[MCR] Lake Louise ski area backcountry

Skied north of the Lake Louise ski area today, up Richardson's Ridge down Hidden Bowl and out via the Corral Creek slidepath.

Beautiful day with the inversion keeping it nice and warm up high - no wind. South and west facing slopes were suncrust and would be poor skiing, but I was surprised to find good powder skiing on north and east facing terrain above treeline.  The north facing terrain had about 100 cm of total snowdepth at 2500 m.  Profile in an open alpine bowl gave moderate shears down about 40cm but no failures on the ground with less depth hoar than normal. The good skiing resulted from soft facets on the surface of the snowpack, topped off with a growing layer of surface hoar - weaving a careful line between the wind hammered areas!

Great day where I was and nice to be done by 1pm. Good message from Marc Ledwidge for ice climbers to watch out for south/west facing gullies and big slopes overhead.  I saw plenty of loose snow avalanches running in the sun and near rocks today. Stay in the shade!

Grant Statham

Mountain Guide

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