[MCR] Rockies, Crowfoot Pass

Guided a ski tour to Crowfoot Pass today, March 31. We parked on the highway and went direct into the drainage to the northwest of Bow Peak. About 30 cms of new snow. Good travel to treeline. At treeline we got two large whumpfs and settlements on low angle ground. I could see no safe way to gain the pass via the large open slopes and bowls next to Bow Peak so we decided to shoosh back into the trees. There is a size 1.5 slab avalanche out at treeline on the NW ridge of Bow Peak. I assume that it was a slab that went during the March 28/29th storm. I could see another slab out higher up that looked to be the same deal -March 28,29. While climbing back up to do some yo-yoing I spotted a small morraine 500 meters to the NW. We traversed along a bench at treeline to it, and were able to gain the large bench that leads to Crowfoot Pass by it, with 10 meters of boot pack facette wallowing (hip deep coarse sugar snow). We toured to Crowfoot Pass and retraced our tracks down with some fine boot top powder skiing along the way. Numerous storm slabs size 1-2 out on the big rock wall NE of Crowfoot Glacier.

Happy trails,

Barry Blanchard

Mountain Guide

www.barryblanchard.ca