Rossland and West Kootenay Ski Trip Off-Trail skiing on 27-Dec-2018

NOTE: This was a dual-coordinator trip with both Christine Grotefeld and Chip Scialfa organizing.

This was the fifth annual Ramblers' trip to the Kootenay Boundary region of B.C. in search of first tracks in cold smoke. Although we were not blessed with the sunshine that has sometimes graced our party in the past, we had great success in finding slopes with good to very good snow. The unofficial data for the 6 days was about 4000 m gain and 72 km covered, though about one-half of the group took a day off to track-ski and so didn't climb quite so high. Here's the schedule:

Day 1 - Cutblock Peak via Plewman Trail (Rossland Range)

Day 2 - Lepsoe Basin via Summit Trail (Rossland Range)

Day 3 - Elgood Basin via Murray Creek (Rossland Range)

Day 4 - South Baldy Rocks, Lightning Strike Ridge and North Baldy Rocks (Kootenay Pass) or Champion Lake Provincial Park (20 min west of Salmo) for XC.

Day 5 - South Baldy Rocks, Lightning Strike Ridge (Kootenay Pass) with a bit of a detour courtesy of Chip.

Day 6 - South Baldy Rocks (Kootenay Pass)

The new cabin at Lightning Strike Ridge (ca 2016) is quite nice. We also found Igloo Hut on the way to Elgood Basin. It is being rebuilt.

Rossland-Salmo - Baldy Rocks and Detour

Rossland-Salmo - On the Plewman Trail

Rossland-Salmo - Why We Do This

Rossland-Salmo - Skiing the Crust at Champion Lakes

Rossland-Salmo - Lightning Strike Lunch

Participants: Christine,Kim,Inge,John,David,David,Cathy,Diane, Barbara, Chip