Nigel Pass has always been on the tour schedule as far as I can remember; and since the older tour leaders had not offered to lead, it I did. Jeff kindly offered to assist and so we had a trip. The Ramparts Hostel has a new- to- us- hostel parent, nice guy from the east.

We all decided that because it was one week before Xmas and we had all been over-busy through December, sleep was a priority and so gave ourselves permission to sleep in till 8. Since no one set an alarm we rose at 8:30 and hit the trail by about 10:00.

Fat skis -thin skis was the hot topic. I have seen AT gear to track skis on this trip with equal success. In the end, only Kelly opted for heavy skis so she worked harder than the rest of us(which means too that she makes more room for dinner) There was fresh snow on and we took turns breaking trail. Jeff can be relied on to find the turnoff thanks to his trusty GPS skills.
The temperatures were mild and we all skinned up on the hills. Progress was slow and steady. Due to skins, wet snow and lots more snow coming, the group decided we would not reach the pass and so turned back about 3 kms shy of our objective.

Somebody, who will remain nameless, brought a big bag of booze and made us all drink our share. We toddled off to bed and the snow kept falling through to the morning.
We skied Glacier Lake the second day, out before the snowplow. Again we broke trail. With warm temperatures the fresh snow turned to ice on impact making traction tricky for those skinny skis. We made our way home in full daylight, stopping in Rocky for chili and cocoa.

Sandy