I went five days without skiing this trail! Goat creek and Spray river west were simply spectacular today. The 2-3 cm of cold snow we received in the past 24 hours has improved conditions.
It’s 900 metres to the Banff boundary, at which point the tracksetting begins. Don’t see the tracks? They were demolished by the multi-users soon after tracksetting.
The new snow has smoothed out the tread on the first 4k which is well-used and abused by all the “multi-users.” I don’t even fantasize that the trail will have any semblance of tracksetting for the first 4K, but it was quite skiable in any event.
Might as well skate. There aren’t any tracks to destroy, and it might smooth out the ridge.
On Christmas eve I like to take Tessa for a ski, and she was with me until we reached the Banff boundary. Dogs aren’t allowed on the trail once you reach the boundary. She returned with Cheryl to the trailhead, at which time they fought the traffic in hopes of getting to the Spray river west trailhead before I did.
Easy downhill to Goat creek bridge
At 2 pm the air temperature was -12°C and the snow was -10. VR40(-4/-12) did the trick and I enjoyed another entire ski trip without so much as one herringbone.
Can you spot the two elk beside Spray river west trail?
Around 4k the tracks start to reappear. A few people had skied ahead of me, so I had nice silky smooth tracks for the remainder of the way. The initial kilometre or two from Spray west trailhead was even in nice shape(relatively speaking). Check the photos and you’ll see the reason why Spray west near the trailhead gets so beat up.
The fresh snow made the descents to the two main bridges ultra-easy. There should still be a little snow left over for Christmas day skiers! I see we might even get another skiff overnight.
