Mini road trip along the Powder Highway - opinions wanted

[danmorgan]

Hi all, I'm looking at a 10 day Canadian trip in late Jan (23rd Jan - 2nd Feb) and am thinking about the following itinerary:

23rd Jan - Fly from London to Kelowna via Calgary, drive to Silver Star
24th Jan - Ski SS
25th Jan - Drive to Revelstoke, have an afternoon's skiing
26th-28th Jan - Ski Revelstoke
29th Jan - Drive to Kicking Horse, have an afternoon's skiing
30th Jan-1st Feb - Ski Kicking Horse
2nd Feb - Drive to Calgary, fly home to London

The logic behind the planning is that SS is only a short drive from Kelowna and a day there will let us shake the rust off from last season before hitting Revelstoke and Kicking Horse. We're both boarders (apologies!) I'm high intermediate and my wife is intermediate (but a bit nervous!). We'll stay on mountain in SS and KH, but will stay in Revelstoke town, since although we don't want wild nights out we do like a choice of dining options and a few beers.

What do you think of this itinerary? All comments welcomed

Thanks in advance

 

[Tony Crocker]

I would be doing the driving in the afternoons to be positioned each morning at the resort you're going to ski. I would also start with 2 days in Kelowna to ski both Big White and Silver Star.

 

[danmorgan]

Thanks for the response Tony, my logic was to drive in the morning so that I can use the afternoon half day tickets at each place to save an (admittedly paltry) bit of cash, and also so that I'm driving in the morning rather than dusk. That being said I can definitely see the benefit of driving at night in terms of maximising the skiing time.

I do like the idea of Big White, but unless I can persuade my wife to do 2 weeks, I think getting 4 resorts into the 10 days could be a bit tricky :-(

Thanks again

 

[longshanks]

Wow, another Londoner on FTOL...Cool. Your plan looks solid enough man. I have done the London to Calgary or London to Kelowna and back again many times although I have never been to SS or BW. I took my sons out over Christmas 09/New Years 10 for a 10 Day trip where we rode every day (we did the driving mostly at night). The pace damn near killed the lads by about Day 8, whereas I got stronger as we went. Here is my post on the trip from back then complete with commentary from Tony Crocker...
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=8445&p=50260#p50260

I prefer Calgary over Kelowna as a gate-way into the Interior largely due to the ski-the-same-day-as-you-arrive options that Calgary affords...Sunshine, Lake Louise, KH, Castle, or even Fernie. Trips usually include any or all of these destinations along with the Red Mountain and Whitewater. Red Mountain has arguably the best terrain (and the very best tree skiing on the planet!) even if they don't get as much snow as some others. The Town of Rossland is also very cool and I'm told that Nelson is as well although since my 1st trip West back in 98 I have yet to get there...

BTW, Boarders Rock! and most of the Two Planker Wankers that frequent this site secretly wish they were Boarders eh?

 

[Tony Crocker]

driving at night

I do not advocate a lot of night driving in interior BC. But for what you're doing it's only 1.5 to 2 hours after skiing, so you'll arrive where you're going 6-7PM. Half day lift tickets are 3/4 full day price nearly everywhere: virtually never makes sense in terms of value IMHO. If you need a break in a multi-day trip, better to just take a day off.

 

[danmorgan]

@longshanks - my thinking was to drive in 1 direction (i.e. from Kelowna back to Calgary) rather than doing a loop, and given the time that our flight arrives there's no real likelihood of any skiing on the first day anyway. Great trip report as well, cheers!

@Tony - Totally agreed on the lack of vfm offered by half-day tickets, the only other consideration is around getting late checkouts etc. from the accommodation. Following your suggestion I must admit that I'm still mulling over the idea of driving at night though...

 

[socal]

I did a trip up to BC last winter, flew into Spokane, drove to Nelson, skied Whitewater and cat skied, went to Schweitzer, then back to Spokane. Main takeaway from the trip, besides the great skiing was how slow the driving is up there. Granted when I was there it snowed almost nonstop but the driving was SOOO slow. Maybe I'm just a cautious driver but i never felt all that safe doing much more than 30-40 mph on the snow covered roads. Not getting fooled by distances is something to consider.

Heading out of nelson:

Here's what the drive over Kootnay pass looked like:

Night driving:

 

[Marc_C]

Not getting fooled by distances is something to consider.

But all their distances are in kilometers. They're like miniature miles! :-D

 

[socal]

Not getting fooled by distances is something to consider.

But all their distances are in kilometers. They're like miniature miles! :-D

Haha. Unfortunately the speedometer also is in kilometers so it kinda works itself out....

 

[Marc_C]

Not getting fooled by distances is something to consider.

But all their distances are in kilometers. They're like miniature miles! :-D

Haha. Unfortunately the speedometer also is in kilometers so it kinda works itself out....

Well yeah, there's that. Last time I was in BC (this past September) I drove from SLC, so I was constantly doing the mental conversion from my non-metric speedometer (yes, the occasional metric tick marks help but.....).

 

[longshanks]

BTW the World is Metric...only the USA, Burma, and North Korea abstain

 

[Powderqueen]

If you are more intermediate skiers/riders, I would just make your trip less stressful and stay in the Okanagan. Skip KHMR. It's a really great mountain, big and steep. If you aren't going to ski the steeps there, you can reduce your driving by skiing at Big White, Sun Peaks, Silver Star.

I've not been to Revelstoke, so I cannot comment on the terrain there, though I'm sure there will be plenty there for all to ski/ride.

Big White got a ton of snow and it's really a friendly place for all abilities. I thought Sun Peaks was as well.

You can get great deals on a mini Okanagan road trip ski tour.

 

[flyover]

I did a trip up to BC last winter, flew into Spokane, drove to Nelson, skied Whitewater and cat skied, went to Schweitzer, then back to Spokane.

I take a ski trip every year with a friend from Seattle. This year we're thinking about a very similar short trip out of Spokane.

Main takeaway from the trip, besides the great skiing was how slow the driving is up there. Granted when I was there it snowed almost nonstop but the driving was SOOO slow. Maybe I'm just a cautious driver but i never felt all that safe doing much more than 30-40 mph on the snow covered roads. Not getting fooled by distances is something to consider.

Here's an itinerary I'm considering suggesting to him:

Day one: He drives from Seattle to Spokane, I fly from Minneapolis to Spokane, together we drive most or all of the way to Rossland, BC.
Day two: We ski Red and Drive to Nelson.
Day three: We ski Whitewater or cat ski.
Day four: We ski Whitewater or cat ski and drive most of the way to Schweitzer.
Day five: We ski Schweitzer and I catch an evening flight home, while he drives back to Seattle.

Is this:
(a) A piece of cake?
(b) Doable, but tiring?
(c) Insane and only to be attempted by those under 30 with a the ability to stomach massive quantities of caffeinated beverages?

If the answer is (c), I'm way open to suggestions for a reasonable itinerary from Spokane that isn't longer than five days.

 

[socal]

I did a trip up to BC last winter, flew into Spokane, drove to Nelson, skied Whitewater and cat skied, went to Schweitzer, then back to Spokane.

I take a ski trip every year with a friend from Seattle. This year we're thinking about a very similar short trip out of Spokane.

Main takeaway from the trip, besides the great skiing was how slow the driving is up there. Granted when I was there it snowed almost nonstop but the driving was SOOO slow. Maybe I'm just a cautious driver but i never felt all that safe doing much more than 30-40 mph on the snow covered roads. Not getting fooled by distances is something to consider.

Here's an itinerary I'm considering suggesting to him:

Day one: He drives from Seattle to Spokane, I fly from Minneapolis to Spokane, together we drive most or all of the way to Rossland, BC.
Day two: We ski Red and Drive to Nelson.
Day three: We ski Whitewater or cat ski.
Day four: We ski Whitewater or cat ski and drive most of the way to Schweitzer.
Day five: We ski Schweitzer and I catch an evening flight home, while he drives back to Seattle.

Is this:
(a) A piece of cake?
(b) Doable, but tiring?
(c) Insane and only to be attempted by those under 30 with a the ability to stomach massive quantities of caffeinated beverages?

If the answer is (c), I'm way open to suggestions for a reasonable itinerary from Spokane that isn't longer than five days.

The answer from my trip was b. I did just about the same trip except I went from Spokane to Nelson directly. Let's just assume the somewhat best (or worse case depending on how you want to look at it) case that you go during a good time when it's snowing close to every day. In the snow the ride to Rossland is probably something like 3-4+ hrs. I found the roads on the USA side of the boarder out of Spokane to be really bad (windy, dark, and unplowed) but doable if you drive cautiously. Not sure about the ride from Rossland to Nelson but just double whatever amount of time you think.

I did a day cat skiing at Valhalla and it was great, there was another company called Wild Horse that I didn't go to but was in the area http://www.skiwildhorse.com.

From what I recall there's really not much between Nelson and Sand Point (near Schweitzer). The ride was brutal in a storm and took over 5 hours. I skied until about 1pm at Whitewater then drove over, it was a pretty brutal day but a lot was due to the whiteout conditions but that ride up and over Kootnay pass was tough. Once you get back into the USA it was a straight flat road but in the dark with blowing snow was still slow going. The ride from Sand Point to Spokane was an easy 1-1.5 hr drive and about 1/2 or so was on an interstate.

I think your agenda sounds fine and I'd do it again in a minute.

 

[flyover]

socal,

Thanks for the quick and informative response.

 

[kingslug]

Panorama is a good place as well, especially for intermediates. If the road to KH is snowed in it's a good alternative.

 

[jkamien]

I'm not sure whether this point of view has been stated already, so if I'm repeating something, my apologies.

I've done tripswhere I skied a lot of different areas. When I was a kid, skiing every New England ski area I could was my raison d'être. But, I'm now older and wiser and have realized that getting to know an area takes several days, especially when the places are big. So, I would counsel choosing 1 place that appeals to you and just go there. By day 2 or 3 you'll begin to know your way around a little bit, and can start finding the places on that mountain that you really like to ski. Otherwise, I don't think you stand much of a chance of really getting the most out of any ski area. You'll waste a lot of time just figuring out the lift system and how to avoid being in places you don't want to be in.

 

[Tony Crocker]

I agree b) is the correct answer. It helps that there is more than one driver, especially if weather lengthens the road time. I did a very similar itinerary in 6 days (2 each at Red, Retallack snowcat and Schweitzer) with Adam in 2000, unfortunately for me the year before he could drive.

 

[danmorgan]

Hi all, we've just booked the trip, flying to Kelowna via Calgary, then driving to Silver Star, spending 1 day riding at Silver Star, then heading to Revelstoke for 4 nights, then Kicking Horse for 4 nights. I've got my fingers crossed for the conditions, thanks to everyone for their feedback \/

 

[Tony Crocker]

That's an easy itinerary in terms of driving. 4 days each at Revy and KH is ambitious in terms of skiing, fine for advanced skiers but intermediates may wear out fast. With your timing and the strong early season start you should have no worries in terms of snow.