Kicking Horse/Sunshine Village 02/12-02/18

[MadMadWorld]

From Boston it was about a 6 hr. flight plus a layover in MN. I highly recommend stopping in MN as it seems to be a natural halfway point and really breaks up the flight. We only had one real powder day during the whole trip but at least the weather cooperated. It was about 20 degrees, no wind, and lots of sun. We skied Sunshine and Kicking Horse during the trip. We did get a chance to ski Delirium Dive and Wild West while we were there but after both of our skis got core shots we decided to head to the other side of the mountains. Everything you read about Kicking Horse is 100% true. There are so many things that make this mountain "special". I highly recommend EVERYONE to make a trip out to interior BC/AB! (In both the videos I am the one filming)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4r8K6_htQc

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eB314JQIJ58

 

[emmaurice2]

From Boston it was about a 6 hr. flight plus a layover in MN. I highly recommend stopping in MN as it seems to be a natural halfway point and really breaks up the flight. We only had one real powder day during the whole trip but at least the weather cooperated. It was about 20 degrees, no wind, and lots of sun. We skied Sunshine and Kicking Horse during the trip. We did get a chance to ski Delirium Dive and Wild West while we were there but after both of our skis got core shots we decided to head to the other side of the mountains. Everything you read about Kicking Horse is 100% true. There are so many things that make this mountain "special". I highly recommend EVERYONE to make a trip out to interior BC/AB! (In both the videos I am the one filming)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4r8K6_htQC

www.youtube.com/watch?v=eB314JQIJ58

Nice report!

First vid wouldn't load for me.

The Wild West video did...if I ever make it out there, I know what I won't be skiing! :-o

Did it look like the mountains had good options for varying ability levels?

 

[MadMadWorld]

Nice report!

First vid wouldn't load for me.

The Wild West video did...if I ever make it out there, I know what I won't be skiing! :-o

Did it look like the mountains had good options for varying ability levels?

Sorry the the first link is updated. It's the better of the two by far. You will see why if you watch the video all the way to the end. And yes, Banff has terrain for all ability. There are 3 mountains (Norquay, Sunshine, and Lake Louise) all within a 20 min ride of one another. All 3 offer very different things. Lake Louise is known for its tree skiing, Norquay is a great intermediate mountain, and Sunshine is known for its big mountain skiing. However, with the exception of Wild West and Delirium Dive I found the mountain to be pretty tame. Because of the lack of snowfall we ended up skinning WaWa ridge and found some true champagne powder. Kicking Horse is a whole different animal. Lots of hiking involved but skiers are rewarded with some of the nastiest chutes, cornices, and cliffs you could ever imagine. And once you reach the bottom of the bowl you are welcomed by 1,000 ft of moguls. Needless to say, I have never been so exhausted from 2 days of skiing in my life.

 

[emmaurice2]

Sorry the the first link is updated. It's the better of the two by far. You will see why if you watch the video all the way to the end. And yes, Banff has terrain for all ability. There are 3 mountains (Norquay, Sunshine, and Lake Louise) all within a 20 min ride of one another. All 3 offer very different things. Lake Louise is known for its tree skiing, Norquay is a great intermediate mountain, and Sunshine is known for its big mountain skiing. However, with the exception of Wild West and Delirium Dive I found the mountain to be pretty tame. Because of the lack of snowfall we ended up skinning WaWa ridge and found some true champagne powder. Kicking Horse is a whole different animal. Lots of hiking involved but skiers are rewarded with some of the nastiest chutes, cornices, and cliffs you could ever imagine. And once you reach the bottom of the bowl you are welcomed by 1,000 ft of moguls. Needless to say, I have never been so exhausted from 2 days of skiing in my life.

Thanks for the info and glad you're okay! That was a brutal fall.

 

[MadMadWorld]

Yea it was. The whole thing I could think about during the slide was, what could I possibly hit that will stop this slide and how many bones am I going to break in the process. Luckily, the only injury I sustained was to my ego! It took 20 seconds from the moment I fell until I came to a stop based on the video. My buddy told me I was traveling at least 30mph. I haven't had the time to do the math but I'm guessing I fell pretty far. I was really lucky that I was able to grab hold of a marker instead of many rocky outcroppings or the avalanche debris that was at the bottom of the bowl.

 

[filejw]

Nice...FYI if you are at Kicking Horse I highly recommend driving up the road to Revelstoke. Best of all of them..

 

[MadMadWorld]

Ugh I know. I wanted to but the person I was with didnt want to make the haul from Banff to Revelstoke. Next year I am definitely going to stay in BC so I can be close to Kicking Horse and Revelstoke. Apparently there is a group of angry former sunshine (rightfully so) patrollers and staff that just opened up a cat skiing operation on Fortress Mountain (the one from the movie Inception). Unfortunately, we found out about it last minute and there were no seats left. Looked pretty awesome. If anyone wants their info let me know!

 

[kingslug]

That is some serious shit.I was at both resorts several years ago but didn't try those runs...I think that chute would have bugged me out..big time..

 

[snoseek]

Whoaa! 3:30 in that second vid looked like a leap of terror! Seriously steep stuff. Did your homie make it off that alive?

 

[wawawawawa]

feels great to push the limits...seems like you guys went way past.

 

[MadMadWorld]

Whoaa! 3:30 in that second vid looked like a leap of terror! Seriously steep stuff. Did your homie make it off that alive?

Yea we both almost crapped our pants when the we realized the snowfields we were skiing funneled into that couloir. We skied it a second time and found an easier entrance to the couloir further up the mountain. The only way to get in was to side slip to the edge of the ledge and jump turn 90 degrees so that you landed with your skis across the fall line. I decided to just land on my ass to ensure that I didn't pinball down the chute. I was fully expecting my buddy to lose it on the entrance and slide and take us both out. So instead of waiting and making sure he was okay, I decided it would be best to ski down to a place where I could safely stop and wait for him. He said he pretty much went with the same technique as me. After skiing both WW and DD I can definitely understand why they require a transceiver at the entrance. I wouldn't want to just unexpectedly stumble upon that! Lol

 

[jaja111]

I give ya props for the drop in... indeed, but I have to ask - why did you have both poles in one hand? (Beer in the other? Then you are a GOD!)

 

[MadMadWorld]

feels great to push the limits...seems like you guys went way past.

Yea dude. That's what skiing is all about for me. I live for that feeling in your stomach. The fall that I took at Kicking Horse could have ended really badly but I know that I wasn't skiing outside of my ability. It did however, make me realize that I needed to take a few runs to drills to work on my stem christies and balance!

 

[jaytrem]

I highly recommend EVERYONE to make a trip out to interior BC/AB!

I'll 2nd that!!! Sitting in Kimberley BC right now, 4th year in a row of some form of interior BC trip. That's some fall, glad it only bruised your ego. We did Kicking Horse on Saturday, great powder day. Visibilty wasn't so good though, so had to stick close to the rocks and trees. Hiked out to Super Bowl and everything was white white white. Hit Panorama today, great powder day and easy to get fresh tracks even at 4. Kimberley is looking a lot wetter for tomorrow, it has turned to snow, but the very wet kind.

We flew in from Newark, which Air Canada does direct for any of you NY/NJ area folks. Used Continental miles. For some reason the frequent flier flights change almost everyday. So I booked two one way flights. Don't know if the direct out and back flights that I wanted ever showed up on the same day, it was always one or the other, kinda odd. There were tons of non-direct flights, so the risk of booking them at seperate times was minimal.

 

[MadMadWorld]

I'll 2nd that!!! Sitting in Kimberley BC right now, 4th year in a row of some form of interior BC trip. That's some fall, glad it only bruised your ego. We did Kicking Horse on Saturday, great powder day. Visibilty wasn't so good though, so had to stick close to the rocks and trees. Hiked out to Super Bowl and everything was white white white. Hit Panorama today, great powder day and easy to get fresh tracks even at 4. Kimberley is looking a lot wetter for tomorrow, it has turned to snow, but the very wet kind.

We flew in from Newark, which Air Canada does direct for any of you NY/NJ area folks. Used Continental miles. For some reason the frequent flier flights change almost everyday. So I booked two one way flights. Don't know if the direct out and back flights that I wanted ever showed up on the same day, it was always one or the other, kinda odd. There were tons of non-direct flights, so the risk of booking them at seperate times was minimal.

Freaking jealous. The snow must be awesome. The hike over to T1 or T2 can be a pain but it is worth it. We ended up skiing a couple of the chutes and then just hiking back up from the bottom of Super Bowl. I used frequent flyer miles from Delta. Did you fly into Calgary or Kelowna?

 

[MadMadWorld]

I give ya props for the drop in... indeed, but I have to ask - why did you have both poles in one hand? (Beer in the other? Then you are a GOD!)

I did it mainly because I knew I had to land on my side in order so I wanted to keep my poles in the other hand so I didnt poke myself and also so I had better access to my poles in case I needed to self arrest. But I think I am going to use the beer explaination from here on out.

 

[jaytrem]

I used frequent flyer miles from Delta. Did you fly into Calgary or Kelowna?

Oh, we flew into Calgary, the flight times to Kelowna never seem to good. Glad you got to use miles also, other wise Calgary is kinda expensive, at least from Newark.

The powder at Kicking Horse does make quite a difference. In prior years I've been down a bunch of the chutes when it was packed snow, so much easier and less nerve racking.

Kimberley turned out to be great today. There was about 1.5 feet up top and it wasn't heavy at all. Got fresh tracks again til 4. Only negative was the trees limbs held a lot of the snow so it was actually a lot better on the trails. Fun place, lots of steeps in the back, nothing too crazy though. In Nelson now, so tomorrow is Whitewater. Should be a sunny day on tracked out powder. Probably hit a small local hill, Salmo, in the evening for a few runs.

 

[MadMadWorld]

Oh, we flew into Calgary, the flight times to Kelowna never seem to good. Glad you got to use miles also, other wise Calgary is kinda expensive, at least from Newark.

The powder at Kicking Horse does make quite a difference. In prior years I've been down a bunch of the chutes when it was packed snow, so much easier and less nerve racking.

Kimberley turned out to be great today. There was about 1.5 feet up top and it wasn't heavy at all. Got fresh tracks again til 4. Only negative was the trees limbs held a lot of the snow so it was actually a lot better on the trails. Fun place, lots of steeps in the back, nothing too crazy though. In Nelson now, so tomorrow is Whitewater. Should be a sunny day on tracked out powder. Probably hit a small local hill, Salmo, in the evening for a few runs.

Nice that's quite the trip. How come you didn't ski Revelstoke? I heard the snow at Fernie is awesome! Sounds like you got better snow than we did

 

[jaytrem]

Nice that's quite the trip. How come you didn't ski Revelstoke? I heard the snow at Fernie is awesome! Sounds like you got better snow than we did

We hit Revelstoke a couple years ago, it is indeed awesome. Next time you need to drag your friends over there. Or better yet plan a whole trip around it. Would love to go back, but it didn't fit into the loop this time. From there it's not too far too far from Big White, Silver Star, those two have been great to me. And this year you can ski them free with a Descente jacket and/or Geigerrig backpack (Silver Star is but BOGO with the backpack). Hopefully they'll continue the deals next year. Just in case you want to start thinking about a trip now. FF flights to Kelowna might be better from Boston.

I also heard Fernie has a lot of snow, but they're calling for rain when we get there. I don't think the temps will be low enough to save us this time. Yup, my Western Canada luck has been crazy good, last year we got 9 powder days, 2 regular and 1 rain. Other years we always had a few powder days, but nothing like last year.

Whitewater was real nice today, but a lot more crowded than expected. Apparently the joke is everybody in Nelson grows pot for a living so they have plenty of time to ski. Had a bit of good luck bad luck, the new lift on the backside was down most of the last week, including yesterday and until about 2:30 today. That kept the snow nice, but you had to take a shuttle bus back to the base and also hike at the top. So we didn't get as many runs over there as we would have liked, but the ones we got were real good. We did make it to Salmo afterwards, riding the t-bar was fun, but the trails were a bit slick.

Red tomorrow, heard they don't have as much snow. But it's supposed to be 50 and sunny, so hopefully it will be some good spring skiing.