HELI SKIING IN RUSSIA
Heli skiing in Russia may conjure up images of old beaten up military helicopters, bribery and kerosene-drinking pilots, and to some extent this is true. But Russia is a big, mountainous country with lots of helicopters. Some of them are well maintained and flown. Some of them are not. During the past seven years we have travelled throughout Russia and done the research that will enable you to book your heli ski trip with confidence.
If you are used to heli skiing in Canada, you will find Russia is a very different experience and it is therefore important to set your expectations accordingly. On a cultural level, Russia is not like what we are accustomed to in the West and for some people travelling there can be somewhat of a shock.
Things simply do not function as efficiently and smoothly as we are used to in the West, and inevitably there is always needless waiting around that seems to go hand in hand with doing just about anything in Russia.
Maybe a local authority will decide to check everyone's passport before getting into the helicopter each morning causing you to wait around for twenty minutes for him to turn up. Maybe president Putin is flying in to go skiing and has grounded all other helicopters. Or the aviation authorities in Sochi have looked out of the window and decided that the weather thirty minutes away in Krasnaya Polyana is no good for flying, when in fact it's fine. Maybe this will happen to you, maybe it won't, but the point is that things like this happen regularly and they just need to be taken as part and parcel of heli skiing in Russia. There are simply more uncontrollable variables to deal with than in other places. If this is understood and accepted, then heli skiing in Russia can be an extremely rewarding experience.
A customer orientated service mentality is not one that has infiltrated its way into Russia and it seems that it will be a long time before it does so you should not expect the same attention to detail or level of service that you would receive in North America or elsewhere.
If the peculiarities outlined above don't bother you too much then Russia boasts some of the most phenomenal heli skiing found anywhere - from the deep powder and mind-blowing tree skiing in Krasnaya Polyana to the other-worldly experience of landing on an active volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula and skiing into its smoking crater.
Krasnaya Polyana, Caucasus mountains
The town of Sochi is situated at the foot of Russia's Caucasus range, on the Black Sea. It is one of the main seaside resorts in Russia and the gateway to the ski resort and heli skiing base of Krasnaya Polyana. The Caucasus are an imposing mountain range ideally suited to heli skiing.
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Lake Riza, Abkhazia, Caucasus mountains
Lake Riza is located on the north east coast of the Black Sea twelve minutes flying time from the first heli skiing runs. This small state of 8600 km2, bordered to the North by Russia and to the South by Georgia, is dominated by the immense Caucasus range.
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Kamchatka Peninsula, East Russia
In the far east of Russia, situated between the Okhtsk Sea to the West and the Bering Sea to the east, The Kamchatka Peninsula is a remote and isolated land that is the size of Germany, Austria and Switzerland combined
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