Preamble:
After hiking the popular Silvercup Ridge trail in the Badshot Range in the summer of
2011, our interest was piqued by an area of similar character just to
the northwest. This gentle alpine ridge system starts at Ferguson,
runs northwest to Beaton, and is anchored by Great Northern Mountain
at the southeast end and Mount Thompson at the northwest end. As,
the Badshots are known for poor rock and good skiing, a spring
traverse of this ridge system seemed preferable to a summer trip.
After waiting for what seemed - and was
- weeks for a short period of stable weather and stable snow, we
finally set off on this trip on a Thursday evening, driving north of
Nakusp and over Galena Pass (still snow in the trees) to Armstrong
Lake, a few kilometres south of Beaton.
About 200 metres from the Hwy 31
junction with the Beaton Road, we found Thompson Creek FSR heading
north into the forest. We were only able to drive perhaps 70 metres
up this road before reaching a long, deep snow drift, so we parked
one vehicle here, and continued south down Hwy 31 to the Ferguson
Road which runs up the north bank of the Lardeau River to the
community of Ferguson.
It was dark and cold by the time we
arrived in Ferguson, a small community of, mostly, unfinished cabins,
that was entirely deserted. Cindy put her tent up at the end of the
road, while Doug and I crashed in the back of our truck. The next
morning, the valley was dark and cold until, surprisingly early, the
sun came streaming down the valley and immediately warmed everything
up. Both Doug and I wandered in different directions looking for an
old mining road (Fissure Creek) that climbs from Ferguson to a
ridge-line east of Great Northern Mountain and ends near 1900 metres.
Walking back down the Ferguson Road towards Trout Lake, I found the
road marked by nothing other than the standard "Warning: Road
Deactivated" sign. The road was indistinguishable from the
surrounding terrain.
Doug skiing up the road out of Ferguson
Ferguson to Mountain Goat Creek
We finally got underway about 8.50 am,
and began skiing up Fissure Creek FSR. After perhaps 1.5 km, we came
to a T intersection, where we took the right hand fork and continued
steadily gaining elevation. Travel conditions were incredibly fast
and easy on well frozen snow and within an hour or so we had climbed
enough to have great views up the main Ferguson Creek drainage as
well as out to nearby mountains which relieved the usual tedium of
road skiing.
We soon found ourselves crossing
Broadview Creek and then heading almost due west up Fissure Creek.
At around 1750 metres, the terrain was easy and open enough that we
had no further need of the road so we skinned south up a shallow draw
reaching the ridge-line we would follow for the next two days just
shy of 1900 metres. The next 100 metres featured a short steep climb
and we put ski crampons on to ski up to about 2000 metres where the
angle kicked back.
Perched on the ridge here, overlooking
the Lardeau Range to the south, we stopped for lunch. After lunch,
we continued on to about 2100 metres easily following the ridge. At
this point, we were about half a kilometre from a minor peak to the
east of Great Northern Mountain. We decided to circumvent this peak
on the south side which required losing perhaps 30 metres of
elevation and then skinning up an easy draw that brought us to the
base of Great Northern Mountain. Some slightly steeper terrain that
was still solidly frozen was easier to climb with ski crampons, and
soon enough, we crossed a gentle plateau leading to the 7,508 foot
summit of Great Northern Mountain.
An easy descent on corn snow down the
southwest ridge of Great Northern Mountain led to a 2060 metre high
point just above the head of Mountain Goat Creek. This location
promised both early morning and late evening sun and we decided to
set up camp even though it was only about 3.30 pm.
I built a kitchen in the sun, we spread
out wet boots and skins to dry and cooked up numerous cups of tea and
soup to rehydrate. The sun lasted well into the evening and reached
the tents before 7 am the next morning.
Doug and Cindy on Great Northern Mountain
Mountain Goat Creek to Mount Thompson
Our second day out was spent rambling
over ridge-lines in spring sunshine with tremendous views all around.
Snow conditions remained excellent, just soft enough for easy
skinning, and travel was fast and easy. We bypassed, on the west
side, one bump on the ridge before Mount Thompson, but skinned up the
last bump on the ridge that is directly south of Mount Thompson. A
short easy ski down to a small tarn below Mount Thompson followed by
a descending traverse, took us quickly across to the south ridge of
Mount Thompson.
We left a bunch of extra gear stashed
in garbage bags here and then skinned up the south slopes of Mount
Thompson, ski crampons were handy but not essential. Once up an
initial modestly steep slope, it was easy cruising to the summit.
What looks like a narrow ridge on the map, is, in fact, a broad
gentle snow plateau.
From the summit, we had extraordinary
views all the way to Wheeler Peak near Rogers Pass, up the
Incommapleux River valley, over to the Gold Range, and out to the
Moby Dick area. Although there were many familiar peaks on the
horizon, there were also many that we have not (yet) climbed.
The south face descent, when we finally
pulled ourselves away from the vista, was on some of the best corn
snow I've ever experienced in the Kootenays, and, I was almost
tempted to do it again, had it not been such a hot grunt up in the
sun. After repacking our backpacks, we cruised on corn snow down to
a 2112 metre prominence on the ridge of Mount Thompson and made camp
among some burnt timber.
Cindy skinning up Mount Thompson
Mount Thompson to Armstrong Lake
Previous to this trip, we'd found a big
cutblock and new road on Google Earth that runs up a north facing
ridge on the south side of Thompson Creek to about 1660 metres. The
next morning, after taking a compass bearing off the map to this
location, we followed this bearing down, across a series of
overlapping gullies and soon found ourselves over looking the
cutblock which, although still 400 metres down, appeared deceptively
close.
About an hour after leaving camp, we
cruised out into the cutblock, skied some corn snow down to the road,
and vibrated our way down frozen sun-cups on the road until we
reached 1200 metres where the road turned south, faced into the sun
and was bare of snow. Below us, Beaton on the NW arm of Arrow Lake,
was looking green, fertile and pleasant in the sun, although I can
only think winter must be long and dark.
Skis went on packs and we walked down
the road to about 900 metres where the big fat snow drift that had
stopped us three days before allowed us to ski the final 100 metres
to the truck.
Linking together some shrinking snow patches
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