Hello Ramblers - Wow, what a day. Our 13 had a fun & insightful day in the mountains. The weather was great (-5'ish, snow & sun & clouds), and we got out just as the winds started to pickup. Geared up & on the trail by 9.30, we worked up a little heat getting back to the meadows. The requisite willow bash & tight forest tree slalom were a good refresher in its own right. I am sure Norman planned that route but just did not want to warn us... I've omitted Bill's GPS track to protect the innocent.
This snow pile set up really strong, that's Christine on top and the brave Phyllis!
For 11am, we were at the meadows & had two snow piles built. We went through a gamut of things, slope search, multiple beacon search, shelter/fire building, probing, digging and wisecracks. Each of us contributed, and I think even the wisest of us likely relearned at least something. We ended off the day with the digging race won by Team Acquroff. In hindsight, we could have used one of the piles to do a quinze build. As shown, 3 hours of setting time makes a supper solid structure. Snow depth was +50cm depending on location, so a pretty good base to work with. Of the shelters, 1 group actually actually made something viable, 1 group moved a LOT of snow, and 1 group socialized around afire. All practical learning lessons.
One thing we neglected to address was the current snow pack. As far as snowpack, there is a solid icecrust (at +10cm), and I do not know if that will affect our favourite Spray ski areas.
I am not sure if it was the threat of parking tickets, however we had the Rock Glacier lot to ourselves. So in hindsight we could easily have held both planning the 2 refresher sessions here.
Thanks to Norman for co-cordinating with me. To Jenny & Gordon, & John for running the second session, and to Clifton for the 3rd session later this week. Sorry to folks who were left out, thanks to those who dropped out to let others take part.
From Steve Riggs:
an FYI about a software update for Tracker 2 owners. Steve did this back in the summer, and had a 2 week turnaround. https://backcountryaccess.com/en-ca/blog/p/t2-software-update
Here is a useful trip planning form courtesy of local guide Tom Wolfe. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UMM-vC6aFC9ja0920xI7oITyrX8VN5Rjb8qmHzHKn3k/mobilebasic
More trip planning stuff here on Tom’s website, Sawback Adventures.
https://sawback.com/blog/ski-touring-trip-planning-forms/?fbclid=IwAR2k1D9_BWPwB4zT22QMyGR60ABUX3PdntE5QJfjR53Cr3DYFRFkNmhRuiQ
Our wise and witty group included: Norman,Christine,Bill,Jim,Gerald,Alda,Phyllis,Leslie,Joanne,Barbara,Evan,Roy,Steve.
A fine searcher, a quick searcher, and a digger
Shelter 2 - WIP - & air guitar
Views to north, towards Rock Glacier (Steve R)
View to south - we saw about 6 different parties skiing the main bowls. (Steve R)
Group think (Steve R)