Awaking to a bluebird dawn at the base of Rogers Pass, the sun glints off the surrounding crown of Selkirk Mountain peaks and reveals a blanket of freshly fallen snow. My second day at Great Canadian Heli-Skiing proves a far cry from the first.

The day prior had been divvied up in near equal parts skiing, studying and salivating as we were intermittently grounded by the storm. Skiers and snowboarders were systematically grouped by ability level and body weight before we were meticulously instructed in the finer points of avalanche safety and the ground rules designed to ensure the whirring rotor blades didn't thwack off any wayward skis or stray appendages as we piled in and out of the spry A-Star helicopters.

We managed some quality skiing during that stormy orientation, but this was another day altogether. A day holding the promise of powder and big-league Canadian vertical. Breakfast is consumed through manic, adrenaline-fueled grins, equipment is loaded and, only moments later, we are buzzing up Rogers Pass between the Purcell and Selkirk mountain ranges and into the vast, icy wilderness along the border of Canada's Glacier National Park. Our pilot eases down atop an open powder bowl and we slip out the door, ducking into a huddle as the helicopter leaves us to behold this alpine paradise.

From the far reaches of the 2,000-square-kilometer Great Canadian Heli-Skiing permit-a lengthy slope known as "Eggs Benedict," some 20K from the base lodge-we take in the expansive Selkirk Range towering over 11,500 feet, as well as Columbia Peak, the "Apex of the Continent." One-upping the Great Divide in my home state of Colorado, runoff from the Columbia Ice Field flows to the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic Oceans.

Skiing Canuk country Photo: Scott Willoughby

It seems almost unfair that there are only four us admiring the infinite majesty atop Eggs Benedict, but that's the way things work at Great Canadian, a somewhat undiscovered Golden-based outfitter pioneering a new business model it refers to as "boutique" heli-skiing. Making use of the smaller six-seat A-Star helicopters and limiting skiers and snowboarders to four per guide (24 per day), the boutique model results in a more intimate skiing experience that maximizes vertical and safety by minimizing downtime and exposure to hazards. Having heard about the operation through word-of-mouth buzz during a winter getaway in Whitefish, Mont., we piled into the SUV and made the trek north to B.C.

The Selkirks and Purcells of interior British Columbia are among the most famous skiing mountains in the world, particularly among that hardcore element of powder skiing enthusiasts who travel the globe in search of perfect snow. With copious amounts of light, dry powder snow falling well into the spring, spectacular scenery and immensely diverse terrain, the ranges draw skiers from the world over. Dedicated skiers dream of days like this.

Skiing these mountains is not the adventure in first-descent peak bagging or "slough management" you'll find in places like the precipitous Alaskan Chugach, but big avalanches do occur on Canada's continental snowpack, such as the shocking slide that took the life of snowboarding legend Craig Kelly along with seven others in the Selkirks last January. Everyone on board realizes this, but it doesn't interfere with the bliss we share slicing through acre after acre of untracked powder. To a man, our group has never felt more alive.

Following the lead of our guide, Dave Rutherford, we charge Eggs Benedict with abandon. The snowpack has settled to the point that avalanche hazard is minimal, but the fresh blanket offers over-the-ankle snow, enticing us into a top-to-bottom descent of some 3,000 vertical feet.

Although we are outside the Glacier National Park boundaries, the remoteness of our heli-assisted locale affords no shortage of views of enormous blue ice glaciers as we ski across the Canadian hinterlands. Among them is the "Blue Tongue," a magnificent ice cave that could easily qualify as the epicenter of all things winter. Skiing past the icy blue hole in the earth, I am stricken by the vastness of this place, feeling the latitude and limitless terrain in a sea of snowy peaks.

A couple runs later, we are introduced to "Perfect Glacier," which lives up to its name as we are greeted with a perfectly-pitched slope of long, continuous vertical through knee-deep untracked powder. The A-Star meets us at the bottom and we move over one peak to "Eat Your Wheaties," a carbon copy of Perfect that accounts for a significant chunk of the more than 30,000 vertical feet of almost entirely untracked skiing that day.

The tour goes on for miles and miles, beneath massive cliffs and cornices as we ski the runout of an immense slide path known as "Hitman" that had recently snapped two-foot trees like twigs and left a base of some 30 to 40 feet of snow underfoot. The power of the earth is evident all around us, although she is gentle today and we are blessed witnesses to winter's majesty.

Situated on the west end of the Central Time Zone, this segment of B.C. stays light late in the day and we call it quits sometime after 5 p.m., well before the sun. But even with daylight to burn, there's no argument from our weary posse of powder hounds. Dinner is a welcome excuse to go home early and satisfied.

— Scott Willoughby, Livin' the Life for MountainZone.com