Peter Lougheed Park-North Trails
Trip date: Saturday Mar 16, 2024
Submitted by Alf Skrastins
Particpants:
3 of us
Discussion:
We opted to follow the most recent grooming for the best chance of having good ski conditions on a very warm, sunny day. Starting from Pocaterra parking lot, we followed the crisp new grooming on Come-Along, Pocaterra and Lynx, then slightly older grooming on Amos, Wheeler and Packers to the new grooming on Pocaterra. We took Lynx again to Amos, Wooley, Meadow, Sinclair and Lodgepole to complete the loop. Skiing was a fast and a bit icy at first, but that settled to a pleasant pace as the snow first started to soften. On the older grooming on Packers, we had our first hint of the dreaded "catch & release" at the sunny patches at the bottom of the terrifyingly steep downhill pitches. It was back to more consistent skiing on Packers and Lynx, thanks to the fresh grooming. As temperatures warmed to near +15C, we found more sticky patches, where the sun had been on the snow for a while. But the shaded areas were still good. The big surprise was that the crazy-steep descent on Lodgepole was lovely, easily edge-able corn snow. It was actually fun for a change.
Fantastic spring skiing conditions! That should all change, when winter returns on Wednesday.