blag – Page 23 – evilmoose

The February of warmth, melting snow, and suspicion

Post author By megan
Post date 28.2.2015
No Comments on The February of warmth, melting snow, and suspicion

When we weren’t sitting around eyeing weather forecasts suspiciously (“Surely it’s going to get cold again some time soon?!”), much of February was spent riding bikes from the left of frame towards the right:

The Prospector trail in Exshaw was alarmingly dry… and we spent more time trying to get the boy to pedal his trail-a-bike. And going on random explorations (in-between working on renovations… which are, by the way, a fantastic way to eat up every moment of your spare time).

There was some more skiing, as we gradually came to terms with the fact that there might not be a long nordic ski season this year. At least Moraine Lake Road still had snow!

And the Nordic Centre is always fun, slush and warmth are preferable to -25oC and windy as far as I’m concerned.

Also, jumping is fun.

Winter Carnival in Canmore came and went with a whimper – the pile of snow on the street kept trying to melt, even with extra snow being brought in to shore it up. The toboggan slope was great fun though.

And then the boy’s run bike was passed on to the next generation of biking toddler.

All of which serves to remind me that I really need to remember to take my proper camera a little more often, instead of relying on my phone camera.

Tags canmore, canmore nordic centre, febtober, prospector

bikes canada general

January catch-up

So, time has been escaping from me – somehow it’s the end of March now, and I have posted no words or images here since January. Possibly I no longer exist. In an attempt to fool you though, here are the some of the things I claim to have done in the rest of January.

Banff Mountain Madness Relay – The relay had been wildly shortened thanks to the un-seasonal melting of the Bow River, but we were still out to defend our honour as reigning champions. Sadly our first relay member crashed badly on the horrendously icy slopes of Mount Norquay. We ended up racing the rest of the relay legs anyway, telling ourselves that we wouldn’t bother to try too hard. We’re the kind of idiots who can’t help ourselves once we put a race bib on though, and so despite the fact we had already DNFed (Did Not Finish) we pushed ourselves as hard as we could. Fun times. We’ll be back next year to win that trophy again! (Although our skier has now been forbidden to do the ski leg)

Lunch break skiing!

Back in the optimistic days on January when we still assumed the snow coverage at the Nordic Centre would get better.

And then I bought a fat bike. There was much trialling of options, and long lunch rides in the snow, but eventually a deal came along in the form of a 2nd-hand white Salsa Mukluk, and I couldn’t resist. We’ve been out adventuring together through January and February, although as March has rolled around, it seems the snow has already melted.

Tags banff mountain madness, canmore, canmore nordic centre, highline

bikes canada general

Frozen lakes and Friday adventures

Post author By megan
Post date 23.1.2015
No Comments on Frozen lakes and Friday adventures

Alex and I had a day off together, so went riding on the Lake Minnewanka ice (as well as doing more renovations, but that’s neither picturesque nor interesting).

The lake was snow-covered for the first kilometre or so, before the snow began to give way to larger and larger sections of clear ice.

The forecast was for the wind to pick up later in the day, and as we rode further, the wind at our backs grew stronger.

Eventually we decided to be sensible, and made our way across to the shore, where we could pick up the snowy trail to get back home. Cycling across the wind was challenging even with studded tyres. The wind would lull and then gust, and try and sweep your bike out from underneath you.

As we neared the shore, we found methane bubbles frozen in the ice. I’d been hoping to find some, and so we entertained ourselves admiring them, and sliding around on the ice near the shore, where the ferocious wind was slightly less ferocious.

When I got back home, I found photos of people breaking the ice to let the methane escape, and then setting fire to the gas. It looks like the dangerous kind of fun.

After cycling homewards along the snowy trail for a few kilometres, we decided the wind had died down a little, and braved the ice for the final stretch of cycling home.

The sun came out for a moment, and the wind wasn’t too fierce, and we watched skaters playing hockey, and optimistic girls heading out with skates in hand, starting their trudge through the snow to find the clear ice.

Frozen lakes are beautiful and fascinating, although terrifying (what? there could be lake monsters). I’d love to go back and explore some more, but might wait until the temperatures have settled down to something a little less ice-melting.

Tags banff national park, fat bike, frozen lake, lake minnewanka

canada general snow trip reports

Around Mount Rundle

Mount Rundle is awesome – the massive looming presence between Canmore and Banff, with its many pokey mountain parts of no-doubt highly significant and meaningful geological origin. I’ve read about it on numerous occasions, but fail to remember any of the details. I just know it’s a wonderful mountain.

So, Mount Rundle is wonderful. And we decided to ski around it. Well, someone had mentioned to me the idea of skiing around Mount Rundle last winter. I thought it sounded interesting, mentioned it to another friend, forgot I mentioned it to that friend, then she mentioned it back to me. Clear as mud? Probably.

The summary thus far: Mount Rundle is wonderful, and we wanted to ski around it.

The cast of this adventure was myself, Kat and Sarah. We set out through the Nordic Centre on Sunday morning, glad to be escaping the madding crowds before the races started. Straight out along Banff Ave, slowly slowly on our waxless/fish scale skis.

There had been a couple of centimetres of fresh snow the night before. After setting out onto the Rundle Riverside trail, we soon became incredibly grateful for this extra snow, as the snow cover along Rundle Riverside was incredibly thin in places.

In fact it was so thin that we suspect there was probably bare dirt in some spots on Saturday afternoon. Well, bare dirt, rocks and roots. It’s a good thing I was using rock skis.

On the whole though, the skiing was surprisingly nice. I say that based on the expectation it was going to be a bit horrendous though, so don’t get your hopes up. I think it could be quite pleasant with a little more snow cover though. It’s a nice peaceful section of forest there. Well, aside from the relentless noise from the highway… honestly, it’s mostly quite nice though.

It’s about 5.5km from the daylodge to the end of the Nordic Centre trails, then another 8km along Rundle Riverside before you hit the golf course roads in Banff. That 8km was definitely the slowest of the day, as we started having to alternate skiing and walking.

Eventually though, we did reach the golf course roads, where the marginal amount of fluffy new snow on the roads compacted nicely to be skiable. We cruised along, attempting to accurately identify trees, and pondering what to eat once we got to the Banff Springs. And trying to distract Sarah, whose toe hurt quite a lot after a crash early in the Riverside trail (we found out later that it was broken!).

On reaching Banff Springs, we swung in for soup, coffee, brownies and rehydration. And then Kat and I set out alone up Goat Creek. Which is definitely, and slightly inexplicably, more enjoyable in the uphill/towards Canmore direction.

With actual snow on the trail, and proper trackset tracks to ski in, we made pretty good time, despite the snow starting to stick to my skis like crazy.

We knew it would be windy when we reached the end of Goat Creek, and the weather forecast did not disappoint. Crazy strong gusts and overcast skies. We were intent on at least trying to walk down to Grassi Lakes though, and hopefully skiing down the easy Grassi hiking trail. At least six extremely chivalrous lone males stopped and tried to give us a lift as we walked the few hundred metres to the start of that trail. They mostly seemed to think we were crazy, but we managed to convince them that we had a plan, and didn’t need rescuing honestly.

Once we reached the trail though, we realised our plan would not work today. The trail was covered deeply in blown snow, and looked entirely uninviting. We wouldn’t be closing the loop today. So quickly we got a lift down to the Nordic Centre. Still – a good 40km or so of skiing, and not a bad local adventure.

Distance: ~40km
Elevation gain: ~955m