This winter season, I decided that I wanted to get into splitboarding. The only problem is splitboarding is not an accessible sport. You can’t just go out and do it (especially this year, where the snowpack is all wonky in the Sierra!). There’s so much more knowledge, gear, and skill involved. I also don’t have many local friends who do backcountry snowsports, much less splitboarding. To safely learn the sport, I decided to take Alpenglow Expeditions’ Women’s Backcountry 1.0 and 2.0 course.
Snowsports are an outdoor activity that’s about as bro-y as it gets. The outdoor market caters to men, and it’s super obvious when you try to shop for splitboard gear. As women, we sometimes need gear that fits our bodies better. Splitboards and all the associated hardware are no different. Because the offering for women is so small, I scoured the internet for as much women’s splitboard gear as I could find. Here’s a complete list of women’s splitboards and other necessary gear to get out in the backcountry.
Please note, this is not a list of recommendations. This is simply everything that exists out there for women. I’ll be uploading my splitboard kit soon!
So you wanna get out in the backcountry in the winter. Backpacking and hiking look very different with the addition of a very cold beast: snow. With snow comes navigation challenges and more dangerously: avalanches. Learning to mitigate risk in the wintry backcountry is essential to staying alive. To do so, most folks take an Avalanche Institute for Avalanche Research and Education (AIARE) course. AIARE courses can be quite cost-prohibitive, especially for folks who are underrepresented in the winter backcountry. I’ve compiled a list of all available AIARE scholarships, or AIARE-adjacent scholarships below.