November 7-8, 2014, Purcells, Farnham Glacier

With last weeks rain crust finding its way onto the tops of peaks of all my usual haunts I choose to make my first ski of the year more about exploration then quality. I had never been to Farnham Glacier before but it was the first early season ski location I had learned about when I began touring due to its past life as the Canadian summer ski training facility. This early season touring location certainly exceeded expectations. Large peaks loom in all directions, free cabin, and most importantly a sparsely crevassed glacier.

We got in late on Friday night around 10pm, but with a full moon we choose to walk the 400m of vert to the cabin. The moonlight, clear skies, and lack of wind lured us past the cabin and up onto the glacier for some very special first turns of the season. We ended up packing her in at 2am! We had the glacier to ourselves on Sat till noon when six sleds and 10 people showed up to join in on the farming. We made our exit soon after.

The skiing was surprisingly good with 5cm of snow on top of the rain crust. While the rain crust will soon be feared and scorned, for this trip it acted as an excellent shield against rocks.

There was a little more then a meter of snow at 2700m on the glacier, with around 40cm at the cabin.