Alaskan Splitboarder, whitewater guide, and Outdoor Lover meet Carver Culbeck

Winters spent splitboarding in the PNW and Alaska, and summers spent whitewater guiding out of Jackson Hole, Carver is living and working the dream, and we salute that.


You grew up between two beautiful but very different small towns - Haines, Alaska, and Sayulita, Mexico. How did that happen, and how has it shaped you?
I was born in Alaska, but my parents made an effort to travel a lot even when my brother and I were young. This was made easier by my parents doing seasonal work. When I was 7 years old, my parents took my brother and me out of school and booked a one-way ticket to Mexico. We ended up in Sayulita on a whim and spent the next 8 years there, 4 to 6 months out of each year. Growing up in two small towns allowed my brother and me a sense of freedom that most kids don’t get to experience. We played outside from sunrise to sundown and fit schooling in where we could. From age 7 to 15, I was lucky enough to spend half of the year surfing the beach breaks of Mexico and the other half of the year adventuring in remote southeast Alaska.

"My personal goals are pretty simple: Create more and consume less.


The native name for the town of Haines, where you partly grew up, is Deishu, which means end of the trail. Tell us about the town.
Deishu was originally inhabited by two `different Tlingit tribes, the Chilkoot and the Chilkat. The Chilkat tribe was the most powerful Tlingit tribe for a number of reasons, but the main reason was their location. The Chilkat River was one of the only passages to the interior from the coast. Living in the Chilkat Valley allowed them to control all movement of food, goods, and people, to and from the interior. I don’t know as much as I should about these things, but from my understanding, this place was called Deishu because it was the end of the long journey from the interior to the coast. Nowadays, it is still the “end of the road”. Haines (Deishu) sits 40 miles from the Canadian border, which is the only way in or out via land.  It is a small town of just under two thousand, and it hasn’t grown or changed much in 30 years. It is surrounded by massive peaks rising straight out of the ocean that get coated in the world’s steepest snow and ridden by the best athletes on the planet. The wilderness that borders our town just so happens to be the largest protected wilderness area on the planet. Haines is and always will be my home.


You are an avid split-boarder - how did you get into snowboarding and then split boarding?
I was fortunate enough to learn to ski at Alta Ski Resort at the age of 4. I skied until I was 9 and then switched to snowboarding at age 10. Unfortunately, when I made the switch, my parents were losing interest in snow sports, which made it tricky to practice. In addition to that, there are no chairlifts in or around Haines, despite the legendary heli-skiing presence every spring. I started by boot-packing with my snowboard into the backcountry, getting short runs and building jumps. When it snowed in town, we would tow behind cars and snow machines. This was usually the most time I got on a snowboard all year. In the spring of my sixteenth year, I got an old splitboard from a family friend, and it changed my life. The mountains seemed so much closer now that I could float on top of the snow rather than wallowing around in it. I had taken an AIRE 1 (avalanche safety course) the previous year and knew a little about snow safety. With that, I was off, splitboarding as often as possible and with whoever would join me. Two years later, I graduated early to spend the season snowboarding and splitboarding and never looked back.


What was your local ski hill/s? 
We didn’t have a local ski hill. The closest was EagleCrest in Juneau, over 4 hours away by boat.


You now spend winters chasing powder and lines. What are your plans for this season?
This season, I’ll be based at Mount Baker Ski Area until spring when I’ll make the annual pilgrimage back to Haines to snowboard in my home mountains.


In the summer, you live in Jackson Hole raft guiding. How’s that?
The town of Jackson is incredible. You have tons of world-class athletes that push themselves all winter with pressure from themselves and sponsors. In the summer, all of those same people take a deep breath and settle into summer, creating an awesome, low-stress environment. Raft guiding there is fascinating. Every day, I meet new people from all over the world. I was very lucky to grow up traveling and expand my world view, but I never thought I would be expanding even more in this small Wyoming mountain town. After work, I whitewater kayak, paraglide, climb, or see live music. It’s really a great town and hard to beat.

"Nowadays, I rarely spend a day without SPF protection."


You spend a lot of time outside in the mountains in the winter and on the river in the summer. How important is taking care of your skin?
Honestly, while growing up, I was the hardest kid to put sunscreen on. But when I was 13, my friend’s dad, Justin Henderson, passed away from skin cancer. That caught all of us off guard, and my family started seeing a dermatologist annually. Nowadays, I rarely spend a day without SPF protection, even if it’s just using the Hydrating Sun Balm, which I really love, by the way!


Are you team Utu Stick, Balm, or moisturizer, or do you use all three formulations?
I use all three formulations. The balm is an everyday thing for me, whereas I switch between the stick and moisturizer depending on how much I think I'm going to sweat!


What are your goals for splitboarding and personal over the next year or two?
I try not to set a timeline on goals within the mountains because the mountains always have the final say. With that being said, my biggest goal in the mountains is to climb and snowboard Mount Fairweather in the St. Elias range and then hike back to my house in Haines. The trip is only 75 miles as the crow flies, but on foot, it would be closer to 150.  While I'm not usually one for a traverse, this one inspires me because it's so close to home, and back in’99, my parents attempted the trip but never made it to the summit. I'm hoping to give the Fairweather traverse a try either this spring or the next. My personal goals are pretty simple: Create more and consume less.



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