Time for my annual trip out west to visit family and make sure my ski legs don’t get too rusty – although I did have a major wipeout at Lake Louise my first day that left me with a battered knee. I haven’t had a good wipeout in years and I must say, it’s not something I’m really missing. I was bouncing down a great run on Ptarmigan on the backside of Louise and must have caught an edge or something b/c I really fell hard and twisted my leg. I figured a couple days of ice and some Advil would do the trick, so hopefully that’ll be the case. The snow was so great that it was totally worth it.
I met two of my Irish friends in Calgary who flew over from Dublin for some real snow here in Canada and true to our word, we did not disappoint. The snowfall this year has been spectacular with more than usual, so the mountains were in amazing shape to impress my visitors. We spent a couple days in Banff with some friends of mine, skied a couple days there and then headed to Panorama, which is in the Columbia Valley, the next set of mountain ranges over from Banff National Park. It’s great there – a little less touristy, generally warmer (although not always as much snow), and a little more off the beaten track so it’s worth the extra hike to get there. In any case, my brother lives there, so it’s a good excuse for a visit. He is starting to teach my 3-year old niece to ski and once she’s on skis I think we’ll all have met our match – I can just tell that she has her aunt (and her dad’s) passion for skiing and the outdoors, so we can all hardly wait til she’s zipping around on her own.
We had several good days of skiing at Panorama, although my friends had a few mishaps that provided some challenges for them, including a bad case of agoraphobia, which resulted in my brother having to make a toboggan rescue to get one of them off a steep slope – somehow I don’t think taking up skiing is probably the best thing for someone who is afraid of heights AND of wide open spaces… unless you master skiing blindfolded, I think the general concept is going to be challenging. In any case, we made the best of it, and I still got a ton of great skiing in, so that’s what counts.
We headed out for a day of cross-country one morning, but with the spring thaw and cold temps at night, the track was sheer ice – and given that you have pretty much no control over x-country skis in a narrow track at the best of times, trying to manage it on mountain trails (aka big hills) with an icy track didn’t seem like the best plan – unless I wanted to ensure my knee injury lasted a bit longer… We settled for drinks on the deck of the ski chalet in the sun, watching the ice melt – an excellent compromise.
I met two of my Irish friends in Calgary who flew over from Dublin for some real snow here in Canada and true to our word, we did not disappoint. The snowfall this year has been spectacular with more than usual, so the mountains were in amazing shape to impress my visitors. We spent a couple days in Banff with some friends of mine, skied a couple days there and then headed to Panorama, which is in the Columbia Valley, the next set of mountain ranges over from Banff National Park. It’s great there – a little less touristy, generally warmer (although not always as much snow), and a little more off the beaten track so it’s worth the extra hike to get there. In any case, my brother lives there, so it’s a good excuse for a visit. He is starting to teach my 3-year old niece to ski and once she’s on skis I think we’ll all have met our match – I can just tell that she has her aunt (and her dad’s) passion for skiing and the outdoors, so we can all hardly wait til she’s zipping around on her own.
We had several good days of skiing at Panorama, although my friends had a few mishaps that provided some challenges for them, including a bad case of agoraphobia, which resulted in my brother having to make a toboggan rescue to get one of them off a steep slope – somehow I don’t think taking up skiing is probably the best thing for someone who is afraid of heights AND of wide open spaces… unless you master skiing blindfolded, I think the general concept is going to be challenging. In any case, we made the best of it, and I still got a ton of great skiing in, so that’s what counts.
We headed out for a day of cross-country one morning, but with the spring thaw and cold temps at night, the track was sheer ice – and given that you have pretty much no control over x-country skis in a narrow track at the best of times, trying to manage it on mountain trails (aka big hills) with an icy track didn’t seem like the best plan – unless I wanted to ensure my knee injury lasted a bit longer… We settled for drinks on the deck of the ski chalet in the sun, watching the ice melt – an excellent compromise.
