Skiing in April
Skiing in April? Is that a thing?
Yes! One of the season highlights is the Spring Fling snow camp in May.
The 2022 event featured fresh snow and blue hard wax on the classic day. The 2023 event had the same perfect conditions.
Here are some images from April and May 2021, which was a low-snow spring. In a 'typical' season, there would be a lot more snow and 2020 had another 2 metres of base.
April 1, 2021: High and Low in 3 photos
On April 1st, 2021, we had hard wax skiing on top in the morning and shorts+t-shirt afternoon running down in the valley.
This is spring in the North Okanagan.
White Elephant Trail
One of the lowest elevation trails used in the event. Prefer classic? Rode BV15 hardwax was magic.
Lake Views from Aberdeen Trail
Kalamalka Lake is on the left, Okanagan Lake on the right. Neither freezes, allowing paddling all year.
Kalamalka Lake
It is shorts weather on the running and biking trails at the valley bottom, with Kalamalka Lake in the background.
April is believable. How about May skiing?
May camp week has been a popular way to kick off the new training year for a long time. Both areas close in April because the skiers are busy paddling and biking, not because of a lack of snow.
FasterSkier.com covered the first Enduro event on May 13th, 2018. See the full coverage.
The corduroy photo below is May 14, 2022.
SilverStar also does mountain biking in a big way, but the first challenge each summer is to clear the trails of snow. Check out the video from June 2017.