I'm finished skiing for the year! I had my last day today, at Silver Star Mountain Resort, outside of Vernon, B.C.. It snowed, but visibility was mostly very good. Still, the layer of powder on top of the snow was not thick enough to fully hide the icy patches underneath. Silver Star is of moderate size, bigger than Kicking Horse or Whitewater but smaller than Lake Louise or Fernie. Its runs had a good variety of difficulties, but many of them were accessible only through long catwalks from the lifts, so the run times themselves were not terribly impressive. Still, it made a nice way to end the tour.

Favorite mountains: Lake Louise, Whitewater, Fernie, in that order. Whitewater had the best snow, Lake Louise had the best terrain, and Fernie had the potential to best both of them, but I was unlucky with the weather during my visit their. Most disappointing: Kicking Horse, highly hyped but not worth the trip until they add a couple more chairs and a whole bunch of gondola cars. Biggest waste of time: Banff @ Norquay. Stick to Sunshine Valley and Lake Louise instead.

Tomorrow I'm driving to Vancouver, to stay overnight with the Fords, which will be great. Looking forward to meeting Carolyn!

More baby news: congratulations to Kathy Plamondon on her second, a boy, Lórien, born Saturday Feb. 23!
posted by Tom at 2:51 AM | link |