We skied the Bow-Yoho April 27-30. We stayed at Bow Hut, Guy Hut and Stanley Mitchell Hut.

We were the only group on the Bow-Yoho traverse on those dates, with no other groups at the Guy and Stanley Mitchell Huts.

Travel conditions were excellent above 2100m. No avalanche activity observed.

We had mixed weather, with some periods of poor visibility, but generally easy navigation. There were only a few cm’s of new snow during our trip. We ascended the Collie icefall on the climber’s right, but not right under Mt. Collie. We only had to work carefully for a 50m section between a couple of large crevasses, probing between 75cm to 1.5m to solid ice. We were roped up whenever we were on a glacier.

We mostly probed 1.75m to 2.75m of snow coverage on the glaciers.

Bow Lake was still frozen and Bow Canyon was in great shape.

We used ski crampons across the narrow ridge to the Guy Hut in reduced visibility and also kept the rope on for the narrowest section. We also wore ski crampons while ascending the final couple hundred vertical metres to Isolated Col due to low density snow on a crust. This allowed for easy and secure skinning to the col.

The south side of Isolated Col offered buttery skiing on a firm crust until a couple hundred metres above the Stanley Mitchell Hut. The final treed slope to the Stanley Mitchell Hut was a bit punchy and required slow skiing and caution.

We chose to exit via the summer trail and Takkaka Falls road rather than the Iceline. The snowpack below 2000m had become quite weak and unsupportive. The summer trail to the Takkaka Falls parking lot was skier tracked and offered an easy ski out.

When we were down on the Takkaka Falls road by the hostel we confirmed that skiing down off the Iceline would have been difficult, due to a warm, weak and thin snowpack below treeline.

Parks Canada had plowed the Takkaka Falls road to just above the switchbacks as of April 30th. We were aware of this and brought trail runners for the final walk out on dry pavement.

Jordy Shepherd
ACMG / IFMGA Mountain Guide
www.PeakAlpine.com
Co-host of the Delivering Adventure Podcast www.DeliveringAdventure.com

Landon Shepherd
ACMG Ski Guide