By JULIE OVENELL-CARTER
Special to The Globe and Mail
Saturday, November 29, 2003 - Page T1

B.C. schoolteacher Jennifer Henrichsen recalls her first date with Michael, the geologist who is now her husband, as a hot and sweaty business. It was April, 1997, and he had promised to show her the Seven Steps of Paradise -- a renowned ski run in B.C.'s Glacier National Park.

Wearing 15-kilogram packs, they trekked more than 10 kilometres on skis to a rustic hut on the edge of the Asulkan glacier. To their delight, they had the place all to themselves. For three days, they skied on virgin powder; by night, they watched the comet Hale-Bopp hover in the clear sky.

For Jennifer, an Ontario native who had until then skied only on groomed and crowded hills, it marked the glorious beginning of a long-term love affair -- with Michael, and with mountain-high backcountry shelters.

Parks Canada's Asulkan cabin -- a six-year-old structure that sleeps 12 and features heat, light, and cooking facilities -- is just one of dozens of snug and inexpensive recreational huts scattered throughout the Canadian wilderness.

They are hardly the stuff of glossy travel brochures, but their existence is legendary among a tight-knit group of fanatical outback adventurers. Many are bare-bones buildings, remnants of the early 20th century when they were built as seasonal homes for the miners, surveyors and outfitters who opened up this country.

Others, such as the Asulkan hut and the million-dollar Kokanee Glacier Cabin in B.C.'s Kokanee Glacier Provincial Park, have been purpose-built in the past decade to accommodate the rapidly growing number of outdoor enthusiasts.

The dominant landlord in this backcountry community is the Alberta-based Alpine Club of Canada (ACC). The non-profit mountaineering association has 18 chapters and 10,000 members spread across the country, including the vertically challenged provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

Formed in 1906 by Arthur Oliver Wheeler, a Canadian surveyor, and Elizabeth Parker, a Winnipeg journalist, the ACC is part of a global federation of alpine clubs whose combined membership makes it one of the world's three largest organizations, according to ACC director of facilities Nancy Hansen, 35.

While membership is encouraged, it is not required to use the 26 huts, which span the country from Tantalus Provincial Park in western B.C. to Bon Echo Provincial Park in eastern Ontario, and which cost from $12 to $27 an adult per night.

Most ACC lodgings are concentrated in the Columbia and Rocky Mountains and are used year-round. The facilities vary from what Hansen terms primitive -- "unheated huts the size of a garden shed that you have to be a mountain goat to get to" -- to luxurious -- "historic log cabins with wood-burning stoves and propane in the kitchens."

In between are the standard-issue, self-service cabins that sleep up to 20 people and include propane cook stoves and comfortable sitting areas but no internal heat source -- a challenge in the winter months.

Still, "they're extremely well-insulated," Hansen says. "And when you get a couple of sweaty bodies in there, they warm up really fast."

It's telling that the kind of people who enjoy holidaying in alpine huts are the kind of people who don't mind sharing a relatively small space with several unrelated, sweaty bodies. In fact, they seem to really like it. For a couple such as the Henrichsens, "sharing the space is one of the main reasons to go," says Jennifer, 33. "You get to teach someone's kid how to play cribbage. You get to make hot chocolate for someone who arrives after the sun's been down for four hours and they're freezing. Most people are friendly and happy to be bunking with strangers. You meet such interesting people."

The Henrichsens now take an annual backcountry ski vacation with American K2 veteran Greg Krohn and his young son Adrian, whom they met several years ago while sharing a hut.

Although the ACC is the most high-profile proprietor of backcountry huts, especially in Western Canada, some park services offer similar accommodations. For example, Ontario Parks maintains several heated yurts (semi-permanent, canvas-sided structures) such as the ones in Silent Lake Park, near Peterborough, which cross-country skiers can book for $60 a night or $350 a week.

B.C. Parks maintains almost 50 cabins and huts, including the 107-year-old Slocan Chief cabin in Kokanee Glacier Provincial Park, where former Olympian Nancy Greene Raine spent summer weekends in the mid-1960s, and Michel Trudeau spent the last night of his ill-fated skiing trip in 1998. (With the opening of the deluxe Kokanee Glacier cabin this year, the rundown Chief was closed. It will reopen as a museum in 2005.)

Unlike ACC huts, which must be reserved, B.C. Parks huts are offered on a first-come, first-served basis. They are rented by thousands of hikers and skiers for a mere $15 an adult per night, or $30 a family.

With such a constant stream of through-traffic, backcountry huts require regular maintenance, most of which is taken on by volunteers from community ski and mountaineering clubs.

Raine, now director of skiing at B.C.'s Sun Peaks Resort, remembers how she and a group of friends spent one fall repairing the Slocan Chief. "It was 1963 or '64. It was pretty apparent to us that hut wasn't going to make it through many more winters. We said, 'We should fix this up,' and we hauled in different bits and pieces to keep it going. That was a lot of fun."

Roger Tierney, 52, recreation officer for the Kootenay region of B.C. Parks, credits the ACC and other community-based groups for "preserving the huts we have in the Rockies. They'll donate money or have a work party to replace a roof, for example.

"If it wasn't for local supporters, many of B.C.'s recreational cabins would have been lost."

Tierney notes that "there is surprisingly little difficulty with vandalism, and drinking parties are a very rare occurrence, despite the isolation. People have to put a lot of effort into getting to these places, and it's kind of hard to carry a case of beer on skis."

As a result, backcountry huts offer a decidedly family-friendly atmosphere. In 1997, Hansen -- who this summer became the first woman ever to climb all 54 summits over 3,353 metres (11,000 feet) in the Rocky Mountains -- honeymooned with her entire family, including her husband's 73-year-old grandmother, at ACC's Elizabeth Parker hut in Yoho National Park.

Tierney recalls fondly his frequent holidays with his four children in B.C. Parks' Naiset cabins at Mt. Assiniboine in the Rockies.

And Jennifer Henrichsen, now six months pregnant with her first child, plans to pass her annual pre-Christmas sojourn at B.C. Parks' Elfin shelter on Mt. Garibaldi, near Whistler, with her 60-year-old mother and her twin sister, whose baby is five months old. Next year, Jennifer's own baby will make the trip.

"We go the week before Christmas when everyone else is shopping and no one is skiing," she says. "And on our way out, it's not uncommon to pass families with six-year-olds in tow, dragging their turkey dinners behind on toboggans. It's a completely magical, non-commercial, nature-oriented way to celebrate the season."

Quiet, quaint and inexpensive, alpine and backcountry huts would appear to be the epitome of egalitarian accommodation -- the ultimate equal-access vacation opportunity. As Raine observes, "Huts are the great leveller. You don't have to be wealthy to enjoy the beautiful views or the great skiing. They create a common bond between people of every social and economic background who love the mountains."

But the backwoods are hardly benign, and Tierney and Henrichsen caution inexperienced skiers, hikers and climbers to assess their outdoor skills honestly before heading off to a hut.

"Someone who's a hot-shot downhill racer shouldn't necessarily assume they'll know what they're doing when it comes to alpine touring," Henrichsen says. "I've seen lots of people out there who have the gear but not the brains. Hooligans die out here. Avalanches happen. Skis break. You've got to be prepared. You've got to be schooled up before you do this."

Tierney suggests that the best places to get "schooled up" are outdoor recreation programs offered through local community centres or colleges, or one of the ACC's 30 fully catered and guided multi-day mountain trips.

In July, 2004, the national arm of ACC will offer five one-week camps ($1,195) in the Rocky Mountains to develop general mountaineering skills. In February, the four-day First Summits camp ($795) will introduce novices to winter mountaineering skills on the Wapta Icefields in Banff National Park. The ACC's regional groups also offer a variety of free volunteer-led programs, many of which are suitable for greenhorns.

It is, by all accounts, an addicting experience. "People come back to our camps again and again," Hansen says.

"But it doesn't really matter where you go," she adds, searching for adjectives -- "sublime, blissful, peaceful, relaxing, memorable" -- to describe the ultimate hut experience, which she says can be found at any and every cabin.

Little wonder then, that when Kootenay National Park's Fay cabin -- the original ACC hut built in 1927 -- was destroyed this summer in B.C.'s raging forest fires, Hansen was inundated with e-mail messages from grieving members.

"It just broke people's hearts," she says. "Every hut has its own personality. Every hut makes its own memories."