Taking advantage of the weather, we headed east to Manning Park - 220Km of drive. Luckily the drive was easy with 2x car. There was only one 1Km of not plowed road that led to our parking lot, which I think it could have been avoided if we parked higher up on the main road and hiked down perhaps 50m of elevation.
Our approach was to take the shortest distance as possible to the peak. We cut through Lightening lake and bushwacked through and coming cross the long switch backs of the Summer trail at one or two points. The slope is steep for first 100m of elevation.
Snow conditions were good. It was soft above 1700m and hard pack below 1400m and something in between in the range 1400m - 1700m.
We turned back off our destination for a combination of reasons: being late, the snow was getting too soft, and out of shape for myself (which I tried to hide). I think it could have been possible if we were there earlier. I saw 2-3 new ski tracks coming down from Frosty Peak.
On the way down, we partially followed the long switch back of the summer trail as it was dark and hard to bushwack our way down. The summer trail was well packed but slippery.
The whole trip took almost 10 hours but happy ones.
Feb 21, 2010
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