Category: snow

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canada general moosling snow

Christmas

Christmas Day followed the by now fairly traditional pattern of Alex being at work, and the Moosling and I hanging out at home opening a few presents. The difference this year being that no-one was sick, and the boy was actually keen on the whole presents thing. Although when I told him that the Ho Ho had brought some presents, he was a little dubious. On arriving upstairs he declared: “Where is the Ho Ho? Ho Ho gone! *points out window* No, was Mama. Mama did presents.” So that didn’t last long.

So there was the donning of the festive apparel (new Toy Story t-shirts, amongst others), and the eating of the chocolate frog, followed by the running-around-getting-ready-to-go-skiing. After driving in with others, we caught the gondola up to Sunshine Village, and the Moosling went to hang out in daycare for a couple of hours (quite happily, as there was scary wind outside). I got a couple of hours skiing in, and was not terribly sad to have to stop at midday, as it really was a bit windy and miserable despite being theoretically fairly warm.

The afternoon was spent cooking, and being sprayed with the water pistol which the unthinking Mama had gifted the small child. And then came the eating of the tasty food, the setting fire to the pudding, and the going home early to bed, as it had been quite a long day.

The next day brought about the testing of the full body climbing harness, and the discovery that it certainly works quite well for swinging at any rate.

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canada general snow trail running

This is what it looks like when you go running when it’s -26oC outside

The sky is gorgeous, clear and blue, and everything sparkles, even the air (sadly not captured at all well by a slightly foggy phone camera, but you’ll have to take my word for it).

Your lens fogs up, so you can’t properly capture the misty river, steaming in the cold air, and flowing sludgily with ice.

And your breath freezes on everything it touches.

During this cold spell we also tried the famous “throw a container full of freshly boiled water into the air and watch it vaporise”. And it really does work!

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bikes canada general moosling snow trip reports

Skogan Pass

After a little Moosling skiing near the Ribbon Creek carpark, we took off towards Skogan Pass on Saturday morning. Lincoln and I on classic skis, and Alex riding the fatter of his fat bikes (the Moonlander) towing the Moosling in the Chariot with ski runners mounted. Moosling skis stashed in the back of the Chariot. Moosling stashed in the Chariot.

Bee lining up to Nakiska can be tricky. Particularly when you’re towing an extra 30-35kg. Once we reached Nakiska, and then the groomed trails beyond, things got a little more civilized.

The Moosling did some skiing on the way up. And walking. And hurling himself into the snow at the side of the trail and proclaiming “Help! I stuck!”

Conditions were great though, especially for November. Not perfect, but if a few rocks were the worst the day had to throw at us, we thought we did pretty well.

Once we reached the groomed trails, there were only a couple of short uphill sections where Alex had to hop off and push for a bit. There were definitely other climbs that required rest breaks though – it’s good training I tell him.

I had some fun messy around with waxes. Usually I skate ski. The few times I’ve headed out on classics, it was invariably patterned bases. In Australia the conditions are so frequently spring-like that only the genuinely mad get into waxes. Because it invariably involves klister. So I have almost no experience, and the witchcraft behind it all drives me batty, reminding me why I love the simplicity of a well-behaved, predictable skate ski. But I shall learn!

The Moosling has even started taking on downhills. No mean feat when you consider he’s wearing Nordic ski boots strapped into his old toddler skis (his first proper set of Nordic skis should be here for Christmas).

It doesn’t usually end well, but at least he’s trying.

Then sometimes a boy needs a break from all this learning, and he’s back to what he knows best.

Then finally, the pass! And time for lunch.

Toddlers: ruining family photos since 1876.

Then it was time to learn the Charleston, layer up, and commence the descent. Unlike Moraine Lake Road, Skogan Pass has a wonderfully long and fast descent to pay you back for all that climbing.

Distance: 21.5km
Elevation gain: 766m

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canada general snow trail running

Ha Ling peak again

A dusk ascent.

Directly up via the Grassi Lakes trail, and on along the climbers trail to the pass. Past people wearing inappropriate shoes, who warned me it would be slippery coming back down. I had Yaktrax on though, and was invincible!

It’s always a little bit intimidating running up Ha Ling from town – it looms over you so, and seems so high and imposing and improbable

Up above Grassi Lakes, in black and white because the light was so low my phone couldn’t actually capture colour properly anyway.

A couple of people on their way down over the first kilometre or so, not too long after sunset. And then I was on my own. The mountain got darker, but between the snow and the light of the half moon, I didn’t bother with my headlamp. The trail was well packed all the way, thankfully no treeline post-holing and snow-wading this time around.

I turned my headlamp on at the summit, and Alex messaged that he could see me. A quick glance down to the warm orange glow of Canmore, nestled between the mountains, then back down again, looking out west to the last glow of pink on the clouds, up to the warm orange glow behind me, to the half moon casting my shadow onto the snowy slope, and to the trail, always keeping an eye on that slippery snowy trail.

Summit

I made good time on the descent, and convinced my legs into a tired jog trot to get home for dinner. Around 3.5 hours door to door, with 3 hours of moving time. Not bad for winter conditions.

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canada general moosling snow

Moraine Lake Road

A Friday expedition out to Moraine Lake Road. When you’re used to not having to drive at all to go skiing, it seems like an incredible injustice when you choose to drive for as long as an hour to get to a different skiing location. It’s nice to get out of the valley occasionally, but the hour of driving is difficult to overcome.

We went out to Moraine Lake Road, which had enough snow on for grooming, but not so much that we weren’t hitting our poles on the road underneath from time to time. Although we were up quite late on Friday afternoon, there were still quite a few other people around – I’m glad we didn’t wait until the weekend, from the sounds of it there were hundreds of people about.

The Moosling is much heavier than he used to be. Skiing with him is hard work these days.

Thankfully he’s showing some enthusiasm for skiing on his own. Although at his speed, we would probably take a couple of days to reach the end of the groomed section of road (it’s about 9km one way).