Asulkan to Loop Brook via Dome Col

Dropped a car at Loop Brook and headed up the Asulkan Valley on a hazy, sultry morning.



Fresh snow made for heavy trail breaking and sticky skins.



We made our way up onto The Cleaver.



And had some great views towards Mt. Fox and the other peaks in the Dawson Group.



Before finally arriving at the col.



With a view into both the valley we'd just came up and the one we were about to go down in.



Not a single shot of the ski down. Oh well. This was the route.

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Albert Creek

This was an exploration day near Albert Creek a.k.a. an "it's too crappy to drive all the way to the pass" day.



We got some exercise and the sun did come out eventually.



And we even found a few turns here and there.

Lily Glacier

Up Loop Brook and onto the moraine below the Lily.



Still very wintry up here.



Steve forgot his lunch and had to improvise with breakfast cereal.



Thanks for the Best Uptrack Ever whoever you were.



Blowing like crazy just below The Dome so we gave the col a miss and headed straight down in fading visibility.



Great skiing.

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Markhor

A quick Sunday trip to the Coquihalla where we skied Markhor again.



Once everything fills in there's some good terrain up here. The north aspect helps.





We had a few good turns and enjoyed the feeling of cold winter again.



It felt distinctly spring-like back at the road.

Lookout Col

We slogged our way up to Lookout Col again to salvage some skiing on a pretty crappy weather day.



Great weather! Somewhere. Could not see a thing on the ski down from the col.



Afterwards we skied onto and above the prominent moraine on skiers left below Glacier Crest. It was the first time we'd been over there and found it quite fun.





Definitely worth another visit.

We came across the Outdoor Research tiny house in the parking lot. Check out the shower! Brrr.

Campbell Icefields

We arrived at at Campbell Icefields on a cold, cold morning in early March.



Overnight a big wind storm had sculpted the fine power snow into hard packed crust as far as the eye could see.



Thankfully it started snowing that night and didn't let up for days. Over the week we got something 1.5 metres of snow. Temperatures hovering around -20 made for some incredible powder skiing below tree line. Amazing stuff.







We said goodbye to the bottomless powder as temperatures warmed up later in the week.



Good food.



Good music.



And good times until far too soon it was time to pack up and head for home.



It took two attempts but finally on the second day of trying we bid adieu to Campbell Icefields for another few years at least.

Lookout Col

Another day of clear blue skies found us on the way to Lookout Col with great views of Sir Donald and everywhere else. The guys were lucky with the weather this year.



We had a vague idea of doing the traverse but discretion won the day and we settled for simply enjoying the views into the Asulkan side of the col.





We stayed hard skier's left on way down and it was much better than the roly-poly route right down the middle.



This was the end of my mini-vacation with the boys but I would see them again later in the week to fly into Campbell Icefields.

Asulkan

Zoiks it was -18C inside the camper when I woke up. A hot coffee restored motivation and soon I was out the door to meet M & D at the Wheeler Hut. We plodded up the Asulkan Valley accompanied by the infernal racket of Damon's squeaky NTN bindings.

The "drought layer" was very much on people's minds with good reason. Two interesting things in this photo I think:



One is the obvious avalanche just behind the hut. Never seen that one pull out before. The crown looked to be about 1.5 metres tall and it ran a surprisingly long distance, just about reaching the moraine where the up track is usually located. The second is the almost total lack of tracks above the hut even after two blue bird days. None across the valley on the Dome side either. Everyone was taking it easy.

And so so did we with a conservative route up towards the 7-steps before pulling the skins and skiing down the wind effected snow.





Fun. Cold! We scurried back to the hut for beer and burritos.

Balu Pass

A short day behind the hotel with special guests Martin and Damon. A little sketched by the stability we gave up on 8812 Bowl and diverted down Hospital Gully (I think that's what it's called). Fun, steep, great snow. Then to Balu Pass and up the ridge towards 8812 to ski a couple of laps on looker's right of the headwall. A freezing day but nice to see the sun.

Flat Creek

Come on...-24C!? I've been in the Okanagan too long for this. Anyway it was another cold morning and still no significant snow after 3 weeks. Keen to avoid the busier areas on a BC long weekend we headed up Flat Creek towards the slide paths on Mount Smart. We last visited these slides way back in 2008.

At least the cold temps made the creek crossing easy.



And the surface hoar was spectacular.



We worked our way up to around 1800m and called it a day. The skiing was surprisingly fun.