Be careful what you wish for!!
We had a roommate named Richard who was a lot of fun and we had many great experiences with him. Richard was an athletic type that did lots of things on his own including going hiking/mountaineering ….. The line between these two activities is not clear to me ….. Leave it to say that Richard was out in nature by himself …… a lot!!
This story happened in 1983-84. We lived in Horseshoe Bay, West Vancouver, BC. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseshoe_Bay,_West_Vancouver Richard rented a room in our house and all was well.
Black Mountain, one of the ski hills at Cypress Bowl ski area https://cypressmountain.com/ loomed 1,200 meters over the backside of our house. One day Richard was up and out early in the morning. When he returned several hours later we learned that he had hiked up Black Mountain. That is where this story begins.
Richard was obviously tired when he got back …… 5 or 6 hours of up and down 1,200 meters of mountain hiking will do that to you …… and he casually said to us “It sure would be great if you could hike up the mountain and have a helicopter pick you up and bring you back down” ….. Or something very close to that.
My wife Mona and I were very willing accomplices in doing “interesting” things and when we heard Richard say this it started our wheels turning. It was Richard’s birthday soon and …… “what if we could fulfill Richard’s wish” as a surprise. We liked surprises!!!!! We knew that helicopters were very expensive and it was not very likely that we could afford do it but ……
Coincidentally a work colleague of mine had a sister who worked for the Grouse Mountain Helicopter https://www.grousemountain.com/ tour company. Almost as a joke I told her about Richard’s wish and asked her if she could check with her sister and see what they would charge to fly from Grouse Mountain ….. Pick us up on Black Mountain ….. And then drop us off down in Horseshoe Bay. So she asked her sister and ….. if memory serves they would do the flight for $125.00 CDN. We were pleasantly surprised and ……“What the heck ….. Let’s do it” …. So we did it!! The deal was on!!!!!
We were put in touch with the pilot ….. we discussed how it would only take a few minutes given that Black Mountain was only 10 km from Grouse Mountain. I don’t know if it was because the pilot needed flying hours or whether there was some other reason but they agreed to do the flight.
So then we needed to get the whole thing coordinated ……we needed Richard to climb the mountain with us …… we wanted pictures of course ….. My brother-in-law Ron agreed to fly in the co-pilots seat with a camera …… we needed to choose a specific time for the helicopter to arrive …. and of course we need a specific spot for the helicopter to pick us up. Notice in the picture above that the Bell 206 is sitting on a raised platform ….. platforms are not common in the mountains!!!!
We chose a date ….. Check! …… Richard agreed to go ….. Check!! ….. getting good! …….. Helicopter committed and paid for! …… Check! ……. Ron will be the photographer …. Check! …. the date came and it was as beautiful a day as one cane imagine. The secret was safe ….. Richard had no idea of the plan.
Oh ….. remember this was “pre-cellphone” era so we developed a messaging protocol. We needed to time our arrival at the summit with the arrival of the helicopter. When we got to the summit, we would signal our friend Jean Charboneau down at our house with a signal mirror. Jean would phone Grouse Mountain and the helicopter to coordinate the start of the flight. OK!!!! I guess we are ready!!
We are getting ready to go and OMG …… Richard decides he doesn’t want to go!!!! …… Well …. every thing is in place …… we have to go ……. the chopper is paid for ….. we did everything to convince him …. “Richard you said you would go” …… “COME ON!!!!!” ….. and in desperation we finally had to divulge our secret before he would agree to go …… and off we went ….. Richard was a good man!!!
The climb took about 3 hours ….. Richard walked on ahead without exchanging a word …… he was kinda like that ….. a lone wolf kinda guy ….. We finally met up at the summit. If memory is correct we were a few minutes ahead of our estimated rendezvous time. We were lucky that the area that we had found was close enough to the edge of a cliff that we were able to signal Jean ……. We searched around for a landing spot ….. it was a kind of plateau and there were 2 or 3 other hikers there ….. and I remember that one of them had a satellite phone and somehow or other he used that phone to help the pilot find us or something like that …. ….. bottom line is that somewhere between our friend Jean and the sat phone ….. we were able to signal Jean …… launch the chopper ….. and somewhere in between her, the Sat phone, the signal mirror …… the chopper …….. and we waited!!
….. Reality can often be a little different from our imaginations !!! ….. Black Mountain was much ….. much …… bigger than we had imagined! …… as we saw the helicopter for the first, it became clear how big this mountain really was.
The helicopter was hundreds of feet below us searching …… the pilot did not realize that we would be so far up …… at the summit!!
So we used our signaling mirror to catch his attention ….. connected!! …… Then the action began ….. as he approached our spot he attempted to touch down several times ….. at least three times if memory serves ….. before he felt safe ……. we learned later that the pilot had been very concerned about one of the other anonymous hikers who was getting too close to the tips of the rotors ….. the uneven nature of the landing spot was a little unnerving for the pilot ….. he said to the co-pilot (my brother-in-law) that if the guy wasn’t careful he “might lose his head”.
Finally the chopper ….. he barely touched down …… still flying really …… the three of us crept over the under the continual pounding of the rotors ….. the three of us jumped in and …… Voilà …..the chopper literally arrived ….. fell over the edge of the mountain ….. exhilaration!!!!!!
We landed at Sunset Beach Marina https://sunsetmarina.ca/, drove back to Horseshoe Bay where we had a great lunch for the whole bunch of us. Now most people are familiar with “Troll’s Restaurant” https://www.trollsrestaurant.com/ in Horseshoe Bay, as locals we tried to avoid the “tourists” of course ….. we had pizza and beer at Bay Moorings …… Gus’s Place ….. “dèsolèe” ….. no longer in business!!!!
Richard was happy!!!! ….. An exciting birthday wish gift!!!!! …… a few beers …… a great pizza at Gus’s …… as always ….. and a good time was had by all!!
