The slog up Taylor Creek was a lot tougher than I remembered!
Rummel Lake
Who are those people who park at the intersection of Mount Shark Road and the Smith-Dorrien trail, and where are they going?
Three Lakes Valley
It's already been a good start to the ski season, but I hadn't done any backcountry yet.
Lake O'Hara
We hadn't seen Frank and Tiiu in a while, so they joined us for a ski up the Lake O'Hara fire road.
Great Divide Trail
The Great Divide (also known as the Continental Divide) is the jagged line that divides both North and South America between the areas that drain into the Pacific Ocean and the areas that drain into the Atlantic Ocean.
Moraine Lake Road
When I saw that the Banff National Park trail report had Moraine Lake Road listed in "good" condition, I knew it was time for my first ski day of the year!
Raspberry Ridge
Snow levels are putting an end to the hiking season along the Bow Valley. We were hoping that heading south would give us a bit more time.
Cory and Edith Passes
Summer is officially over, but there is still lots of warm weather to take advantage of, and I wanted a good look at Mount Louis after the half-glimpses from the highway at 100 km/h.
Read's Tower
I had wanted to check out Mount Sparrowhawk for the coming ski season, and decided to add Read's Tower to the day as well since it was in the neighbourhood.
Picklejar Lakes
After the aggressive destinations the last few weeks, I decided to join Carol and Simon to do something a little more leisurely.
Northover Ridge
Gillean Daffern considers this the best backpacking trip in all of the Canadian Rockies, and we decided to do the entire thing in one day.
Mount Chester
I'm feeling a bit uninspired lately, so here are the photos from a scramble up to the summit of Mount Chester.
Mount Rundle
My last attempt on Mount Rundle, with Mike F. in 2010, was thwarted due to ice and snow on the Dragon's Back, a somewhat loose slab-and-scree section with long dropoffs on either side.
Carthew Summit and Alderson Lake
Akemi and I attended the wedding of Ryan and Teresa, held in Waterton Lakes National Park.
East End of Rundle
It had been 4 years since I last went up East End of Rundle (or EEOR, as it is commonly called).
Windy Peak Hills and Hailstone Butte
These two destinations are across the road from each other, so it seemed like a good idea to tick off two targets in one day.
2011 Scotiabank Calgary Marathon
Ran a marathon yesterday. Training had gone poorly due to an ankle injury right around the time I was supposed to do my longest training run. My longest training run had been a bit over 17km, so I was quite unprepared (ideally, would have been around 35km).
The intention was to complete in 4 hours, and up until the 30km mark, I was on pace to be pretty close. That's when the wheels fell off and I literally limped the rest of the way. Both calves and hamstrings started cramping up and I had to stop several times to stretch them out.
The course was fantastic, and it was great being able to run on Memorial Drive and Shaganappi Trail. The Shaganappi hill next to the Children's Hospital was great. Running through Varsity was a bit uninspiring as it was all through residential areas. I like running on long, open stretches. It would be nice if the course went back to the University of Calgary.
These were my split times:
10k - 57m30s
Half marathon (21.1k) - 2h01m43s
30k - 2h56m43s
Full marathon (42.2k) - 4h36m41s
My chip time was 4h36m39s.
Feeling okay today. Limping a bit, but I expect to be fully recovered by Wednesday at the latest.
The intention was to complete in 4 hours, and up until the 30km mark, I was on pace to be pretty close. That's when the wheels fell off and I literally limped the rest of the way. Both calves and hamstrings started cramping up and I had to stop several times to stretch them out.
The course was fantastic, and it was great being able to run on Memorial Drive and Shaganappi Trail. The Shaganappi hill next to the Children's Hospital was great. Running through Varsity was a bit uninspiring as it was all through residential areas. I like running on long, open stretches. It would be nice if the course went back to the University of Calgary.
These were my split times:
10k - 57m30s
Half marathon (21.1k) - 2h01m43s
30k - 2h56m43s
Full marathon (42.2k) - 4h36m41s
My chip time was 4h36m39s.
Feeling okay today. Limping a bit, but I expect to be fully recovered by Wednesday at the latest.
Taylor Lake
The original plan was to try for Fairview Mountain, but a scouting mission the day before convinced us otherwise.
Simpson Pass
Back in February, when I was planning the trip to Egypt Lake shelter, one discussion that came up was the possibility of having to take an alternate route up to Healy Pass due to avalanche hazards along the southeast face of Mount Bourgeau.
Icefields Parkway
Akemi and I spent the weekend at the Lake Louise hostel, skiing along the Icefields Parkway.
Elk Lakes
We spent 3 days / 2 nights at the Elk Lakes cabin and enjoyed some very spring-like weather. As I am falling behind with my blog posts, I'll just add some commentary to the photos.
Chickadee Valley
I'm having some difficulty coming up with an interesting angle for this day's write-up, so I'll spare you the eye strain and just give up the pictures. Now you can't say, "I read this blog for the articles."
Fortress
When civilization has collapsed and the majority of the people of the world struggle to fulfill their basic needs, there will still be a tiny segment of the population that strap long, wooden boards to their feet and explore the remnants of the old world.
Chickadee Valley
Avalanche conditions are quite favourable right now, so we decided to try some more complex terrain, both to gain experience in such terrain and to have some good, exposed lines for skiing.
Cascade Fire Road
I am constantly trying to improve. Usually, it is a concerted effort that focuses on one of my primary activities (skiing, climbing, photography). Sometimes it takes the form of technique work or practice days. Others, it involves testing out new gear (and I do this a lot ... the gear stores along the Calgary / Canmore / Banff corridor love me). I use the weekends to try out different things, then spend the week going over the data and my impressions of how they worked out. It's a lot of fun, but exhausting at times, and can even be frustrating when something I try ends up backfiring.
Every once in a while though, it's nice to just slap on my old classic track skis and push hard.
Every once in a while though, it's nice to just slap on my old classic track skis and push hard.
Taylor Lake
I had been to Taylor Lake before, during my first or second season telemarking. Similar to when you don't really know where you are going when someone else is driving, I didn't really know where I was going at the time because I was following someone else. And, truth be told, the trail up to Taylor Lake is mostly through dense forest and everything just starts to look the same. This was made worse by the fact that the sky was cloudy and snow was falling pretty much the entire time.
On the plus side, we knew that the ski down would be an exciting, narrow, twisty trail through the trees, and snow conditions were absolutely fantastic (boot-top medium density powder). Well worth the skin up!
Well, I should clarify that last comment. I decided to do a bit of experimenting on this day, using wax on my telemark skis instead of skins. Snow temperature at the parking lot was about -10C, so I put on two layers of green and started up. Initially, things went really smoothly and both step-resistance and glide was much better than with skins. However, after about an hour, grip was starting to fade and I had to side-step some of the small steep sections. Another two hours after that, almost up to the elevation of the lake, I gave up and put on my skins.
By the time we had gained our elevation, we ran into a group of two that we had seen a few times on the trail already. They mentioned that the trail we were currently on went up to Panorama Ridge, which looked like it had some good skiing on a lightly gladed slope. The trail to Taylor Lake was unbroken, and there was easily half a metre of powder to cut through. Ray and I were both pretty tired and did not relish all the trailbreaking that would be required to see the lake. The ridge looked enticing, but given snow conditions we decided to skip and ski back down.
After a quick frozen lunch (it was around -15C by this point), we put away our skins and skied back down the narrow trail. This is when I discovered that my grip wax hadn't completely rubbed off yet, and my glide was significantly affected. In the future, I will have to pick my spots for when to use wax instead of skins.
When I got home, I learned that a skier had become trapped in a size 2 avalanche off the slopes of Mount Sparrowhawk, pinned against a tree and buried up to his armpits. Fortunately, he was able to get his cell phone and call for a rescue. Conditions are still a bit sketchy out there right now so be safe!
On the plus side, we knew that the ski down would be an exciting, narrow, twisty trail through the trees, and snow conditions were absolutely fantastic (boot-top medium density powder). Well worth the skin up!
Well, I should clarify that last comment. I decided to do a bit of experimenting on this day, using wax on my telemark skis instead of skins. Snow temperature at the parking lot was about -10C, so I put on two layers of green and started up. Initially, things went really smoothly and both step-resistance and glide was much better than with skins. However, after about an hour, grip was starting to fade and I had to side-step some of the small steep sections. Another two hours after that, almost up to the elevation of the lake, I gave up and put on my skins.
By the time we had gained our elevation, we ran into a group of two that we had seen a few times on the trail already. They mentioned that the trail we were currently on went up to Panorama Ridge, which looked like it had some good skiing on a lightly gladed slope. The trail to Taylor Lake was unbroken, and there was easily half a metre of powder to cut through. Ray and I were both pretty tired and did not relish all the trailbreaking that would be required to see the lake. The ridge looked enticing, but given snow conditions we decided to skip and ski back down.
After a quick frozen lunch (it was around -15C by this point), we put away our skins and skied back down the narrow trail. This is when I discovered that my grip wax hadn't completely rubbed off yet, and my glide was significantly affected. In the future, I will have to pick my spots for when to use wax instead of skins.
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Rockbound Lake
The theme of the weekend was "avalanche avoidance". The trail to Rockbound Lake crosses some runouts, but I felt that we would be able to navigate around them safely. Plus, I figured the scramble up the headwall between Tower Lake and Rockbound Lake would make for an interesting experience.
The trail to Tower Lake was pretty well packed, but beyond that there was only one set of tracks. Half our party stayed back due to a mixture of blisters and difficult terrain.
Three of us soldiered on, and after the development of a new technique for negotiating steep, loose terrain, we finally managed to top out of the headwall and arrive at Rockbound Lake, which was as impressive as ever.
Curiously, the snow around Rockbound Lake did not exhibit the November and December crusts that were so prominent elsewhere. However, the base was mostly facets and very very loose. There weren't many signs of natural avalanche activity either, which made me a bit cautious when crossing the two large runouts along the trail.
Skiing back down the headwall was challenging but fun. We eventually caught up with the rest of the group (they had started skiing back down when we were still on our way up) and had a nice run back to the car.
Here's to hoping that the snow conditions stabilize soon and we can get on some powder slopes!
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Three of us soldiered on, and after the development of a new technique for negotiating steep, loose terrain, we finally managed to top out of the headwall and arrive at Rockbound Lake, which was as impressive as ever.
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Here's to hoping that the snow conditions stabilize soon and we can get on some powder slopes!
Cosmic Ray Road
With 2 avalanche fatalities occurring just across the Smith Dorrien Trail at Burstall Pass while we were at Chester Lake last weekend, no one was interested in venturing past simple terrain. Avalanche conditions were still high in the alpine, so I figured we could get a good workout, and maybe a few turns, going up Cosmic Ray Road on the backside of Sulphur Mountain.
I had attempted this trail as a hike in the spring a few years ago with my mom, and I remembered it being a relentless slog. It did not disappoint! Unfortunately, there was scant little else that I could recall in any detail, so it was like a brand new trail.
Snow conditions were very suspect all over the trail, with cracking and whumpfing evident all over. I'm sure that had the trail been steep enough, or if we had ventured outside of the trail, that a slide would have been very easy to trigger.
We arrived at the top to see that the gondola was running and that tourists were milling about the boardwalk. Some even took pictures of the crazy Canadians.
The ski down was pretty exciting! Conditions ranged from bulletproof snow to knee-deep powder. Extra care had to be taken to ensure that we didn't venture off the trail lest we trigger a slide or fall off a cliff. However, it was a fun ski down and I'd like to do it again when the snow is a bit friendlier.
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The ski down was pretty exciting! Conditions ranged from bulletproof snow to knee-deep powder. Extra care had to be taken to ensure that we didn't venture off the trail lest we trigger a slide or fall off a cliff. However, it was a fun ski down and I'd like to do it again when the snow is a bit friendlier.
Chester Lake
Glorious snow!
With some areas in Kanasaskis Country having received up to 35cm in the past 3 days, conditions were finally making up for lost time. We were still sitting on a less-than-average base, but any snow was good news.
Avalanche conditions were high, so we decided to go to what is perhaps the easiest and safest backcountry destination around - Chester Lake.
We left Calgary to -22C. When we arrived at the trailhead, it was easily -5C, and perhaps even warmer than that. It was so odd to get out of the car and feel a gust of warm air!
Blue skies would occasionally peak out of the clouds, but overall it was an overcast day with a tiny bit of wind and snow.
After having lunch at Chester Lake, we ventured further towards Three Lakes Valley. However, we could see signs of fairly recent avalanches on the slopes of Mount Galatea, so did not get very far.
To make the trip both fun AND educational, we decided to do a Rutschblock test on a 30 degree slope. The result was a 3, which indicates that a human triggered slide is probable. Kudos to Angie and Joanne for doing most of the work. I got to do the fun part by jumping on the block.
Afterwards, we did the requisite dinner at the Grizzly Paw. What a great day!
With some areas in Kanasaskis Country having received up to 35cm in the past 3 days, conditions were finally making up for lost time. We were still sitting on a less-than-average base, but any snow was good news.
Avalanche conditions were high, so we decided to go to what is perhaps the easiest and safest backcountry destination around - Chester Lake.
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Blue skies would occasionally peak out of the clouds, but overall it was an overcast day with a tiny bit of wind and snow.
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