The Couloir To Nowhere – Full Version
I am very pleased to offer the full version of my 2011 film, "The Couloir To Nowhere," now online for your viewing pleasure at YouTube. I'd been wanting to put a copy up for a long time, but for various reasons just never got to it.
Over the past few weeks, I finally felt motivated to make it happen. I've remastered the entire film, and done some minor editing to touch up a few things here and there. If you've never seen it, I must tell you it is not only an extraordinary Southern California ski mountaineering documentary, it is also widely regarded as the finest example of Cinema Verite of the postmodern era.
Skiing Iron Mountain's north couloir with Dave Braun and Lou Bartlett remains the quintessential Sierra Descent for me. It was savage, brutal, absurd, and, in the end, impossibly magical. I invite you all to join us now at Heaton Flat, as we strap skis to our backs and prepare to climb that broiling south ridge...
— December 9, 2016
Andy Lewicky is the author and creator of SierraDescents
Corrado de Francesco December 10, 2016 at 8:15 pm
Just great, both the ski trip and the movie!
Joseph Gregory December 12, 2016 at 10:40 pm
Weeellp...I know what I'm watching tonight!
Brad Brown December 21, 2016 at 12:50 am
Fine work, thoroughly enjoyed this. Since I'm a junkie my opinion is biased but my intermediate skier daughter in law said it's "awesome" as well as 3 thumbs up from actual daughters and son. Pretty amazing you pulled this one off due to snow and schedule restraints. Never mind the vision to see this crazy thing in the first place, the planning logistics to try an unknown line, the risk of a huge effort potentially fruitless endeavor not to mention actual risk, and the sweat investment ("suffer feast" line from Dave B) needed to pull this off. Well played!
Greg Reynolds December 24, 2016 at 3:52 pm
I just finished watching your film Christmas Eve 2016. A nice Christmas present to be sure!
Let's hope winter 2017 is going to be a good one, we have a great start!
Brad Brown December 29, 2016 at 12:20 am
Summit was a hoot Xmas eve, way better than my obsessive storm "model" would have predicted. AM started out with surprisingly heavy "pow" in AM for the 23 def start temp , 1 foot range. The magic came in the afternoon as temps dropped and snow continued. One of the best local days in memory for sheer snow quality and non SoCal feel. Left Summit lot a 4pm, got turned around on SR 18 at the pass to Lucerne Valley (road blocked with big rig). Next off to SR 38, blocked again at 2 locations finally got to Redlands around 11:15 and home at 1:00am. 9 hours on the road, could have made it to Tahoe. Still worth it, love me some pow!
Jonathan L December 31, 2016 at 11:46 pm
The music, dude... The music. Congrats.
Andy January 2, 2017 at 11:46 pm
Thank you! Music school was originally what drew me to Los Angeles. So you can pretty much blame everything on that. :)
Jimmy January 13, 2017 at 3:38 pm
Completely awesome. Thanks for making it and sharing it. As Dave said, it was the schist.