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A surge of interest in contrast therapy has made it easy to unleash your inner Viking.

Elif Koyuturk about to cold plunge into the Deschutes River in the snow — Photo of and by Elif Koyutürk

Frankly, I think they’re bonkers. Some friends and I are seated in a sauna sweating our cheeks-to-cheeks off. It’s a cold, brittle day in Ramsvik, Sweden, and the oven-hot air inside here has that spicy cedar scent. My leg muscles, tight from a morning trail run, now go slack like molasses in the sun.

“You ready?” prods my friend Jim, motioning toward the sauna door.

The sauna sits along a small cove of black, 43-degree seawater, which is a whopping 160 degrees colder than inside the 200-degree sauna. Jim wants to race outside and do a cold plunge. The Vikings themselves knew this kind of hot-cold routine could bring curative, transformative powers. To me, it sounds like torture.

Getting ready to cold plunge in Bend Oregon — Photo of and by Elif Koyutürk

“I don’t know,” I say. But peer pressure prevails and into the water I go.

You know what happens next. I freak out. The cold crushes my breath into sharp, inefficient gasps. The water drains the heat from me with lethal efficiency. Every brain cell tells me to get out of this, now. I do as Jim says and work to control my breathing. When I do, something odd starts to happen.

I find willpower. Time slows and thoughts go still. I stop reacting to the pain and let my mind feel it out, like a finger drawn on an old stone wall. For a moment, I’m in control.

In less than a minute survival instincts take over and guide me out of the water. Dripping wet in the icy breeze on the dock, I am neither hot nor cold but sharp and alert like never before. I feel like a guy who has learned he can fly.

Cold Plunge Bend Oregon — Photo of and by Elif Koyutürk

Cold Plunge as Therapy

Scandinavians have long embraced the sauna-plunge ritual of vinterbadning, or winter bathing. But now “contrast therapy” is everywhere. In Bend, you could even say it’s having a moment.

Consider this. Gather Sauna House: The original sauna/cold plunge business in Central Oregon is in its third year of a partnership with Bend Park and Recreation District. Its setup at at Riverbend Park allows you to sweat in a wood-fired sauna only steps away from a plunge in the chilly Deschutes River. Founded in 2019, Gather Sauna House will soon add a brick and mortar spot in addition to its seasonal park location. In late December 2024, SweatHouz opened on SW Century Drive with cold plunges and infrared saunas that warm tissues with a deeper heat. ChillWell opened in September 2024 on Olney and Wall streets. Flux Thermal Lounge in the westside Century Center will open in 2025 to provide hot and cold water immersion therapy. Bend’s mobile barrel sauna and cold plunge service, 541 Social Club, found a permanent home at Foundation Health and Fitness in southeast Bend.

Inside Gather Sauna House — Gather Sauna House | Photo by Samantha Henry

Want to build your own? Redmond Spa Stove and Sauna has the heat. For about $15,000, Redmond-based BlueCube will make you a handcrafted tub cooled by commercial chillers.

“People are digging it,” said Bryan Messmer, a former self-described contrast therapy skeptic who tried it, had a wonderful, transformative experience and launched ChillWell. “I thought for sure I was going to see a bunch of yogis and granolas and endurance athletes and biohackers and those kinds of people, but that has not been the case,” Messmer said. “This has been for everyone.”

From the Athletes

For years, athletes everywhere have fought muscle soreness and fatigue with cold therapies while others have sought the mental and physical benefits of cold plunges and breath work championed by people such as surfer Laird Hamilton and Wim Hof—the Dutch “iceman” known for his acts of enduring extreme cold. With this flush of new services in Bend, anyone can book a session and hire an expert to guide them through the experience.

Clayton Reeves, a Mountain View High School grad and an Oregon State Beaver with a bachelor’s degree in exercise sports science, is one of those experts. He returned to Bend after seeing a need for a mobile contrast therapy service. By January 2023 he was rolling around town with a barrel sauna and cold plunge tubs on a trailer that he could set up outside of gyms. He showed up at corporate retreats and marathons. Often people would hire him to do private pop-up events on their neighborhood streets.

“So many people would stop me and be, like, is that wine?” Reeves said. “I’d say, ‘No, it’s performance recovery.’”

His new space at Foundation Health and Fitness is now fully enclosed but the benefits are the same. How hard you train is only as beneficial as how well you can recover, he said. Alternating between hot and cold can speed that up.

For the hot portion of contrast therapy to work best, Reeves said you need an environment that’s at least 170 degrees. That’s when our cells activate a flood of heat-shock proteins that cruise around the body looking for and repairing damaged cells. The heat also ups your heart rate, which ups your blood flow and results in faster repairs. A sauna also stress tests our abilities to sweat, which trains our bodies to cool themselves more efficiently in the future.

After taking a cold plunge — Photo of and by Elif Koyutürk

Adding in cold is when things get interesting. Getting into water that’s roughly 40 degrees drastically reduces inflammation throughout the body, slashing pain. Cold-shock proteins whirl to life and pick up the repairs. Feel-good neurochemicals such as dopamine, adrenaline, epinephrine and oxytocin surge into the blood stream giving us a euphoric rush. To warm ourselves back up, our cells incinerate “brown fat,” a healthier fat than the “white fat” that’s great for the brain. The hot-cold combo can leave you in a better mood with less stress and anxiety and more confidence to face new challenges. “Plus I sleep like a baby,” Reeves said.

Me, too. Not long after I get home from Scandinavia, my wife and friends book a session at Gather Sauna House. I’m tempted to try it again, but ultimately chicken out. My wife struggles to push through the pain, while another friend, Erin Morgan, is hooked. She lights up when I ask her about it a few days later.

“I feel like that yoga shirt that says, ‘I’m just here for the Shavasana,” Morgan laughs. “Bring it on.”

Bend’s Ski Tune Masters

These Bendites get your sticks in top shape for a slippery season on snow.

You know the feeling. There you are, cross-country skiing along the first leg of the Tangent Loop at Meissner, when everything goes south. For me, it often happens after that left at the five-point intersection and the long climb toward Swampy begins. Sure, it’s uphill but it’s not that uphill. Suddenly I’m working 20 times harder. My form crumbles and lungs burst. Snowshoers are faster. What a drag.

Dan Simoneau, Powder House | Photo by Ely Roberts

My waning fitness notwithstanding, the culprit is almost always the base of my skis, and my alpine skis aren’t immune. If the bases are damaged or slathered in the wrong wax—or no wax at all—chances of suffering are high.

That’s where the Ski Tune Masters of Bend can help. These folks don’t just drizzle on a layer of all-temperature hot sauce with an old iron in the garage and call it good. Each has taken the craft of unlocking your equipment’s top-notch gliding performance in innovative ways that keep in mind Central Oregon conditions. Their work can improve anyone’s skiing, no matter the level.

Masters of the Glide

Dan Simoneau has been thinking about cross-country skis and how to maximize their glide for pretty much his entire adult life. A three-time Olympic athlete, Simoneau made the U.S. Men’s Ski Team in 1976 before “skate skiing” was even a sport. That discipline didn’t appear at a World Cup until 1985, and Simoneau, who became the second American cross-country skier ever to podium in a World Cup, was there racing at that inaugural event, too. The twist?

“We all skated on classic skis,” he said with a laugh. “Classic poles. Classic boots. There was even a classic track in the way.”

The Race Place Ski wax prep — Eric Holmer, The Race Place | Photo by Ely Roberts

Today, Nordic skiing has become much more sophisticated. To get the best glide, Simoneau says what matters most is the ski base and the tiny, strategic cuts that give it “structure.” Skis glide best on a thin layer of water that forms between the base and the surface of the snow, and managing that water for optimum glide is a delicate function influenced by temperatures, water content, the shape of the snow crystals and more. Too much water under the ski will make it sticky; too little water means too much friction. Tweaking the density, length and depth of those cuts can produce a Goldilocks glide.

To do that, Simoneau and his co-workers at the Powder House use a stone grinder, Central Oregon’s only such dedicated machine, to create structure in cross-country bases. Figuring out the ideal structure is where Simoneau really shines. Every winter you can find him out at Meissner testing at least nine pairs of skis, each with a different structure. The result means he can tune your bases to your own skiing habits, including whether you go in the morning or evening, on cold winter days or warm spring ones, or all of the above. (In that case, ask for the universal “S22” grind.) And if you’ve never had your bases ground at all, even one tune up will make a huge difference.

“We’re not testing anywhere else in the world,” Simoneau said. “We know what works here.”

The Racer’s Edge

Eric Holmer moved with his parents as a kid to Bend in 1988, when he joined Mt. Bachelor Sports Education Foundation and saw his ski racing career take off. By his late teens and early 20s, Holmer had become one of the top male downhill racers in the country, and his father, Scott, had developed a serious interest in how best to tune skis.

“I remember one time my father started questioning a World Cup technician about the accuracy of his method,” recalled Eric, who runs The Race Place after his father’s retirement. The Race Place was one of the first—if not the first—ski shops in the country dedicated to ski racing. The elder Holmer and the technician started disagreeing and things soured fast. “My father was genuinely curious and wanted to learn,” Eric said.

close up ski wax with Between the Evergreens mobile truck — Between Evergreens | Photo by Ely Roberts

That disagreement led to great things, however, when Scott Holmer invented one of the most celebrated edge-tuning devices shortly after that time. Soon, racers from across the country clamored to get their edges tuned by Scott. Called the Base BEAST, for Best Edge Accuracy Ski Tool, it’s still one of the easiest and most intuitive ways for alpine racers to get the edges they need to win.

The BEAST edge boils down to the angle of the metal edge as it relates to the base of the ski. Racers typically want a 1-degree bevel, which helps the ski onto its edge before grabbing the snow. It’s a minute but critical angle.

“One-degree on an edge that’s at most 2 millimeters thick can ruin your day if it’s not proper,” Eric said.

To get that angle, skiers used to wrap tape around the handle of a file to thicken it up and increase the cutting angle when the handle was placed on the base. It was all very subjective. The BEAST took the guesswork out by using a jig for the file that would produce consistent results every time. Since it was cheap and easily shipped, The BEAST also democratized the ski-tuning process.

“People no longer had to send in their skis, because the shop was the only place that could do it,” Eric said.

Tune-Up on Wheels

For most skiers and snowboarders, the best wax is any wax, but taking your boards to a shop isn’t always convenient—especially if you’re a visitor who’s come to town for a getaway. That’s where Ben Beyer can help. He’s the owner of Between Evergreens, a mobile ski shop that fits inside a Sprinter van that can roll right up to your doorstep.

“I got the idea while living up in Portland where it can take a week to get your skis tuned,” he said. “I was thinking of starting a brick and mortar shop but then thought, what if we did it out of a van?”

Mobile ski tune van — Ben Beyer, Between Evergreens | Photo by Ely Roberts

Beyer, now in his 40s, learned the craft working in shops throughout Park City, Utah, before moving to the Pacific Northwest. He and his wife Sarah now own the shop Between Evergreens in NorthWest Crossing which also services bikes, but the van is dedicated to skis and boards. Inside you’ll find a powerful electric generator that can handle the energy waxing irons demand as well as all the tools needed to do other tasks, such as mount new bindings and sharpen edges.

He does more than house calls, too. Look for the van parked at events at Mt. Bachelor or outside of Boneyard Pub from time to time. “You can have dinner and drinks and your skis will be done by the time you leave,” he said.

The Grumpy Guide to Winter Driving

Bachelor is open. The road is slick. Don’t be that driver.

When Mt. Bachelor opened on November 15, it was the earliest the lifts had spun since 1998. That means I got a jump start on being cranky.

That has nothing to do with the mountain or Powdr Corp. or the way the Skyliner lot fills up hours before it used to back in the Old Timey times when two hand pulled pints at Deschutes with a burger and a side Caesar cost you $12. No, no. Bachelor is one of my favorite places to ski and I’ve skied in about 20 countries. It’s that damn drive up. And it’s not even the drive, really. It’s the people who can’t just chill out that make me a frosty Ebenezer. You know who they are.

They’re the yahoos who loathe the conga line and inexplicably try to frogger their way up a 20-mile line of cars. They drive too fast for conditions, jamming out to music I hate, and spin off the road in disbelief. (“I wasn’t going fast!”). Most of the time, nothing happens, until it does, and then the rest of us who were at least tolerating doing 45 have to either abort, wait or turn around and go through Sunriver. I hope no one gets hurt but the impatience is enough to make me pop.

The worst of the bunch, in my grumble opinion, are the drivers who are either too inexperienced, too ignorant or too lazy to be prepared. I sorta get it, though, having been “that guy” myself when I first experienced a proper winter, in Montana, when Bush 1 was president. It didn’t take long for me to learn that a two-wheel drive pickup with bald tires isn’t a great way to get to Bridger. So I made other arrangements. That was the first winter I’d ever heard of AWD.

Accidents are accidents and not “on purpose-ents.” We live in a place that attracts a lot of people who may arrive in rental cars or in their little two-wheel drive Westsidemobiles. A lot of locals work their asses off just to afford a pass, let alone a $30,000 Suby. And so they set out on Century Drive with an “it’ll be fine” attitude. Maybe it will. Maybe it won’t. But you have a choice. So, for the love of Ullr, here’s what I’m begging you to do:

Get proper snow tires.

All-season tires are not proper snow tires. Those “mud and snow” tires, the ones that say M+S on them, are not proper snow tires. Get something like what I’m running this year, Nokian Hakkapeliittas, the “granddaddy of all winter tires,” as the guy at Discount Tire said.

At the very least, look for the three peak mountain snowflake on your tires. That means they have been verified by a third party to perform in extreme winter conditions. The tread is good, yes, but the rubber compound remains flexible and grippy in cold temperatures. Nokian Tyres even makes an “ice grip” tire that goes a step further, which is what you’d expect from a Finnish company that invented the snow tire. Don’t think you need them? Your AWD or 4WD does nothing to help you stop or turn. That’s up to your tires.

Studs vs no-studs.

This is like asking, Deschutes or BBC? Everyone will have an opinion and swear theirs is right. The simple answer: Studs are superior when the road is slick as snot or packed in rock hard snow. But that’s it. Most of the time, like 95 percent of Central Oregon winter driving, proper non-studded snow tires are the way to go. They handle better on dry pavement than most studs do, too.

Slow down. (That means you.)

“Most people try to go too fast,” says Michael Johnson, a retired sheriff’s deputy who taught cops how to drive for years. Brake before you enter a curve, he says. Accelerate after you’ve come out of the curve. When coming downhill, downshift. “If you get the tire sliding and you try to turn, the car is going to just go straight,” he says. “Start managing this weight and energy when you can drive in a straight line, before a corner.”

Take a course.

Johnson offers a “Skid Car” training class with hands-on instruction on how to handle skids and slides using a car set atop a special rig that mimics losing traction. Have a young driver who loves to ski in your family? (I do). Best $100 ever spent.

Leave lots of room.

The person in front of you driving way too slow? Maybe it’s a young driver who’s playing it cautious because they worked all summer to save up for their first car and don’t want to smash it. Maybe it’s a visitor. Maybe that person just doesn’t want to risk making everyone else go around through Sunriver. So chill out. Back off. Enjoy the drive. Breathe. (Bend has classes on that.) You’ll get there a whole two minutes later. Who cares?

Take the bus.

I’ve lobbied for years that we need a ski train but while we’re waiting for that $10 billion idea we have the $7 Mt. Bachelor bus. Don’t have those snow tires? Take the bus. Don’t feel comfortable driving in the snow? Bus! Want to be a lay-arounder and not a zoom-arounder? Stay home and watch ski movies. I mean, take the bus!

Opening day, I let my daughter skip school. We were giddy as could be until the guy in front me was doing 44 on dry pavement. Still, ever the role model, I backed off. Good thing. My brand new snow tires got a workout near Virginia Meissner, where winter really began.

You know who didn’t have brand new snow tires? The guy in the white SUV who spun out near Swampy and got stuck in a snowbank.

The Bachy 500 had begun.

Keep up with the winter weather cams at Mt. Bachelor, or with our weekly report here.

Adventure Racing

Get Hooked on a Sport Where Excitement and Teamwork Create Community

Jason Gockel felt the alarm bells ringing in his head. It was early October 2023, and the teacher from Bend Forest School stood atop a bridge in La Pine State Park, peering 30 feet down into the Deschutes River as it slipped past, cool and green. This was his first adventure race—a multisport, human-powered contest that involves navigating between checkpoints often by foot, bike and boat—and the 37 year old had already spent the morning hiking off trail, cycling roads and using only a map and compass to orient his way through the park. Now, to complete a checkpoint, he and his partner, Matthias Ambert, had to rappel off the bridge into the water. But something wasn’t right. The rope was much too short. He’d have to free-fall the last few feet right into the drink.

“I’ve done a lot of climbing, and rappelling off the end of a rope is something you never, ever want to do,” Gockel said. “But that’s what you had to do.”

Gockel felt the end of the rope eerily slip through his harness as he plunged into the river with all of his clothes on. It took only a few seconds to swim to shore but something far more enduring had washed over him. This first-timer had caught the adventure-racing bug, bad.

“I was totally hooked,” he said. “It was one of the most fun days of my life.”

Since then, in less than a year, Gockel has competed in no fewer than four adventure races, most of them in Central Oregon, which is an excellent venue thanks to an abundance of wild and varied terrain. On October 5 and 6, the La Pine Loop race—the same race that got Gockel started—will unfold for the seventh time. That race also includes a family-friendly version with checkpoints where kids gather materials to make something fun they can keep, for example, charms for a necklace. Other races throughout the year include the Technical Endurance Challenge near Redmond and Smith Rock in April and Sunriver Scramble, a six- to eight-hour race taking place in June.

Adventure racers reviewing the maps pre race — Photo by Darren Steinbach

In September, some of the best teams in the world compete in Expedition Oregon, a whopping six-day contest that has racers tackling class III rapids, exploring caves, climbing cliffs and mountain biking single-track trails. “We call it America’s Toughest Race,” said Bend resident Jason Magness, who along with his wife, Chelsea, organizes, directs and competes in adventure races throughout Oregon and the world. Together they also manage and participate in their own professional team called Bend Racing, one of the best adventure racing teams on the planet.

Group of adventure racers learning the rules — Photo by Tim Crowley

Magness and Bend Racing may sound familiar. The team featured prominently in Amazon Prime Video’s 2020 reboot of the highly popular Eco-Challenge series that put adventure racing on the North American map in the 1990s. That new television series, which was hosted by Bear Grylls, saw Magness and three other teammates battle their way across the jungles of Fiji, where they built a make-shift raft out of bamboo to float down a river, sailed a traditional boat between islands and ran and biked for days on end through stifling heat and torrential rain. Mark Burnett, the series producer who also created shows like “The Apprentice,” likened the race to “an expedition with a stop-watch.”

Adventure races include fat tire biking in the mud — Photo courtesy of BendRacing Media

For newcomers to the sport, such an undertaking would feel like cruel and unusual punishment, but the bite-size races are a great way to give the sport a try in a format that really ups the fun. Magness says adventure racing’s appeal at pretty much any level typically boils down to a person’s willingness to embrace the unknown. You might make a wrong turn. Maybe your bike gets a flat. Perhaps everything goes far more smoothly than ever before and no one even gets a blister.

“No two races are ever alike,” Magness said. “There aren’t a lot of endurance sports out there where you really don’t know what’s ahead.”

Rock Climbing in an Adventure Race Central Oregon — Photo courtesy of BendRacing Media

That element of surprise certainly appeals to Gockel but his new hobby taps into something bigger, too—a sense of community. “I love being part of a team and how you can all work together to problem solve while running through the woods or paddling down a river,” he said. “If you want to be competitive, you can be competitive, and if you want to just have fun you can do that, too. Everyone who crosses that finish line has a smile on their face.”

Adventure racers checking in during a race — Photo by Tim Crowley

What is an Adventure Race?

Adventure racing takes racers off the road and into the unknown. Think triathlon, but make it wild. Instead of a swim, bike and run, the sports vary race-to-race and adapt to the natural landscape of each event. Teams of two to four athletes navigate miles of wilderness on mountain bikes, in kayaks, on ropes and by foot with no marked course. They work together and reach checkpoints along the way with the help of compasses and maps. For amateur teams, the only prerequisite is a sense of adventure. But to go pro, Bend Racing lists team requirements needs as: navigator, medic, bike mechanic, a captain to make big decisions, a pace counter to keep the team on track and “a stoker” to keep morale high.

Adventure racers searching for the next clue — Photo by Darren Steinbach

Where to Find a Race:

April 20-21: Technical Endurance Challenge, Redmond and Smith Rock | Features: Day one is an advanced adventure race, but a kid and family- friendly race takes place on day two.

June 1: Sunriver Scramble, Sunriver | Features: Technical sections are suited for professional racers, but there are options to shorten the course and avoid difficult segments.

September 6-14: Expedition Oregon, Columbia River Gorge | Features: A world championship qualifier for experienced teams, this event is for experienced teams and spans six days with extremely technical sections for advanced racers.

October 5-6: La Pine Loop, La Pine State Park | Features: The seven-hour event is for intermediate and experienced endurance athletes. A four-hour course is less technical and best for kids and families.

High School Adventure Racers cross the finish line — Photo by Darren Steinbach

Mt. Bachelor Before the Sun Rises

Throughout winter, Mt. Bachelor buzzes with activity that most of us Bendites never see. Beyond the groomers and the parking lot plows, teams run deliveries through the night to dole out everything from snowmobile parts to the untold tons of chicken tenders that visitors blow through by day. The effort required to keep the lifts spinning alone is breathtaking. While we sleep, the maintenance folks inspect and de-ice exactly 1,248 chairs on 20 miles of cable across 195 towers. Every last one of the “sheaves,” those wheels that a lift cable rolls over, has to be inspected, too. There are roughly 2,600 of them. Here, meet just a few of the wizards working behind the curtain to make our winters spectacular.

The Power Couple

Every time you hop on a Mt. Bachelor chairlift, offer thanks to Alicia Smith and her husband, Brandon. Waking up at 2:45 a.m. each day, the power couple drives to the mountain long before the plows fire up to make sure the lifts are ready to go—all before most of us are even thinking about getting out of bed. Together, they and their teams strengthen the backbone of what carries us up the mountain.

Alicia Smith and her husband, Brandon at Mt. Bachelor — Alicia and Brandon Smith, make sure the lifts are ready to go—all before most of us are even thinking about getting out of bed.

The Smiths started working at Mt. Bachelor almost 20 years ago as lift operators. But in the years since, they’ve moved into different roles. Brandon is now the mountain’s senior lift maintenance manager and Alicia, who helped install Cloudchaser, is the resort’s life maintenance electrical supervisor for anything under 600 volts, which includes every lift, some of which can produce up to 1,000 horsepower.

Everyday, the team inspects 1248 chairs & 20 miles of cable across 195 towers.

Mount Bachelor’s weather makes things tricky, particularly with ice that can build up on the sheaves. It’s imperative that they spin freely to prevent the cables from damaging them. To clear them, the team will run the lift backwards for a bit to knock off much of the ice without breaking tower sensors which make sure the cables stay in their tracks. Team members will then ski or snowmobile down the lift lines, inspecting each one of the sheaves. If one isn’t spinning, someone will climb up the tower and free it by hand. It can take days during a storm cycle to get them all spinning properly. Summit Express actually rotates constantly at a slow rate, even during the night, to help prevent ice build-up and allow for a quicker opening. Other teams work to clear snow from the terminal stations, making sure all the belts and pulleys are ice-free. There are more than 2,100 belts alone. Many of them have to be cleared by hand.

Meanwhile, Alicia will go around making sure the lift controls are all functioning. Ice can get into those, too, and cause the contacts to fail, which means she has to swap out a lot of switches. Those are easy, Alicia said. The worst is when a communication cable breaks. The cables run top to bottom on every tower, and sometimes right along the ground, because burying cables in volcanic rock is challenging. “They get eaten up,” Alicia explained. When a circuit fails, she has to go find the weak spot in the cable, which can be buried under a winter’s worth of snow. “It can take hours, or even days,” she said. One of the most difficult things she’s ever had to deal with was a time when the Northwest Express motor failed. She’d had it “totally dialed in” as one season came to a close, only to discover something that happened over the summer fried it. “The motor had literally pulled itself apart,” she said. It was too late to buy a new one for the season, and most companies won’t rebuild a motor like that for liability reasons.

Eventually, she did find someone willing to take it on, and now the motor functions like it’s brand new. This year, Alicia has some other challenges to look forward to, namely the new Skyliner Express lift which runs on AC power, just like a home appliance. All of the other lifts run on DC, like most battery-powered devices. The control systems are wildly different, with small “programmable logic controller” cards that replace the thousands of relays and switches. “With the older lifts, I can walk up to them and physically change whatever is wrong,” she said. “Now, it’s more about reading lights and figuring out what they mean.”

Evening comes. The Smiths pile into their Ford F-150 and head home to feed the dogs, eat and wash up. By 8 p.m. they’re fast asleep.

The Wizard of Mt. Bachelor

For the past 24 seasons, Betsy Norsen has been an integral part of Mt. Bachelor, first as a ski patroller and now as senior mountain operations manager. That means she oversees all of the grooming, terrain parks and various maintenance teams. “It’s all encompassing,” she said. “There’s always something that needs to be done.” Norsen is typically on the road up to the mountain by 6 a.m., listening to radio chatter on her Motorola from the maintenance and grooming crews that have been working all night. She gets weather reports specific to Mt. Bachelor, and right away she can tell if it’s going to be a difficult start to the day—say, winds are high or lifts are frozen—or if it’s going to be “a turnkey” kind of morning.

Betsy Norsen Mt Bachelor — Betsy Norsen, senior mountain operations manager, Mt. Bachelor

Summit Express rotates constantly, even during the night, to prevent ice buildup.

Norsen was once at the top of Sunrise Express when winds hit 100 mph, which means the lifts couldn’t run at all because they’ll slam into or even miss “the trumpet,” a rail that guides the chair into the station. Many times, it’s a game to figure out how to open what they can as safely and efficiently as possible. Pine Marten Express has 102 chairs—Northwest has 180—and if the radio chatter suggests the crews are stopping the lift to clear each one, she may have to pull people off one job and send them out to another to help. “There are a lot of puzzle pieces,” she said. By 6:30 a.m., the first snow reports and conditions updates will be posted online. By 7:30 a.m., she’ll have a better idea of which lifts will open and when. At 2 p.m., she’ll meet with the marketing team and operations teams to see if there were any surprises and what they can learn from that day. “We’ll come up with a plan for the next day and hope the stars align,” she said. “Then, when all of the guests go home, another whole world begins.”

Time to Clear the Lots

As the director of base operations, Ryan Gage—just “Gage,” to his friends—is in charge of a lot of what skiers first encounter when they arrive at the mountain, namely making sure the parking lots are clear, among his long list of other duties. Gage will start touching base with his team daily at around 4 a.m. All through the night, crews have been working to groom the slopes, restock the lodges, distribute parts and mail, haul out the trash, and make sure no one staying in the RV areas needs help.

The director of base operations at Mt. Bachelor, Ryan Gage

Keeping the West Village parking area clear, however, is a gargantuan task alone. The lot covers 20.8 acres, which means that even a two-inch storm leaves roughly 158,000 cubic feet of snow to push around (enough to bury your average driveway in at least 80 feet of the stuff). In all, Gage will have six or seven operators working the rotary snow blowers, the loader, the plow trucks, and the grader, to clear the four lots at Sunrise, the Skyliner lot, West Village, and all of the service roads while the rest of us are sleeping. “They have to touch every parking lot and every roadway, every night,” he said. “They’re a very busy crew.” To do that work, Gage goes through a massive amount of diesel fuel. One blower working one shift can burn through 400 gallons of it. On a big storm night, it can be even more than that. Oftentimes, the plow or grader can only make a few passes before the snow gets too deep to move and a blower will have to come in to throw it farther out of the way. It’s a never-ending cycle. “The way snow works, the more you touch it, the more air you take out of it and the denser it gets,” Gage said. “It just slows everything down.”

Ski Patrol starting their day at Mt. Bachelor

Preparing for the Party

It’s shortly before 5 a.m. and Dave “DT” Thomas silences his alarm. He makes coffee, then checks the webcams and weather. As Mt. Bachelor’s Ski Patrol director, Thomas faces a similar challenge every morning: to figure out the mountain’s “operational footprint.” Is the plan to get Northwest Express open? Is there a race on Cliffhanger that day? Knowing those facts will dictate a lot of the morning. Most of the patrollers arrive by 7:30 a.m. and are on the mountain by 8. Together, they’ll get to work setting up signage and fencing and stringing up the ropes. “It’s like setting the table for a party,” Thomas said.

Every patroller has medical training, but before the day begins, they’re more focused on the mountain itself. Avalanche work gets a lot of attention. The avalanche teams will show up around 6 a.m. to get a jump on the snow-safety checks. Since patrollers are on the mountain every single day, they have a good sense of the conditions and which areas might slide. Several “indicator” slopes offer a snapshot of what could be going on up high, too. For instance, there’s an area they call Old Downhill near the top of Skyliner Express that can get a cornice on it that may need to be destroyed, lest it collapse and hurt someone.

Avalanche Work at Mt. Bachelor

Up high, teams of two will venture out into the cirque carrying explosives—typically a two-pound emulsion mixture—while wearing float bags and avalanche beacons, just in case they get caught in a slide themselves. One person will ignite the charge by drawing a wire coated with red phosphorus through a cardboard tube that lights the 90-second fuse, a tricky task if your gloves are frozen. Another patroller ties a length of rope to the charge so it can be raised and lowered on the slope to the exact spot. The charge ignites. Everyone in the parking lot looks up. It’s going to be a good day.

Catch extended interviews with the team at Mt. Bachelor. Listen to The Circling Podcast at BendMagazine.com/podcast.

A Nordic Skiing Paradise in Central Oregon

The Meissner Nordic Ski Club was at it again, and the Forest Service roads and paths southwest of Bend were once again magically transformed into glorious ribbons of cold, corduroy snow. It’d been a tough day at work, but now, standing in the parking lot at Virginia Meissner Sno-Park, the stress faded like so much daylight. A light snow fell. I stepped into my skis and cast off into the purple night, the flakes strafing through the cone of my headlamp.

We live within eyeshot of one of the nation’s largest downhill ski resorts, but we’re also a Nordic skiing paradise. Between Mt. Bachelor and Virginia Meissner alone, the area has more than 100 kilometers of groomed cross country trails, nearly half of which are free thanks to the Meissner Nordic Ski Club. Countless other trails wind around snowy buttes, back to cozy cabins and along quiet lakes. For little to no money, cross country skiers can glide through a winter wonderland where the forests sigh under the weight of the flakes and the tranquility can be exquisite. Or, if you’re one of the countless Nordic athletes in town, you can push yourself so hard the world blurs at the edges, and you feel as if you might cough up a lung.

High school ski teams — High school teams produce nationally-ranked skiers. Photo Matthew Lasala.

Nordic Definitions and Dedication

The range of experiences, athleticism and dedication the sport inspires is a big reason why Nordic isn’t just downhill skiing’s kid brother but a passion that many in Central Oregon embrace with near fanaticism. You can “classic” ski (in which your skis remain parallel, often in a set track) or “skate” ski (in which your skis act more like ice skates on a wide, groomed track). “If you can jog you can basically ski classic,” said Mark Jobson, an instructor at Mt. Bachelor’s Nordic Center. “[But] skating is a lateral motion that is quite foreign to most of us.”

In Bend’s annual Pole Pedal Paddle multi-sport race, the Nordic leg often determines a winner from a runner-up. The winners all skate ski because it’s faster—and more taxing—with a lot of coordination and balance needed to sync the various poling techniques, called V1, V2 and V2 alternate, with your legs. A skier’s entire weight must also transition repeatedly from one ski to the other, all while everything is moving. “Historically I think it’s rare for people to do well in the race unless they have a history of Nordic skiing,” said Jesse Thomas, winner of last year’s event, who trained diligently on cross country skis to make up for his lack of Nordic history. Multiple Pole Pedal Paddle winner Marshall Greene, a one-time World Cup racer, beat Thomas by a whopping three minutes on the Nordic leg that takes elite racers just fifteen minutes to complete. Taking advantage of an extended training season, Olympians such as Dan Simoneau, Justin Wadsworth and Beckie Scott have all called Bend home at one time. Members of the U.S. Ski Team are frequently spotted on the trails well into late spring.

Nordic Skiing — Aidan Jacobus demonstrates skate-ski form during a high school race. Photo Matthew Lasala.

Training Grounds

Central Oregon produces youth standouts as well. Across the entirety of Oregon, about 250 students will be racing both classic and skate for their high schools, and more than half of them will come from Bend. A major reason the state has a high school racing program is largely thanks to Bend resident Jinny Martin, who spearheaded the statewide effort in the late ‘90s. “It’s pretty cool how amped the high schoolers here get,” said Martin’s son, Eric Martin, a National Masters Champion who graduated from Mountain View High School in 1984 and has been the school’s cross country ski team coach for twenty-three years.

If you had to pick one student racer to watch this season, follow Bend High’s Neve Gerard. The athlete, who started skiing in sixth grade, had barely turned 16 last March, when she earned two podium finishes at her first U.S. Junior Nationals Cross-Country Skiing Championships in Minneapolis. “It’s pretty cool, to have gone to Nationals and podiumed there,” Gerard said. But the truly remarkable thing is how she’s hardly alone. “We have a very large number of kids who will qualify for junior nationals, and a few of them have the potential to be on the podium,” said Dylan Watts, the Nordic director for the Mt. Bachelor Sports Education Foundation.

Youth racer Hazel Southam. Photo Matthew Lasala.

Getting Started

While skiing at Virginia Meissner Sno-Park is free thanks to its volunteers and a Nordic day pass at Mt. Bachelor costs just $30 (versus $155 or more for a day of alpine skiing), cross country skiing can still be an expensive sport to start, with the hard goods alone costing more than what many families can afford. But Martin said he’s able to outfit each member of the Mountain View team with two pairs of skis, two pairs of poles and a pair of boots each for as little as $20 a year thanks to donations from the community. Unlike a lot of other competitive high school and club sports, no one gets cut from the team.

Often, getting started with Nordic skiing begins with a simple question. “Do you want to ski on snow that has been prepared by a groomer or snow that is virgin and isn’t prepared?” said Jobson. “That’s going to lead you to decide what type of equipment you put on your feet.” From there, beginners can rent skis at a local shop such as Sunnyside Sports, Pine Mountain Sports, or Powder House Ski & Snowboard, and head out with friends or up to Mt. Bachelor to take a lesson. Later, skiers might want to consider signing up for an XC Oregon camp. “A lot of our people are looking to improve upon very specific technical things that they’re struggling with,” said XC Oregon founder John “J.D.” Downing. Maybe they aren’t transferring their weight as well as they could or perhaps their poling technique is off. Our camps really smooth out those edges.”

As for me, that night at Meissner still ranks as one of my favorite evenings of the more than 6,500 I’ve had in Bend. Everything seemed to click. I skated along the flats and up the climbs, threading that line between exertion and exhaustion. Halfway through, I stopped and turned off my headlamp to marvel at this amazing gift we call a Central Oregon winter. Jobson can relate. “Folks ask me, ‘Why are you so dedicated to this [sport]?’” he said. “I say, because winter is the most magical time to be outside.”

Moonlight Trails

As ski lifts are put to sleep for the night and when the sun sets, the time is ripe for Nordic skiers to begin what is often considered one of the most magical experiences on skis: gliding by the light of the rising moon.

When the phases of the moon approach maximum fullness, snowy trails are illuminated by reflections provided from light as it bounces between sky, snow and any clouds to offer a bright glow complete with moon shadows. Experienced skiers that traverse Bend’s trail systems during the daylight hours may feel confident skiing solo in the nighttime silence with the only sound being the swish of snow crushed under a sliding ski. Yet, a classic adventure is a group ski to a snow shelter with friends with the reward of a respite under the stars before a return to the trailhead.

Night Ski Tips:

Check a Farmer’s Almanac to find dates when the moon approaches full. The next dates in Central Oregon are January 6 and February 5.
Watch weather to assess not only safety in the skies, but the snow conditions. See meissnernordic.org/weather/ for webcams and readings.
Know the trails. Bring a map and a headlamp. While moonlight brightens the terrain, landmarks may appear different under a general cloak of darkness.
Bring extra clothing, water and food. Temperatures after dark drop quickly.

The Luminaria event, a long-time tradition hosted at Virginia Meissner Sno-Park by the volunteer-supported nonprofit Meissner Nordic Ski Club, will not be held this year, a product of too much love. “The Luminaria was great while it existed,” said Steve Roti, board president of Meissner Nordic Ski Club. “It started small and grew with the ski community until the size of the event outgrew the size of Virginia Meissner [Sno-Park}.” This year, start a new tradition with family and friends. Watch for music concerts and hot chocolate nights under the moonlight at Meissner.

See meissnernordic.org.

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Amid a Pilot Shortage, Central Oregon is Training Future Aviators

It’s a gorgeous, unreal day over Madras with the high desert canyons collapsing into the rolling expanses of sage and brittlebush, and Tanner Steele is at the helm of a Cessna 172. The pack of dials and gauges before him blink and spin in a language he has come to learn. There’s the airport ahead. He banks. Mount Jefferson slides off his left wing. Mount Hood looms straight ahead. A sign in the cockpit reminds him to behave. No spins. No aerobatics. Steele, a Central Oregon Community College student enrolled in the school’s two-year professional pilot program, is calm and focused; just a red-headed twenty-year-old a thousand feet in the sky. Me? I’m getting queasy.

A cockpit view of No Name Lake | Photo Jesse Polay Photography

“Look straight ahead,” Steele tells me, helpfully. “Don’t look down.”

I close my eyes and that’s when I notice the sound. Something’s off. The constant drone of the engine has diminished to a worrisome sputter, and then a muscleless whisper. Is that an alarm going off? “Have you lost power?” I ask. “Oh no!” he says.

Steele gets to work. He sets the speed to about 65 knots which gives him an efficient nine-to-one glide ratio, meaning that for every nine feet he flies horizontally he’ll lose only a foot in elevation. That should be more than enough to make it to the runway, but then he starts muttering in what sounds to me like run-on gibberish: “Roughly in a downwind turn a little bit more fine runway off the right wing gonna go straight into a right base for one-six.” The runway drifts up slowly and with a squeaky bounce the plane comes to a stop on the ground. No fireball. No vomit.

A computer projection simulation — A computer projection simulates the view from a Cessna 172 cockpit for realistic flight training on the ground. Photo courtesy of Central Oregon Community College – Timothy Park Photography

“Like a boss!” says his instructor, Chris McNulty from behind him. Then the engine magically restarts and Steele does it all over again.

This is all fake—the weather, the airport, even the plane itself. What I just witnessed was a flight simulation boasting a remarkable layer of reality. We weren’t high over Madras. There was no engine failure because there was no engine. Even Mount Jefferson, Mount Hood, and the desert around Madras, were all just a computer projection on a large, semicircle of a screen set before a model cockpit designed to feel and look exactly like the cockpit of a Cessna 172. About the only thing real here is Steele, my nausea and the fact that training like this—along with countless hours flying the real deal sitting outside on the Bend Municipal Airport tarmac—will mean one day very soon Steele will almost certainly be a pilot. When that happens, he’ll be the guy anyone would want in the cockpit should a real emergency take place.

Steele is one of more than 200 students enrolled in COCC’s aviation program that teams up with Leading Edge Flight Academy at the Bend Municipal Airport to teach the next generation of plane and helicopter pilots, as well as drone operators and managers. During the day he’ll take classes in avionics (the study of the electronic systems used on aircraft) and aerodynamics, and then head out to the airport for a lab that includes flying real planes as well as time practicing in the simulator. In less than two years he’s already mastered his private pilot and instrument-flying certifications and will soon have his commercial license, too. That puts him that much closer to realizing a dream of flying helicopters that offer emergency medical transfer. “I’ve wanted to fly since I was a kid,” he said, adding he was going to transfer to Arizona State but then found COCC and Leading Edge. “I decided to stick around Bend.”

Aviation Student Spotlight

ZoË Doden, Bend | Age: 18

How did you become interested in learning to fly?

“I don’t know how a 2-year-old me found the interest, but I’ve wanted to fly for as long as I can consciously remember.”

First flying lessons:

“At Outlaw Aviation (in Sisters, Oregon), when I was 16 years old.”

Age you earned a PRIVATE pilot license?

“Just after turning 18 and a few weeks before graduating from Summit High School.”

Favorite (or most challenging) part of flying?

“I love how you can never learn enough about flying, which is also what makes it a challenging thing to pursue. Flying is a constant learning experience.”

What is your ultimate goal after graduation from the Aviation Program?

“I want to be an aerial firefighter in the long term but I also have a huge interest in backcountry flying and seaplanes.”

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The Tailgating All-Stars of Central Oregon

Ah, spring. The days last longer, the sun hangs higher, and the winter storms that bully our mountains are finally starting to chill. After a big day of play it’s time to kick back with refreshments, friends and a little entertainment, too. Want to up your own tailgating game? Learn from these Central Oregonians who take après outdoor gatherings to a championship level.

Keepers of the Mobile Lounge

Nadine Ruth and the Chix on Stix

If you head up to Mount Bachelor on a warm spring day and see some ladies with flashy tie-dyed scarves dangling off the backs of their helmets, you should bow in awe before these “Chix” and then ask to follow them to their boisterous hang-out for lunch, the PALL.

“That’s the parking lot lunch lounge,” says Nadine Ruth, the 75-year-old “fearless leader” of the Sunriver-based Chix on Stix. “We’re just a group of very active women.”

The Chix on Stix clique goes back to at least 2005 when about a dozen women, nearly all of them retired and over 50, got together once a week for a day of skiing. Since then, the group has expanded to nearly sixty women, many of whom meet on Thursdays at ski racks outside the Sunrise Lodge. They’ll split up for the morning by ability and then meet back at the parking lot where Ruth’s pick-up truck acts as the gathering spot.

You can find her rig quite easily as she built a collapsible warming hut in the back of her truck using about $100 worth of PVC piping and sheets of heavy, clear plastic she picked up at Joann Fabrics. A portable propane fire pit keeps the space toasty while carpets make the bed less slippery in ski boots. If you’re still not sure, look for the words, Chix on Stix, emblazoned on the side.

Typically, everyone just brings their own lunch, but birthdays are cause for celebration. For Ruth’s seventy-fourth birthday last March, someone brought a barbecue and s’mores and fired up the tunes for dancing. “We all share a love for being outside and skiing,” she says. “I don’t ever want to give that up, which is why I have a new knee.”

The Master of Entertainment

Cameron Halmrast

If you head up to Benson Sno Park near Hoodoo Ski Area off Santiam Pass on a Friday or a Saturday night, chances are high you’ll find a crew of hard-bitten skiers and snowboarders sitting around watching a movie outside. There’ll be a fire going and maybe even a tuning bench set in the snow, complete with a hot iron to wax your boards. And is that a pot roast you’re smelling? Why, yes, it just might be.

Cameron Halmrast and his friends have their post-ski situation dialed. The 36-year-old web developer manager for Springfield-based Richardson, a performance headwear company, started skiing at Willamette Pass before switching to Hoodoo, where he has held a season pass for years. Being up there almost every weekend allowed him to quickly fall in with employees and friends who “post up” at Benson. “We don’t plan,” he says. “We’ll just connect with one another once we’re up there.”

Together they’ve created the ultimate place to recharge. Halmrast scored a $5,000 Panasonic projector for less than $100 at a sale in Eugene. With additional help from an Amazon Fire Stick, his phone and a 360-degree speaker, Halmrast can project ski flicks onto a 120-inch screen he brings along for immersive, al fresco entertainment. They’ll play bocce ball and build a fire. To refuel after a hard day of running laps off the Big Green Machine lift, Halmrast breaks out an Instant Pot to whip up meals like jambalaya, huevos rancheros and even a roast. Another friend went so far as to bring a smoker up there to finish it off. “The only issue was having the silverware to cut it,” he says.

Halmrast jokes the only thing they’re missing is the kitchen sink. “I’m just trying to bring some of the fun,” he says.

The Guy with the Coolest Rig

Jeff Harris

You’ve probably seen it parked against the snowbank at the Sunrise middle lot at Mount Bachelor and wondered: Is that a spaceship that crashed into a Ford? A James Bond villain vehicle? A steampunk’s fever dream? Nope, it’s Jeff Harris’ custom late-1960s vintage camper, the rig so many people naturally gravitate to when the day is done.

“My three design words are submarine, UFO and log cabin,” says Harris, 33, who teaches skiing and snowboarding at Mt. Bachelor. “I’m just really drawn to that ‘60s deco style because it’s fun and unique. I think I’ve built pretty much one of the only ones like this anywhere.”

Harris has spent years and untold thousands of dollars rebuilding and customizing the cab-over camper using the dilapidated husk of a Avion-brand frame he found for $1,600 on Craigslist. He knows what he’s doing. He first moved to Bend a few years ago to work on restoring vintage Airstreams for a small company in town and once even converted one of the classically retro silver tubes into a two-chair hair salon for a client in California. With his own rig, he’s installed steel plate countertops, a futon and floating, movable tables that can become a ski tuning bench. There’s a thirty-two-inch Smart TV up over the cab and LED lights that cast a cozy glow across his powder boards stored inside. An open floor plan means he can stretch out. “Even with people hanging out in here, it isn’t cramped,” he says.

Harris often takes his rig down to Wanoga Sno Park where the scene can get rowdy with snowmobilers tailgating after ripping around in the woods. Other times you’ll find him at Kapka Butte (“more mellow”) or even in Bend near the Old Mill when concerts are in town. “I can pump out some sound,” he says. “I mean, everybody is attracted to the thing. It’s pretty awesome.”

The Trailhead Champ

Tobias Scott Carleton

You bought a portable fire pit. You’ve got your gravity chairs and a folding table that’s perfect for holding an infrared, no-flare-up grill. Maybe you even have some battery-powered Christmas lights for extra ambiance when the sun dips low. But does your set-up include a portable wood-fired sauna? Tobias Scott Carleton’s sure does.

“I’ve always really enjoyed building stuff like saunas and hot tubs,” says the 25-year-old Central Oregon Community College student. “The ability to have a sauna I can bring around to places, it’s awesome.”

Carleton got his skills serving in the Coast Guard as a damage control guy who specialized in welding, plumbing and carpentry. He spent about forty hours building the sauna out of cedar fence wood mounted in the back of a trailer converted from a cheap truck bed he found online. Inside he added benches for six people with built-in firewood storage, a porthole window for watching the snow fall, string lights and a small wood stove that hunters might use in a warming tent. Metal tubing and flanges connect the interior of the stove to the exterior of the trailer to suck in fresh air that gets the fire roaring. “I also didn’t want to be competing with the fire for oxygen.”

“The stove gets ripping to the point it glows red,” he says, adding that a pot of water with eucalyptus oil atop the stove adds the vapor.

You can find Carleton at any number of the local trailheads where he loves to cast off on long mountain bike rides or at scenic viewpoints along Tumalo Creek. Last fall, scores of grateful kayakers piled into it at Benham Falls, where about sixty paddlers had gathered on a freezing day for an informal race to raise money for kayaker Alex Kollar, 28, who went missing on the Deschutes River in October.

Chances are good you may see two of these saunas floating around Bend soon, too. “I’m selling this one to build another one,” he says. “I’m always looking for my next project.”

Food for Thought

The thing that separates memorable tailgating sessions from the mediocre really boils down to one thing: food. Burgers and dogs are great—especially if you make your own kraut!—but try these easy, make-ahead treats that you can heat and serve out of a pot.

Chicken and dumplings: Thick and
gut-warming, add a splash of extra veggie or chicken broth to the pot before warming.

Jambalaya: Shrimp, sausage, chicken, ham: all the food groups in one delicious bowl; add a splash of broth to the pot before reheating. Serve over rice or with tortillas.

Chili: Because, chili.

Chicken Tikka Masala: Make it in an Instant Pot at home. Reheats beautifully.

Tortilla Soup: Don’t forget to garnish with fresh cilantro, diced onions, radishes and avocado.

Saucy grits: This is actually quite easy to make on site, requiring about 20 minutes of simmering. Spoon into bowls; let guests add hot sauce, black beans, radishes, butter, cheese, avocado and green onion. A splash of chicken broth or milk prevents pastiness. Serve with naan warmed over your wood fire pit.

Ramen: Technically, a two-pot endeavor but very easy and guaranteed to impress. Make the broth ahead of time and reheat when needed; cook noodles in a separate pot. Use tongs to dish wet noodles into a bowl, add paper thin slices of raw steak, bok choy, mushrooms and green onions to bowl; ladle piping hot broth over noodles and serve immediately. Let guests add their own chili oil, sesame oil, and shichimi togarashi, the Japanese seven-spice condiment that adds some kick. Savory Spice in the Old Mill sells it.

Joel van der Loon Takes Solitude to the Max on TV Show “Alone”

Photo courtesy of the history channel and A+E Networks®

If you consider yourself outdoorsy and haven’t caught an episode of the History Channel’s Alone reality TV series yet, which you can watch on Netflix and Hulu, you’re behind on your studies. The premise of the show is simple but stressful; ten people get dropped off at separate sites deep in the wilderness with ten items of their choosing, with instructions to survive for as long as they can or until a medical team says they must quit. What these bushmasters do to find food, stay warm and not go absolutely mental in the supreme solitude makes your Three Sisters through-hike look like a staycation at Loge.

Given Central Oregon’s outdoorsy cred, it is only fitting that someone from the area actually made it onto the series. About this time two years ago, Joel van der Loon, a survival skills teacher living in Sisters, was in the middle of season seven, holed up on a remote corner of Canada’s Great Slave Lake in the subarctic trying to live on his own for 100 days, which was the longest any contestant on the show had ever done up to that point. The prize for doing so? $1 million.

Joel van der Loon on Alone — Cast members of Alone crafted their own shelters by hand using few tools and the natural materials available to them. Photo courtesy of the history channel and A+E Networks®

“I was just elated to be out there, like a kid in a candy store,” says van der Loon, now 36. “It was this amazing opportunity to combine all of my skills in this area that sees very little human presence with this fantastic safety blanket. If anything goes wrong, you can push a button and someone comes and picks you up.”

Adventure is nothing new to van der Loon, who approaches nature and bushcraft with an almost spiritual connection to ancient cultures. He grew up bouncing between a small sugar cane community in South Africa and off-the-grid in the Tanzanian bush before moving to Sisters via California four years ago. Learning how to survive in the wild as our distant ancestors did has been a passion of his since he was at least five years old. That’s when his grandfather, Desmond, gave him a bow from the San Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert that ignited a curious spark.

Joel van der Loon teaching students survival skills — Joel teaching a class of school kids winter survival skills at on the Los Coyotes reservation of the Cahuilla and Cupeño tribes. Photo courtesy of the history channel and A+E Networks®

I was just elated to be out there, like a kid in a candy store. It was this amazing opportunity to combine all of my skills in this area that sees very little human presence with this fantastic safety blanket. If anything goes wrong, you can push abutton and someone comes and picks you up.

That spark turned into an inferno later when his father, John, a cave diver who survived being lost at sea, separated from his mother, Michele, a professional bodybuilder, and built a home in the African bush. To keep the wild animals off the property, his father hired Maasai guards who began to teach van der Loon how to hunt, track, start a fire and other survival skills.

“I was just fascinated by them,” he says.

Joel and his son mushroom hunting in the forest — Joel lives in Sisters with his wife, Leah, and their four-year-old son, pictured here on a Central Oregon morel mushroom hunt. “Mushroom foraging is a great way to get kids engaged in the forest.” Photo courtesy of Joel van der Loon

For three years van der Loon ran a full-time survival school in California—he still teaches once a month while working as a heating and cooling technician—but it wasn’t until 2017 that Hollywood noticed his skills. Producers at Discovery Channel tapped him to be a participant on a show called Bushcraft Build-Off, whereby he and two friends had to build a boat using only an axe, a chisel and the natural materials in their immediate surroundings. “It was a great experience but not a survival experience,” he says. “I mean, we got fed.”

That wasn’t the case on Alone. A friend of his, Dave Nessia, had appeared in season three of the show and recommended van der Loon as a candidate for a future season. van der Loon jumped at the chance. Of the thousands of people who applied, he was one of dozen to make the shortlist and one of ten to actually participate.

Van der Loon had no idea where he would be sent until about a month before filming began. In preparation, he packed on as much body fat as he could. Participants were then randomly assigned sites around Great Slave Lake and given a very brief helicopter tour of the area. Crews staying at a fishing lodge in the region would physically come out to check on him every ten days, and he had mandatory morning and evening check-ins via a satellite device. Otherwise, he was there alone and filming the experience himself with broadcast-quality camera gear he had to lug around everywhere he went. “A pain in the butt,” he said.

The show is strangely addicting. Throughout the course of it we watch van der Loon build a shelter straight out of eight-year-old boy dreams. We see him catch a surprising number of fish. And then we watch on tenterhooks when a wolverine, well…let’s give
away no spoilers here.

And would he do it all over again?

“In a heartbeat,” he says.

To learn more or sign up for a survival class with van der Loon, see bushsurvivaltraining.com.