Legacy-Minnewanka road ride

The Legacy Trail is brilliant! It was built between the Banff Townsite, and the east park gates as a celebration of Banff National Park's 125th anniversary. It was subsequently connected to the town of Canmore, and makes for a great road ride from Grandview Chalet B&B to Banff, and beyond. The electronic sign above is situated near the Alberta Tourist Information Centre in Canmore, and it counts the number of users going by. On this April Monday, there were 84 users by noon when we went by, and over 220 by the time we came back mid-afternoon. The Legacy Trail has been a big hit, and it's obvious that the trail should be extended to Lake Louise along the Bow Valley Parkway highway.

On this day, we took the turn off near the Banff townsite that takes a nice safe route under the highway into the Cascade Ponds picnic area. From there, we made our way around the Minnewanka circuit. A portion of the circuit (~5 km) was still closed to vehicular traffic (as part of a winter wildlife corridor), but is easily used by bikes and walkers. Although the Minnewanka road is speed restricted (50 kph), it's great not to see any cars at all.

By the way - a couple of the famous Parks Canada red chairs are located in the rest stop along the Legacy Trail, with a  view of the Rundle Range. The chairs have been somewhat controversial for some critics, but having sat in a couple in Gros Morne National Park with a great view on a nice hike, we think they have merit.

The Legacy Trail is supposed to be continued up into the Nordic Centre in Canmore - just not sure when. That will take it very close to Grandview.

April MTB conditions Canmore

Assessing the damage - photo by Paul G

Back in Canmore, recent snows had come and gone - we went for a mtn bike ride on Reclaimer, and into the Nordic Centre. Reclaimer requires a ride up the Spray Lakes Road, but at the moment that road is fairly quiet and not too dusty. Reclaimer is a downhill descent, and tons of fun! It was totally dry - but it is a fairly steep trip. After that we went into the Nordic Centre to do Soft Yogurt, which is a short but very fun rip - ending on Devonian Drop, which is a very short steep pitch. All good so far. On EKG, which is a favorite, there were sections of muddier track - especially near where the ski tracks were melting away. That said - not bad! We took Coal Chutes (black) down, and it was fine. But Georgetown is still very muddy.

Above picture is moments after a crash that John took. Clipped a pedal on a log that immediately flipped him over for a chin landing. Aside from some scrapes and bruises, he got lucky landing in mostly soft dirt mixed with roots. A reminder that mtn biking has it's moments! Generally not as soft to crash in as a meter of snow.

Whistler-Blackcomb

You can never be sure! The forecast for Whistler-Blackcomb sounded terrible: rain/showers, and 14C. But we had the trip planned out - meeting some friends from North Van and the Island. I drove out with several pairs of skis, and three mountain bikes, while my Canmore friends flew. The first thing you get over is the upload into the snow zone. Magically, the drizzle turned to snow at the top of the Wizard Chair (Blackcomb) on Friday April 10. The underlying base was absolutely solid (rains and warm weather), but it quickly got pretty nice with the storm, and there were very few skiers.

That changed Saturday as the skiers/boarders crawled out of the woodwork. We were back at the Wizard Chair at 8:15 - by the time we got to the Glacier Chair, which was not running, there was a fair lineup. We waited about 30 minutes, and were rewarded with what you see in the above picture. Reasonable visibility, and lots of new snow! The lineup for Spankys was already forming at the top! We ripped a few on Glacier, and then one down Blackcomb Glacier (Left-Left was very sketchy due to the underlying bulletproof base). Spent the afternoon on Seventh Heaven, which was very pleasant.

Next morning, we mountain biked the Frank Zappa-named singletracks around Lost Lake - what a great job they did building those! By the afternoon, we were skiing Whistler until the lifts closed. Harmony Bowl was great!

By Monday, there were only two of us left to have another storm day. We managed to ski Harmony and Peak chairs a couple of times, but the visibility was terrible. We retreated to the Red Chair for the remainder of the day, and it got better as the day went on.

Tuesday: had to stay another day! 10 cm overnight, and the Peak Chair runs were remarkable! Such a spectacle to watch the young bucks throwing themselves off the cliffs for the amusement of the line-up! To boot, it was the only bluebird day of the trip, and it does not get better than that.

All-in-all a great trip to the coast!