Kicking Horse, B.C. 1/27/05

Kicking Horse had been fairly lean on snow before the Tropical Punch. The lower mountain got rain and was very sketchy, but the upper mountain got 29 inches of snow and was in good shape. On my first visit here in March 2002 every gondola run had to be top-to-bottom. That would have been a royal pain with today's conditions, but fortunately the new Stairway to Heaven chair allows you to run laps on some of the upper terrain. You did have to plan your skiing to minimize trips to the bottom.

Therefore I took steep drops off CPR Ridge after both gondola rides. And after a few Stairway runs I headed to the bottom via the newly opened Feuz Bowl. The top 700-800 vertical had consistent packed powder, easily the best snow we saw all week. Then it transitioned to hardpack and eventually frozen granular by mid mountain. Below that you had to stick to the groomers, which featured occasional weeds, ice and dirt patches.

That's the problem with planning ski trips in advance...you never know what the conditions will be, so it is always a gamble.

A few years ago I had a trip planned to Banff during an El Nino. I cancelled it, and boy was I glad. Finally got there a few years later, and it was awesome. Did one day at KHMR and the conditions were stellar. had to hike Blue Heaven back then, so only one run was had on that face. The gondola laps really tired us out. I don't think we did more than 6 or 7 runs. They are long and demanding, and we were tired from the previous days at Sunshine and Lake Loo.

Next time I'd like to plan a trip just for KHMR with maybe a day of cat skiing to break it up. A side trip to Fernie from there is not out of the question either. The good thing is that following an El Nino is usually La Nina which brings bountiful snow to that region. I hope to get there next season.

So many place to go, so little time and $.

KHMR has serious logistics issues which Lockie Brown and I discussed in the recent Chatter Creek thread. With its current layout I prefer Lake Louise, Fernie and Castle Mt. for overall ski experience among the Calgary-accessible areas. The key improvement needed at KHMR is a gondola midstation.

I am in general a firm believer in not advance booking ski trips into areas at times of year with questionable reliability. You can't avoid it dealing with the top cat and heli operators in Canada. Of course snow reliability is not supposed to be an issue with these places.....

If you look at Fernie and Island Lake, legendary snow stashes both, the record of the past 5 years does not inspire confidence. That's one reason I picked Great Northern and am now inclined to give a hard look at Chatter Creek. With excellent snow (my 1997 trip) I would still view Island Lake as my #1 snowcat experience.