Kicking Horse, 2/1/08

A partial day here will hopefully be the prelude to my Chatter Creek snowcat skiing for many years to come.

I've been here in 4 different seasons, and today was probably the best of the 4. A few inches new snow over the past couple of days, not quite as much as my first time in 2002. But they didn't have the Blue Heaven chair then, and minimal lower mountain grooming. I'd guess temps were around 10F at the top but probably at least 20F at the bottom.

Due to the lift logistics, we dropped directly into the steep bowl north of the gondola top station to head for the Blue Heaven chair. Then a warmup cruiser they have now groomed most of the way up. Next time up we dropped into Feuz Bowl from the highest point without the hike. Feuz was all very lightly chopped powder, as you have to ski all 4,100 vertical to the base.

Back up the gondola and into the south facing trees dropping from CPR Ridge into Bowl Over. Quite steep, but much softer than the Ptarmigan trees at Louise the day before. After another cruise to the bottom, back up top to one of the CPR north side chutes. This was much like Whitehorn, opening up into some fresh snow once past the steepest section. Using Blue Heaven we did the analogous runs on Redemption Ridge. First the south facing trees, not as steep as CPR but deeper powder, then a north chute into Feuz Bowl and down to the bottom. We left at 1:30 to make it to Golden Airport for the Heli flight into Chatter Creek, where we ski the next 4 days.

Pictures:

So where is this Blue Heaven chair? Is that Stairway to Heaven on the far right of the resort? Or have they added a new chair?

I remember doing laps off of Heaven and dropping into Fuez. As I got better at the bumps (I was a newb) I simply dropped into run off the cat track higher and higher up the face. It was a GREAT way to learn the bumps!

With the chair open the hill is just way more skiiable. When it's closed the ski-out to the bottom is extremely annoying. And in my case it was closed two days out of three. :-(

Maury

Tony Crocker":11m5204i said:

View up the longest fall line in Feuz Bowl, dropping i from the top of Blue heaven.

Click to expand...

Can't you hike for a bit from the top of Blue Heaven and drop in? The high point instead of the ridge?

Yes you can hike up to the north and ski farther skier's left into Feuz Bowl. I'm not sure the fall line is any longer, but it would be untracked most of the time. Kicking Horse has quite a bit of untracked sidecountry accessible within 10-15 minutes. On these abbreviated days before flying to Chatter, I haven't been motivated to do that. There may be situations in the future where I would consider it.

I think the peak is called Blue Heaven and the chairlift to it Stairway to Heaven.