We traversed the Wapta from April 4-7, from Bow Lake to Sherbrooke Lake. Conditions were excellent April 4-6, with fast travel, cool weather, cloudless sky, and not very many people on the same schedule as us. We had Balfour Hut to ourselves on April 5, and there was only an additional party of 2 at Scott Duncan Hut on April 6. That party of 2 had a long day skiing up the Schiesser-Lomas route to the Scott Duncan Hut, traversing the Wapta from south to north.

With -18C at 7:00am at Bow Lake on April 4th, and reports of a previous extensive avalanche cycle in Bow Canyon, we felt comfortable approaching up the canyon. There were no signs of instability noted on our approach to Bow Hut.

We took the route to the Balfour High Col, under the nunatak, on April 6th, as marked on the Klassen/Neault/Scott map, which kept us away from the Mt Balfour serac hazard, and avoided the crevasses on the upper bench. There had been no recent serac-fall activity off of Mt Balfour. With the warming the afternoon of April 6th, there may have been some serac activity after we descended the Daly Glacier to Scott Duncan Hut.

We probed 280cm at 2600m on the Bow Glacier above Bow Hut, and probed over 300cm on the Daly Glacier at 2800m.

There had been an extensive avalanche cycle prior to our trip. We didn’t see any new avalanche activity until the afternoon of April 6th when alpine temperatures rose and there was high solar effect. We noted numerous avalanches from April 6th to size 3, wet loose and wet slab, as we skied out Niles Creek today, April 7th.

Cloudy and warm weather today (April 7th) gave us firm crust and flat light down to about 2000m. Below 2000m the surface was moist but still supportive. The Sherbrooke Lake summer trail is fast and has some fallen tree and bare patch hazards, but was still quite skiable.

Jordy Shepherd, Mountain Guide www.PeakAlpine.com

Landon Shepherd, Ski Guide