Torpy Turns

Winter just doesn’t seem to want to stick around this year. The snow keeps melting, the mercury rises and I find myself wearing runners and a short sleeved t-shirt going for a walk. On Sunday we decided to go and see if we could find somewhere with enough snow for backcountry skiing. As we left town the rain turned to sleet. The Pass Lake road, unploughed and thus usually impassable at this time of year had a well worn track through the slush. By the time we got to the Torpy trail head we had passed two trucks full of sledders and met up with a couple of friends, also on skis.

The bottom of the trail had big rocks, tree roots and open holes in the still running stream. We put our skis on anyway and started climbing. By the time we got into the meadow the slush had turned into a soft fluffy cloud, about 50 cm bonded to a recent raincrust. I began to get excited.

We climbed the ridge, pulled the skins off our skis, locked in our bindings and went down. The slope was very steep, which I like. We were all smiling. We did another run on that slope then descended into the valley for a longer run down a gentler slope, dodging trees and the inevitable sinkholes into the stream as we hit bottom. we ate lunch and went up and down a couple more times before hiking back down to the truck. I hate these short days. We carried our skis on the bottom bit because of the rocks and holes.

Since highways have stopped ploughing all the backroads, the whole time I've been living here, I haven’t had a chance to ski Torpy, only hike it. It’s too bad since it is a really nice place to ski. This picture was taken over the top at Powder King several years ago. Looking at it makes me excited for real winter skiing.