Saturday, December 12, 2009

Ski Touring is fun!

Since about mid November I've been out ski touring, mainly with my I-Pod, and 3 times with partners. It's so nice to be independent and not having to rely on partners all the time. Not only is ski touring a great work out, you also get rewarded with a great run after words-at least so far this year. The downside, same as in ice climbing, are the fairly long drives. Although Canmore lies in the middle of the mountains and is surrounded by 3000 meter high peaks, there is not much skiing to have right out of town. The closest decent destinations in early Winter are Tryst Lake in K-Country and Sunshine or Lake Louise, which is always close to an hour driving. The real good places like Rogers Pass or the Lodge are at least 3h away in good driving conditions, so times 2 makes 6 hours in the car. Coming from Europe I'm still not used to it and the last few years I also got more and more bad feelings about the carbon footprint I leave on our fragile planet. above yesterday's view from Tent Ridge over to Mt. Birdwood-below the beautiful and remote North Goodsir, seen from a ski tour above the BB Lodge.