Training Log Archive: Carbons Offset

Found some nice snow this morning and did several shorter laps. Picked a few different lines in the Granny Trees area, found some nice flow and some short steeper pitches that were exciting. A nice finish to the weekend before heading out with the group. Decided to go back a day early with everyone else so that we could all feel Iike we finihsed the adventure together and also we were nervous about whether Rob's snowmobile would start so we didn't want to leave five of them in an uncertain situation. With Revy's machine available for the boost, Rob's sled fired up nicely and the trip out went really well, got back to the vehicles in good daylight (which was handy for seeing the creek that none of us spotted early enough to stop so Doug and I had to jump it at full speed :)
Again, the road was smooth and so is Revy's driving, so I was having fun playing on the towline and waterskiing in the great powder along the side of the trail... This is how fun you hope that being towed by a snowmobile would be but it usually isn't... but this time it was :)

Super cold again. Wearing all of my downhill clothing on the uptrack. Did more exploring to look for better snow and were starting to find better stuff but sometimes still a little variable. Got radio contact with Kiwi Rob and his group at 10:00, conforming that they were done their snowmobile ride/tow in, so all had gone well despite a larger group and battery issues. Met up with them at the hut and then headed out for some good turns in the afternoon.
Cousin Larry, Fat Tony and I headed down for one more run, doing the uptrack on the last light of the day. Set a fast pace for the first half of the climb but backed off so that we didn't leave Fat Tony behind; ended up catching Rob who had skipped the extra lap but was still climbing up from the previous run.
Followed up with card games and laughs, and finished off the remains of a bottle of American Honey Wild Turkey that a previous group left behind, and the rest of Doug's Fireball that he got us hooked on -- tasty stuff.

Into Jumbo Pass cabin with Revy and Doug. I was nervous about the snowmobile tow-in in -25C. Wore everything I had and was quite comfortable except for getting chilled on my legs and bum but nothing too bad. The road was really smooth so the trip in was quite easy and relaxing. By the time we reached the trailhead, it had seemed too easy, with one major exception: when the snowmobile went over one big dip and bump followed by the toboggan, the big bounce caused the tobaggon to disconnect from the hitch (blame the enginneer who selected the hitch pin to use) and then fly about a metre in the air, with Doug being towed close behind it. Doug dove out the way, barely clipped it, but had a good crash. I managed to swerve around the chaos but let go of my rope too so that Revy would notice that all of the drag was gone and would come back for us. Doug was fine, we reconnected everything, the quick blast of running the tobaggon up the hill to the snowmobile got the legs and feet warmed up and all was good. Big excitement! Then the ascent to the hut, which also went well. Got to the cabin with decent time for one big lap of skiing. Unfortunately there had been a lot of wind up there and most of what we skied had a breakable crust and was quite challenging to ski.

The Gorge with Revy. Parked at km 15, the air was really cold when we got out of the truck, -20C and you could feel the cold right through your clothes. Climbed up and over the top to the other side, and Revy wisely chose to keep us in the sun all day on the southwest facing slopes. No wind and temperatures were quite comfortable, felt about 10 degrees warmer, had to peel the layers off on the uptrack. Fun to ski runs that were new to Revy too. Did a few laps down the back, finding nice open sections with great snow and connecting through some treed sections. Nice sunlight and good views of valley cloud below and snow ghost trees at the top of the ridge, but no cameras with us :(. Oh well, took mental pictures until I ran out of film. Also took a good mental video but am having trouble downloading it.
Finished with a run back down the colder side where we did some traverses to minimize our time down in the gully at the bottom. It played out pretty well. Some sluffing in the deep steep snow at the top, but not a problem - not deep and not running too fast.
A great second day on backcountry skis this year, out for 6 hours, moving for most of it, almost a 2000 metre day at the start of the season.
Always fun to be out with Revy, lots of good conversation on the uptrack.

C • Wow! 1

C • It's nice that you have an ... 1

Headed to Sovereign Lake to ski some different trails. Cold again, green wax is still the ticket. The trails were empty and freshly groomed after the NorAm races this past weekend with over 400 top racers. Wanted to get out on classic skis again to practice the pointers from Friday and try to iron them in. Skied Carl Wylie, Black Prince, Woodland Bell, and then swapped to the waxless skis for a lap of Passmore to compare. The waxless are pretty good (almost infinite grip that makes me fear that my technique could suffer, and decent glide) and I'm sure today's cold temps were not the most favourable to the waxless (and these aren't the condtions when I would need them).

C • Waxless skis 3