Garibaldi Lake: Maya’s First Overnight Backcountry Skiing trip
Last weekend we did a two day backcountry skiing trip to Garibaldi Lake. It had been foggy for a few days in Vancouver with a forecast for continued fog. Just a bit higher than the city it was sunny with
blue skies, which is what we had for the two days. When the temperature gets higher as you go up, it is called an inversion. Apparently on that weekend it was 6c in the city, and 18c on Mt.Seymour (a ski hill on the North Shore), at least 1000m higher! The road to the parking lot had not been plowed, so we parked on the side of the road and skied 2km to the parking lot. On the first day we skied up the trail, mostly through the forest, until we arrived at the Taylor Meadows campground, of course completely covered by snow.
We pitched our tent in a spot with a great view of the Black Tusk. The forecast said minimum 5c in the alpine, but it was more like -10c at night, as our water bottles froze inside the tent. The next day in the morning we woke up a bit late and then had some trouble with the stove. By the time we were packed and ready to go, it was already 11am. Another 2km and we were at Garibaldi Lake – a huge alpine lake,
more or less frozen at this time. It is surrounded by peaks, and having our lunch on the frozen lake with all these great views was a wonderful experience. Then we headed back down the trail, which was long and narrow, through the trees, and Maya find it difficult to ski down. For the last 3km I carried her skis, and by this time it was already dark. The last 2km back to our car had frozen hard by this time, and it was a very bumpy ski back down.
