve Soft Shell
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The Synchro by Mountain Hardwear
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66º North’s Askja Hard Shell
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