Growing up in Vancouver, John Baldwin became fascinated by the Coast Mountains that rise above the city and developed a lifelong passion to explore this incredible range of mountain wilderness.
Over the past 40 years, he has completed numerous first ascents and pioneered many long ski traverses, often to remote areas that have rarely been seen or photographed. For John, the purpose of these explorations is to travel through the mountain wilderness, to climb high snowy peaks, to search for sheltered basins where the snow is deep and light, to look at patterns in the new fallen snow, stare at the chaos of a jumbled icefall, or experience the stillness of a vast icefield.
The motivation for his writing and photography is to inspire others to discover and connect with the intense beauty of this mountain wilderness. It is a celebration of where we live and how wonderful it is.
Out of the chaos of COVID and its many challenges and restrictions most of us have found arenewed interest in exploring our own backyards.
For John, this led to a skyline traverse along alpine ridges from the Vancouver area north to Pemberton. The so-called Sea to Sky Traverse crossed Pinecone Burke Provincial Park on foot and Garibaldi Provincial Park on skis.
With Garibaldi Park nearing its 100th anniversary, the trip was also a way to celebrate how lucky we are to have these parks in our own backyard. John has been skiing and hiking in Garibaldi Park for half of those 100 years and along the way, John takes a retrospective look at some of his past trips in Garibaldi Park to illustrate what the park has meant to him over the years.
Spending time connecting to our local corner of the planet is in essence about coming home.
