Update Sat Jan 9: Trails at Ribbon Creek were groomed and trackset on Friday night. See comment below from RK.
Saturday will be a terrific day to go skiing in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta
Ribbon Creek: the snow is still cold and the tracks are in great condition. Jan 8, 2010
Conditions should be fabulous for our ski club trip
The warm weather did not move in the way it was supposed to. The snow temperature at Ribbon Creek was -10 and the air temp at 5 pm was -8. That means the snow has not deteriorated at all, and the conditions are great. It’s a guessing game as far as the weather for tomorrow, but depending which forecast you believe, it could be anywhere from -4 to +3. Not warm enough to cause any concern.
Frozen Troll Falls in K-Country. Jan 8, 2010
I hope everyone on our trip will get to see the spectacular frozen Troll Falls. It’s about a 2K ski from the Ribbon Creek parking lot, and the trail’s in decent condition.
Bill Who?
The Evan-Thomas trail is now known as the Bill Milne trail and it’s also trackset the entire 8K from Ribbon Creek to Wedge Pond. Super easy as it’s mostly flat and in the open so you get some wonderful scenery.
Bill Milne trail near the Ribbon Creek trailhead. Jan 8, 2010
The tracksetting is about a week old, with a few cm of new snow over top but still in very good shape. More photos
It’s an embarrassment of riches right now when it comes to ski trails. PLPP trail report shows everything in great shape with lots of recent tracksetting. Cascade Fire road has been trackset again. I’m not sure if the warm weather has hit west Bragg Creek, but it sounded like it was in good condition yesterday. Does anyone drive all the way to Lake Louise anymore? I imagine it’s better than excellent around there.
Norseman Ski Club skied most trails in the Lake Louise area Jan 08-10. Excellent conditions on all trails after fresh snow earlier in the week. Temperature Jan 10 at about -8 up at Fairview/Telemark Loops area. Lots of happy skiers.
Since you asked the question, Bob, I happened to have had the chance to ski some trails in Lake Louise Jan 4-6. Upper and lower Telemark were both in great shape with about 20cm of new snow. The groomer happened to go by and groom/trackset while I was on the trail. Fairview Loop was in excellent condition. The Baker Creek Powerline trail was also in good condition although slow on the day I skied it (-25 degrees C) and hadn’t been groomed in several days. The Pipestone trails were also in very good condition with fresh snow on top of recent grooming. Trail #1 from the parking lot was not in great shape until the turnoff to #5 due to snow shoe tracks and what looked like recent snowmobile tracks (not the grooming kind). I know this info is a few days old, but hopefully useful.
I skied at Ribbon Creek on Friday night, and they were in the process of re-grooming a bunch of the trails. Conditions were superb, and the new grooming looks fantastic. Enjoy.
Excellent! As we skied on Ribbon Creek late yesterday afternoon, I could see the gate was open and I commented to Cheryl that it might be because the groomer was coming later. -Bob
Bill Who?
Bill Milne was a Calgary based architect who was the main force behind establishing Kananaskis Provincial Park. His vision was a euro style series of huts connected by a trail system rather than highways, RV parks, car camping and a golf course. What could have been…
I believe Don Getty’s very first official act as Premier was to change the name from Kananaskis to Peter Lougheed PP.
I was curious, so thanks for that info. I like his vision for the park as you described it. -Bob