Icefields Parkway

Akemi and I spent the weekend at the Lake Louise hostel, skiing along the Icefields Parkway.


On Saturday, we went all the way to the north end of Banff National Park and skied on Parker Ridge and Hilda Ridge, roughly 1.5 hours north of Lake Louise.

The Weeping Wall, a popular ice climb within a stone's throw of the Icefields Parkway

Parker Ridge is mostly north facing and has a reputation for good early and late season skiing. The main downside is that it can get windy at times, and it certainly was that on the crest of the ridge. However, we had about 10cm of light powder and did three runs, once from the crest and twice lower down.

Skinning up to Parker Ridge

Hilda Ridge is southeast facing and had a very annoying sun crust underneath the storm snow. Things were a bit better in the trees, but we only did one run.

On Sunday, we went to Crowfoot Pass via the Crowfoot Glacier lookout. On my previous visit, I got to about 1.5km from the pass. This time, there were some threatening cornices hanging over Crowfoot Mountain, but the snow itself felt quite firm and we stayed far enough away from the cliffs for the most part.

Looking northwest across Bow Lake towards Mount Jimmy Simpson

Looking northeast across Bow Lake towards Cirque Peak

Heading towards Crowfoot Glacier

Travel to the pass felt like traveling over a glacier, with many snow crevasses forming from a combination of boulders and wind (and snow). The trail ended about 2km from the pass, and we had to break trail for the rest of the way.

Following the tracks toward Crowfoot Pass

Getting close to Crowfoot Pass

The view on the other side of the pass revealed some very appealing slopes off of Bow Peak. However, the snow was a bit thin and we decided to simply ski back.

Crowfoot Pass, looking south

Crowfoot Pass, looking north (the direction we came from)

I had heard that it was possible to ski from the pass all the way back down to Bow Lake without having to put skins back on, but I was not able to figure out how that was done. We had to put our skins on twice on the ski back down.

It was good to spend some time in a part of Banff National Park that doesn't see as much traffic, but I've decided that it's time to put the big powder boards away and put the rock skis back into rotation.