Boulder Hut

I have just spent a week in the most beautiful part of BC near Kimberley in a remote hut doing some telemark skiing in the back country. Ten of us had blue skies for 7 days and skied the most amazing terrain above 2000m. Each day was route finding, digging pits and exploring some great slopes in the Purcell Mountians, carefully watching south aspects where the sun was causing natural class 1 and 2 avalanches. A meter of snow had fallen the week before and with warming temperatures was settling. We avoided south aspects and wind loaded slopes doing some great turns in sometimes crusty, and some soft powder! What a week, ate well, played games, got lots of fresh air and exercise. Awesome!

some photos to show off... 

No Birkie

Bummer - weather has caused officials to cancel the Canadian Birkenbeiner. After 2 months of training I was really ready. They are predicting -25C with windchills in the -30 plus range. Not good for skiers, nor the 600 volunteers that would have to stand out there for 8 hours in the cold. Oh well, next year. I am off next week to Boulder Hut near Kimberley with 9 friends for a week of back country skiing. Avalanche conditions have been sketchy in the Rockies, but hope for some stability on the BC side. More later.

Birkebeiner coming!

Well, the days of winter are all around, lots of snow, and been very cold all this week. We had a blizzard last Sunday and temperatures dropped significantly to lows Monday and Tuesday of

-34C / highs of -27C, the coldest since 2004. A week later it has only warmed to highs of -22C.

The Canadian Birkebeiner is Saturday, Feb 9 and I am getting excited. The weather should improve by then, current predictions are for snow and highs of -9C. Much better. Will be training a few more days, then rest before the big event. More later.

C0-leading a workshop on Feb 3 for Partner Yoga at the Yogaden. Should be fun.

Neil