Category: Mountain Culture

Life in the mountains.

The Karen Kögler Fonds: Documenting life through photography and self-reflection

The Karen Kögler Fonds: Documenting life through photography and self-reflectionThe Karen Kögler Fonds: Documenting life through photography and self-reflection

September 28, 2026 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Written by Atessa Showrai

Featured photo: Karen climbing Nordic Rock, c. 1990s.

“Either go or fall” – Karen Kögler. Climbing, Mountaineering, Hiking, and Outdoor Adventures Log Book.

Karen Kögler was an avid rock climber and outdoorswoman, who documented her adventures through photographs, climbing log books, and self-reflections. The Karen Kögler Fonds consist of over 300 photographs of various outdoor adventures in the Sea-to-Sky region, which showcase Karen’s life as a snowboarder, mountaineer, and rock climber. 

While the collection’s photography instantly caught my eye – climbing at Nordic Rock, hiking Mt. Fee, and beautiful photos of Whistler – what made the collection truly stick with me was Karen’s story and her approach to life. Her outdoor adventures log book included a page at the end, which we interpreted as a list of self-affirmations to mentally prepare for the next climb.

Two hikers walking on a snowy mountain slope with rocky terrain and steep cliffs in the background.
As Karen captioned: “Blowdown Early Summer ‘97 w/ Dad [Hans] looking for Goats”.

Throughout my experience as a summer student at the Whistler Museum, I’ve worked on several collections, most of which only contained photographs. Karen’s collection stood out because it shows us not only the beautiful places she visited, but also demonstrates the thought and effort put into each adventure. 

The log books which accompany the photographs go into immense detail of her successes, small details and notes on what could be improved on for future climbs. Thanks to Kögler’s detailed note-taking, I was able to take a more personalized route when it came to processing and cataloging the collection into our archive.

Instead of going through Karen’s photo albums without any context besides captions, I was able to gain a deeper understanding of why certain decisions were made. Although the logs were helpful to fill certain surface-level knowledge gaps, such as climbing location and difficulty range, they also left me with even more questions. Why did she document her climbs? Did she often refer back to the logs for future climbs? Did the logs exist purely for her own reference?

Kögler loved being outdoors. She had seemingly found her calling, and attended the University College of the Cariboo to attain her Adventure Guide diploma in Kamloops. The program had a competitive acceptance rate, only admitting 24 students per year at the time. On top of that, students in the program were already expected to have a certain level of experience and knowledge in order to succeed in their studies. Unfortunately, Kögler was never able to complete the program due to a tragic accident which occurred while she was ice climbing at Banff National Park near Mount Wilson with two of her peers.

A snowboarder performing a jump on a snowy slope, with hands raised and a backdrop of snowy mountains and trees.
Karen on her first board, c. 1990/91.

In January of 1999, Kögler was waiting her turn to safely climb up Ice 9, a waterfall ice climb, when a large piece of ice broke off of a frozen waterfall and fell on her. Although Kögler had years of experience as a climber and had ice climbed before, the incident was described as “bad luck” in the Calgary Herald. Kögler passed away at the age of twenty-two on January 24, 1999. Soon after her passing, Karen’s father, Hans Kögler, created the Karen Kögler Memorial Award. The scholarship is awarded to students in the Adventure Guide program who exhibit a passion for the outdoors.

Kögler’s collection serves as a reminder that the end-result might not always show how much thought or effort goes into reaching the summit. In the meantime, the power of self-reflection and committing action to written words is more powerful than most think.

“No hesitating, clear head and tell yourself you are capable of doing” – Karen Kögler. Climbing, Mountaineering, Hiking, and Outdoor Adventures Log Book.

Atessa Showrai is one of two Collections Coordinators at the Whistler Museum this summer, supported through the Young Canada Works Program.

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New insights on the 1956 CT-133 RCAF Callaghan Plane Crash

New insights on the 1956 CT-133 RCAF Callaghan Plane CrashNew insights on the 1956 CT-133 RCAF Callaghan Plane Crash

September 17, 2026 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Written by Oliver Matisz

Featured photo: Military Search and Rescue members from the 442 Air Transport and Rescue Squadron (Comox) gather by Callaghan Lake in August 1997.

After logging 20,900 square miles, 800 flight hours, and involving over a dozen search aircraft, The Royal Canadian Air Force suspended a search for a downed CT-133 jet in April 1956. The search was conducted by sea and air across Vancouver Island, where civilian reports of the crash were made. Two pilots, Flight Officer Gerald Stubbs, 32, and Flight Officer James Miller, 23, went missing on March 22nd while conducting a regular training flight after departing from Comox, British Columbia, intending to fly across the Georgia Strait and then return back.

In March of 2026, the Whistler Museum received photographs and correspondence associated with an August 1997 military recovery mission of the aircraft’s fuselage, which was spotted by a private helicopter pilot fighting fires near Callaghan Lake.  At the time, the Royal Canadian Navy stated publicly that despite four decades having passed since the plane’s disappearance, “aviators have kept a watchful eye over the known flight route throughout the years.” This more substantial 1997 recovery added clarity to a 1974 discovery of the jet’s canopy approximately two kilometers from the original crash site. 

A military helicopter flying over a forested area with mountains in the background.
A military helicopter hovers will conducting recovery operations near Callaghan Lake.

Sergeant Edith Cuerrier was a military photographer dispatched alongside a Flight Crash and Salvage Crew who were flown to Callaghan Lake, about 20 km southwest of Whistler Village, in the first week of August 1997. The lake then served as a base point for military search and rescue helicopter recovery flights to and from the crash site; after initial site inspection of the fuselage it was established that in the absence of ejected aircraft seats, there was no likelihood of finding remains. 

The photography collections donated by Cuerrier encompass a wide array of images, including  technical crash site documentation, salvage crew members actively reviewing flight paths, takeoffs and landings of aircraft, and activities partaken during downtime. The Whistler Museum additionally possesses a fragment of the aircraft’s canopy, some of the plane’s metal tubing, and a helmet of one of the pilots, all of which we received through donation from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 2010.  However, for the two pilots’ families, obtaining information on the crash has been a more tedious and complicated process.

In 1987, the late widow of Flight Officer James Miller, Mary Ford, filed a request under the Access to Information Act with the Federal Government, seeking additional closure on her husband’s disappearance. At the time, neither she nor the family of Flight Officer Gerald Stubbs held knowledge of the plane’s canopy being recovered. Ford received a response that included the T 33’s serial number and record that the canopy had indeed been recovered in September 1974, with no further recovery action being warranted at the time. A friend of Gerald Stubbs’ widow noted after the fuselage’s recovery in 1997 that “the history of this has not been one where the family is advised.”

In light of these circumstances, the acquisition of Edith Cuerrier’s work is an important step for our collections in enabling public access to a variety of crash records. With a combination of physical artefacts from the crash site, and newly acquired photographical and textual material; these records will facilitate increased transparency on investigations into the crash.

As a community museum and archives, we endeavour to foster an open collection policy in building knowledge bases and to impartially maintain records. This has aided us in gaining custody of collections surrounding the crash’s history since the early 2000s from a diverse set of donors including both law enforcement agencies and private individuals. These acquisitions  also tie into our broader institutional mandate in considering certain relevant regional history beyond Whistler’s municipal boundaries. 

We further recognize how a historic absence of answers has negatively impacted the lost pilots’ families, and hope that our stewardship of these records can serve to preserve the memory of Flight Officers Gerald Stubbs and James Miller.

Oliver Matisz is one of two Collections Coordinators at the Whistler Museum this summer, supported through the Young Canada Works Program.

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Train Wreck turns 70!

Train Wreck turns 70!Train Wreck turns 70!

August 11, 2026 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Combine a speeding train going more than twice the speed limit with a heavy load of logs and a narrow section of track and one might say you have a recipe for disaster. Seventy years ago on Aug. 11, 1956, that’s exactly what happened on a portion of rail near Function Junction.

Today, the Train Wreck is one of Whistler’s most popular and family-friendly attractions: a site accessed by a one-kilometre-long trail through forest and over a Cheakamus River suspension bridge, where one happens upon a scattering of derelict, rusting railway cars all covered in bright and ever-changing graffiti. A suite of ruin, also very much alive!

The story of what actually happened that fateful day seems to have remained quite hush-hush for some time. The reasons for this can only be speculated: was it because the Pacific Great Eastern Railway (PGE) tried to deflect attention from the matter? This is neither confirmed nor dismissed—but what we do know now, from first- and second-hand accounts, is that not only was the PGE responsible for the accident, the company also could not clean it up itself.

Train wreck in 2013. Photo: Kristina Swerhun

In 2013, the Whistler Museum’s executive director Sarah Drewery published a piece in the Whistler Question about the “mysterious” Train Wreck. The piece served as a public query and resulted in two members of the Valleau family—who ran a large logging operation based out of Mons—reaching out to the museum and sharing what they knew.

In honour of the anniversary, we share an excerpt from Drewery’s article “Train Wreck Mystery Revealed,” the piece we subsequently published in 2014 about the conversation had with the two Valleaus. Rick Valleau remembered his father talking about the wreck. Rick’s uncle Howard actually remembered the incident first-hand.

“The crash occurred in 1956 shortly after the Valleau family had moved to the area. The wreck happened on an area of track constricted by rock cuts, and there were three boxcars loaded with lumber jammed in there, blocking the line. The PGE Railway’s equipment couldn’t budge them so the company approached the Valleau family,” Drewery wrote.

“The Valleaus took their logging machinery (a couple of D8 Cats) down to the site, put a hitch (luff) on with two moving blocks to the boxcar and pried them out. They then dragged the cars up the track and into the forest, where they lie today. To all those who were confused by the fact that there is no damage to the trees around the wreck, this is because the train did not come off the rails at this point, but the boxcars were moved there after the fact.

“The train had been assembled in Lillooet by John Millar, a conductor for the PGE. Millar told the story to Howard Valleau, as follows: The train had four engines. There was a mistake made on the tonnage of the train, making it too heavy, and they had to split the train to get up the grade to Parkhurst (on Green Lake). This put them behind schedule, and they tried to make up time by travelling a little faster than usual. The speed limit on that section of rail was only 15 m.p.h. (24 km/h). The fourth engine turned a rail, causing the train wreck. They checked the tape in the engine, which told how fast they were going—the crew had thought the speed was 15 m.p.h., but in fact it was 35 m.p.h. (56 km/h).

“Millar told Howard Valleau that had they known the actual speed, they would have taken the tapes out. The engineer and crew were subsequently fired after the investigation into the wreck.”

Ted Tempany riding Train Wreck [1999]. Insight Photography Collection.

It just so happens that the week of the Train Wreck’s 70th anniversary also coincides with the Whistler Museum’s 30th annual Building with Lego Bricks Competition! To celebrate both, this year’s competition theme is “Build Your Best Rescue Machine.”

On Sunday, Aug. 16, the museum invites children ages three to 12 to register for the exciting event, held in Florence Petersen Park: blending imagination, colour and innovation! There will be prizes and activities. For more info click here.

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Kayakers as Glacier Gaugers

Kayakers as Glacier GaugersKayakers as Glacier Gaugers

July 21, 2026 Whistler MuseumWhistler Museum 0 Comments

Featured Image: Lyall Featherstonehaugh paddles the Cheakamus River on May 11, 1980, during a demonstration organized for the Whistler Chamber of Commerce to showcase kayaking opportunities in the Whistler area as part of their May Day celebrations. Whistler Question Collection.

Longtime Whistler kayaker Shawn ‘Puddles’ Hughes left me with an interesting concept: he said he viewed his paddling as a way of “recycling the snow.” In the winter he skis, in the summer, he rides the snowmelt down the rivers – sporting an intimate balance with the hydrological cycle. However, the notion of balance is perhaps, now, better replaced with the term ‘dance’ or ‘positioning’…because, as Hughes has experienced firsthand, over the decades, the waterflow levels and patterns have been changing.

I was fascinated. The impact of glacial recession on local skiing and snowboarding has garnered attention with the closing of the Horstman Glacier on Blackcomb for summer camps in 2023, however this was the first time I had had reason to consider the impact on other non-on mountain sports. As the Whistler Museum actively continues to gather oral histories from a generational cross-section of local kayakers, I extended the question to Archer McLeay, a pivotal advocate within and for the paddling community: a relative newcomer on the scene, having lived in the Sea to Sky for 5 years, moving here, however, for the kayaking.

I asked McLeay, if in his handful of years here, he had witnessed the impact of glacier recession in the waters. He unequivocally answered: “It’s drastic.”

This aligns with Hughes’ deduction that “after 40 years of visually watching this, we’re in some trouble.”

McLeay elaborates “ideally … you get a huge snow base, and that’s what’s traditionally happened. […] Normally, there’s just a massive amount of snow up here. It all melts pretty consistently throughout the year, and you should get like a nice long season.” But that has been changing.

“The Cheakamus has got a way bigger glacial head bond, so that one tends to flow all year, regardless of what’s happening,” McLeay remarks. Hughes concurs, “Cheakamus is pretty safe because it does have a fairly big pack, but no, it’s still shrinking as quickly as everything else.”

McLeay continues, “But for all of our snowmelt rivers [the Callaghan is the main one], the snow will melt, and then after that, it’s just feeding on the glacier. So if you have a big heat wave, it’ll come through, and then the snow melts a lot faster than the glacial water, and then you’ll end up with just glacial melt running for the rest of the year. And so the season’s shorter. There’s less water to go along, and then if there’s a heat wave, it’ll just shorten the season just, boom, just in half.”

Hughes breaks it down simply: “when you take a big piece of ice and you keep shrinking [it] down, there’s some part of the day when it’s not going to flow as much as it did when the ice is big. So what’s happening is there’s a thing that I’ve diagnosed as looping…” Hughes premise on looping is based on discovering what the main source of the flow is. His curiosity was sparked after a section of water that he would consistently launch into a 1 pm every day, only became ‘attackable’ at 4 am. He wanted to understand the fluctuation: “Where’s the water really coming from? Cause there’s three rivers that feed this and the gauges we’re reading, it goes up at midnight and then peaks at four in the morning and then starts dropping and it’s gone by like 11.” He had noticed it going from a “concrete amount of water” to dribbles by August. “I did 31 four in the morning attacks on that to really investigate what was going on.”

Observations persist around many of our waterways, bringing a whole new meaning to rapid and rapidly (e)racing.

The Callaghan “tends to flow out”, McLeay notes. He speculates, “a few years ago, I imagine there would be a big enough glacier to feed the river, but now it’s just melted.”

The ‘Fitz’, too, is affected. “Last couple of years we’re running off the glacier.” Hughes points to its dwindling headwaters. Fitzsimmons Creek feeds the Green River. It also is the source for snowmaking – and that demand is steadily increasing. “Imagine what’s going to happen when this thing really tails out because, man, it’s not that far off…” 

Just, imagine.

For kayakers, glaciers are more than distant icefields—they’re the source of every rapid downstream. As the Whistler Museum continues documenting the history of paddling in the Sea to Sky, these oral histories are becoming more than stories about sport. They are records of a landscape changing within a single generation.

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