Had an awesome day skiing Red for the first time, sorry to the locals for bringing the coastal snow.
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Had an awesome day skiing Red for the first time, sorry to the locals for bringing the coastal snow.
Bummer. Might still be able to make a trip there, or they might announce a later date. Was hoping to go up there for a week and tour and use my indy pass. Might still be able to make it work.Quote:
Originally Posted by river59
Good info. I guess they will have to wait until next season. Might give fernie a shot. Looks like they have a bit more snow and the location fits my road trip plan better.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dromond
Heading to Red this Sunday for a couple days. Will have touring gear, looks like they are having a good season. Anyone around then?
FYI it rained to the summit on Sunday morning. If they get more snow hopefully it should help but be prepared for tough conditions if they don’t get a good shot of snow this week.Quote:
Originally Posted by el hefe
Thanks, was worried about that. Silver Star was +5 at 11am yesterday. Looks like it snowed overnight. Free passes and accom so will be there rain or shine.
North aspects above 1500m escaped the warming, and have been getting nightly top ups for the past 5 days. Lots of great skiing to be had.Quote:
Originally Posted by el hefe
^^^ awesome, thanks!
What's the status around Kaslo? Looks like Whitewater is only reporting a 200 cm base and 600 cm ytd which seems way off of average.
It is triple bad pretty much everywhere in the southern interior ie, freeze thaw for about a week combined with dangerous avalanche conditions and a low base at all the hills.Check Avalanche Canada website
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The backcountry is currently transitioning to a Spring snowpack, shit skiing for the moment, but healing up those PWLs and just needs another round of snow to get good again. In bounds spring skiing in the sun is pretty sweet right now.
Looks like we are moving to Kelowna at years end. Silver Star or Big White season pass?
Welcome to the hood! Really haven’t spent much time at Silverstar, but I would go for Big white just because of the Alpine options. The cliff bowl isn’t huge, but super fun terrain when the conditions are good.
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I quite like Silver Star. Has a good vibe, and everyone seems to know everyone there. Lots of other things to do if that's your bag or you are expecting visitors. Plus you can ski with el hefe sometimes.
I have time off with the family this week. Was planning on visiting Whitewater but concerned about in-area conditions. How is it off the groomers? Soft enough to noodle around the trees with the family will work, but refrozen crud might force a change of plans. Thanks.
Looking for current conditions at Fernie, KH and Revy. Anybody got an update?
Yes they all suck right now. The forcast is for cooler and wetter by next weekend so time will tell
BW is higher and gets more snow but is called Big Whiteout for a reason. It is an intermediate family focused resort and aside from the cliff has nothing particulaly steep. Silver Star is lower and also family focussed but has considerable challenging terrain on rhe backside. I would call it the mullet of ski hills - business in front and party in the back. If you want consistant challenging expert steeps and bumps check out Apex which is my home hill.
Thanks A.D, I don't shred the gnar these days so maybe SS is a good call and will give me terrain to work towards and a few laps with Hefe would be great.
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Heading to Sun Peaks on Saturday. DGAF what the conditions are like, I can't do anything about it. Skiing for 6 days starting Sunday. If anyone wants to give the wife and I the old "Todd Tour," we would appreciate the opportunity. Excited to crush some beers though.
Just got back from 2 days at Red. Monday was super fun, full on spring skiing. Love that hill so much. Was really firm up top yesterday and needs a big reset or needs to be sunny and warm.Liv2ski, any questions on anything SS or Okanagan related let me know!
Paulster2626, Sun Peaks did not get any rain in the recent mild spell. The lower 400 vertical feet went thru some freeze/thaw cycles but now nicely covered by the 12cms overnight last night and still snowing.
I am recovering from pulled muscle/tendon injury and have been off and on skis latley. With the new snow last night, I went out this morning but only did one run and although there were some nice untracked pow turns to be had, I was just too tentative.
As far as conditions go the trees, moguls, and off piste might be sketchy, but the groomers are full speed ahead.
I skied and campd at sun peaks all weekend. Fucking great conditions. Best spring skiing I've had in years. Excellent grooming, good time all around. My 10 year old was loving it and definitely got out of her comfort zone.
You won't be disappointed Paul.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...02010649fb.jpg
Fernie got 23 cm last night but seemed more like 30 up top. That is on top of the 68 in the past 10 days.
It got skied out and heavy by afternoon but it is good coverage compare to the Banff area, at least there are no rock teeth tearing up your skis.
Thanks - looks like there might be a good stormy week next week to reset everything slowly but surely. Either way won't matter - my 12 year old kid will want to ski everything, and "sketchy" isn't in his vocabulary. I have to follow for safety purposes, but if there's no rocks I'm happy.Quote:
Originally Posted by DanoT
We are skiers - we get what we get and don't get upset!
But what's up with $200+/day lessons? My kids enjoy them but they are pricing people out of jobs at this rate.
Thanks to a very aggressive summer grooming program rocks should not be a problem at Sun Peaks as most rocks have been picked as well as stumps pulled, weeds cut, and grass planted. Because of this, Sun Peaks in early season or during a low tide year can have a 30-50cm thinner base than elsewhere but still have equal or better coverage.
The amount of times I've seen you say this has me on a mission to find a rock or stump at Sun Peaks and post photographs. CHALLENGE ACCEPTEDQuote:
Originally Posted by DanoT
Paulster, they left stumps and logs on the Challenger face to hold snow as it is the steepest run on the mountain. To underscore my praising of the summer grooming program: There is an unoffical contest each year to see which B.C. interior mountain opens first. Sun Peaks projected a Nov 16/2024 opening. I thought that was a bit optimistic and indeed when the time came they delayed Opening Day by one week. It snowed that week and Big White opened on the Friday with 4 runs, while Sun Peaks opened the next day with 103 of 144 runs open.
Edit: The rock band on the Big Headwall is 99% covered. I havn't skied it this season, but the rock band on The Chute might have something sticking out.
Feeling pretty optimistic about my Stellar trip this week.
Hey Dano, so far I haven't been able to find any rocks. Some stumps and twigs here and there, but compared to rocks they are just "hard snow" to my edges. Most treacherous terrain of the day was when I was going full-tilt speed on to the Morrisey->Village bridge because I thought it would have snow on it. It doesn't. Had to come to a cool-looking stop inside the bridge, but I still looked like an idiot probably. Every little bit of snow is helping heal the freeze/thaw conditions. Top part of the mountain is skiing great! Bottom half is okay, a little icy in spots but for the most part can hold a reliable edge. I like it here.
It is hard to overstate the impact of the summer grooming program at Sun Peaks. Over on Mt Morrisey they cut the runs two years before installing the chairlift and some of the runs where they planted grass, in summer they look like a vertical golf fairway. With global warming and potentially shorter ski seasons, I think aggressive summer grooming programs are going to be a big thing in the future for a lot more ski resorts.
DanoT. Do you own a summer grooming company? Lots of little resets so far this week. Looking good for a dump for tomorrow and the weekend. Finally....
back from a flash-trip to whitewater.
good viz gave me a solid look at the OB terrain
next trip im bringing touring gear
fun fact for punk fans: the owner of Big Cranium Design in Nelson is the drummer for D.O.A.
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El Hef, owning a summer grooming company might not be a bad idea. A few years ago Sun Peaks hired a guy with a special backhoe to do some grooming and run widening on Expo, a double black diamond run. This backhoe, instead of full tracks, had articulating legs that could be extended out the downhill side of the machine so it could position and rotate the cab and machine boom on a level plane whenever the machine was on a steep side hill. It was very safe and efficient when removing trees and stumps.
Google spider excavator. Does good work but very slow and expensive.
Family/friends trip to sunpeaks next weekend. First time I've been, any insider tips for the good runs? Hoping this storm keeps going!
40cm today at SS. Snowed hard all morning! Stayed pretty light with heavy winds so tracks were getting filled in. Saw 2 wind slab slides in the Attridge area which is pretty unusual.
kootenayskier, message inbound, check your PM
thanks
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Stuntmonkey, at Sun Peaks I often recommend Mount Morrisey's The Sticks. Even though it is a green run, it is nicely laid out with numerous tree islands and you can get going pretty fast with big GS turns between tree islands. There are several blue runs on lower Mount Tod are more like double blue and are almost 2k vertical from the Sunburst chair. The electronic sign boards at the top of each chairlift will have a check mark on the groomed runs and an additional snowflake asterisk if it snowed 10cm+ after the run was groomed.
Okay I've got this figured out. My kid and I schralped the pow all week last week - 1 okay 9cm snowfall on Monday, and then Thursday woke up to another 10 and it snowed all day. Friday was amazing - at least a foot up top. Here's what you do there if it snows:Quote:
Originally Posted by Stuntmonkey
Get in Sundance line around 8:00-8:15 and wait for the 8:30 opening. Doesn't really matter, you're going to get one decent run and maybe another lap before Tod opens. Don't fall for the trap of the groomers under the chair or Granny Greene's, instead head right off the lift, go down the green for a bit and then when you see the sign "Marginal Conditions - Skiing and Riding Not Recommended" go there. It'll take you through some small trees in to peekaboo area, and you'll get fresh tracks the whole way down.
After that, go line up for Sunburst. Again when you get to the top don't fall for the trap of the nice looking stuff under and beside the chair, instead hang a left and go up Crystal right away. Should be no tracks in the bowl, so just hammer a run straight back down the lift line and listen to the people on the lift be amazed at your pow skillz. Next time up the crystal take the ridge and drop back in to the bowl under the burfield somewhere and get back to crystal chair to the top.
Now it's time for west bowl side of juniper ridge. Get off the chair, and check to see what's been groomed off the back side of juniper. If back door/toilet bowl hasn't been touched, that's your target. Otherwise just go down the ridge a bit and duck in to the trees at any point where there are no tracks (should be none really anyway). Just point 'em and let it rip all the way down to west bowl express.
West bowl kinda sucks but you can get 1-2 good runs here before the intermediates have tracked it all out to shit. Get back to Crystal chair, go to the top and again take Juniper ridge all the way to the end and aim for burfield midstation. At the cat track, however, you'll see the sign for challenger. Go there - the meadows at the top for challenger/freddy's are amazing - we found 100% fresh turns at 2pm there still. The challenger run itself sucks balls since it's full of icy moguls and alders to navigate, but it's only like 5 minutes of work and makes the top worth it.
Now you're at the bottom of burfield so get comfortable and enjoy the rest to the top again. Now you can explore Gil's. Cool area, not a lot of vert, but still lots of good turns to be had there and feels very remote.
Anyway, that's how I'd do it. Sun Peaks is great - nobody there, and yet, there are still cool people to meet! And DanoT - not one single rock all week. You were right!!