We are both now officially unemployed. The Tercel has gone off to be squished - the trailer is packed - the house is rented.

Before heading to the East Coast, we had one final trip in the mountains – and what a trip it was. Thanks to Bill and Lynn, we had the opportunity to hele-hike in South East B.C.

Hiking to us means stuffing our backpacks with gear till we can barely lift them from the ground. Then we carry them for hours and days. We eat dehydrated food and huddle under tarps when the weather is bad. Believe it or not, we loved doing it.

Enter CMH (Canadian Mountain Holidays) and their luxury lodge in the Bugaboo Mountains. Within thirty minutes of wiping the hollandaise sauce from our eggs benedict off our chins, we were being transported to the high alpine by helicopter to spend time wandering blissfully through the meadows. Nasty weather on the first day didn’t really bother us. We knew that we had a hot tub and cold beer waiting for us in the lodge.

“We’re going to make mountaineers out of you,” a guide informed us on our second morning. Perhaps I shouldn’t have laughed. Two hours later we were in climbing harnesses and were short roped to a guide Dave, and an Aussie girl Lynette. We had crampons on our feet, and an ice axe in hand. The glacier’s face rose steeply in front of us. Spiderman had nothing on us as we switch backed up the ice slope.

At the crest of the icefield we discussed our options. The clouds were closing so we decided to climb down the glacier on its other side.

“I’ll show you the crevasses,” Dave said as we set off down the progressively steepening slope.

I was not expecting to see a crevasse so intimately. Dave turned to face us, and using the points on the toes of his crampons and his Ice Axe he climbed down inside of one. As we were all tied together, the three of us followed.

The crevasse was about ten foot deep and fifteen foot long. The centre portion of the floor disappeared into blue nothing as the water drained down a huge hole into the guts of the glacier. The rope insisted we go down.

“Trust your footing,” called Dave. “Commit,” progress was slow.

“Use your ice axe.” Unfortunately, shaking hands made that difficult.

With that detour over, we continued down the ever-steepening slope. Soon our route led us between two large crevasses on a curved slab of ice barely three foot wide.

“Look down into the crevasses,” encouraged Dave. I couldn’t do it. I concentrated instead on traversing the fifteen-foot bridge without tripping. The guides now had some serious route finding to do. With the stern warning, “Don’t move,” the guides left each team of three clients attached by their ropes to the glacier by an ice-screw.

We watched the other two guides return to their groups. After a brief discussion they turned round and headed back the way we came. Dave joined us.

“I’ll take you down,” he told us. Lynette and I glanced at each other and at the retreating groups. “Don’t worry – it’s all good.” He bent down, clipped himself back on our rope and began leading us further into the icefield.

Dave is the boss of the lodge and as been a fully qualified mountain guide for over thirty years. The saying goes – ‘A guide’s job is not to know the way but it is to find the way’. We followed.

Dave worked that day to get us off the glacier. He hacked tiny impressions into the ice that he called steps. He built an anchored handrail out of rope over one of the larger snow bridged we crossed. He continued to screw us into the ice if he left us to reconnoitre. He encouraged us when our eyes were wide.

It took us four hours in total for us to reach solid granite.

We thought that we were done the tough stuff when we left the glacier. After a brief hike down the moraine we began to encounter sloping granite – scraped smooth by the glacier. The rock began increase in steepness.

“ Put your left hand there – right foot here. Baby steps.”

After about three more hours we were back in our harnesses, looking dubiously at Dave as he explained he couldn’t find a way down without using a rope. We would be rappelling off the final cliff.

“I don’t think my mouth has ever been so dry,” Lynette said as she emptied her water bottle following the rappel.

We chatted excitedly as we looked back up at the cliff. The rope dangled down our route – and was left there, as we turned hiked to the helicopter for the ride home.