February 13, 2001

Relying on the Kindness of Strangers

Through the generosity of a small company in Calgary and the fact a single web page can have elements from several servers, reports once again have pictures. Hopefully last week's crisis is now pretty much resolved although some glitches are likely to turn up and the servers that make up the site will have to be monitored closely for awhile. These kind folks did not even want any acknowledgment of their contribution, so we are all jointly at bit beholden to mysterious strangers. Blanche would approve. ;-)

Out on the slopes it was a bright gorgeous day which was nice for the return of pictures, butI found it hard to get enthused about the skiing. It's not that it was particularly bad, rather just compellingly lackluster. The runs were hard packed and while I am trying to use that in the plain English sense, tyou might detect just a touch of ski report twang, for there were places where the boiler plate was hard enough to make the DeBeers Company proud - the often delinquent lower Cedar Ridge comes to mind. In general though the runs, while certainly fast, were fairly grippy.

Off run the combination of a week with virtually no snow, weekend crowds, and colder temperatures has eliminated most of the soft pack in the more accessible areas. There is some soft snow about though and I even got a few nice powder turns on upper snake ridge, but after those the alders closed in and the few channels out were infested with firm moguls. Steep slopes with tight alders and moguls are apparently something I need more practice on. :-)

On the bright side the rocks and pebbles that had been reemerging on the weekend, seem to have been beaten back somewhat by the local grooming wizards (Has ever has so much been owed ... whoops, sorry - wrong war). This does not mean there aren't still rock hazards and I sometimes wonder if those of us who have been skiing here all winter might not have the routines ingrained in us by now. Over to the left now, then quick right, dip into the gully here - rocks, nope I didn't see any rocks. ;-) However if there is no more snow for this coming big holiday weekend, I suspect they won't be hard to find.

The Face Lift was open today and it is amusing how high you have to climb up onto the causeway they have built to get up to where the cable runs even with the lower wheel at its lowest position. I went to Snake rather than straight down, but the snow up there seemed pretty nice as it has been spared the hordes.

My kid's basketball game and other things have rather delayed this report, so at 9:00 PM it is -10 C with nice bright stars. :-(


Bear with Griz Peak above it. Firm groomed and moguls pretty much defined the day.

From the top of the Face Lift, the tops of the Bear and Boomerang lifts as well as the bottom of the Face Lift are all visible.

Despite my whining, there was some good snow, for instance here at the top of Snake Ridge.

Polar Peak basks in the sun with Currie in the shade below.

Do you think it's friendly? Some folks seem to peer down 123 with Fernie and the Elk Valley above them and part of the Currie Chutes at the left.