On December 1, 2024 we drove into Kootenay National Park, hoping to ski the lower slopes of Vermillion Peak. Unfortunately, there was not enough snow to ski there. We decided to drive back into Alberta and look for somewhere else to ski.
There are often lots cars parked at the trailhead for Boom Lake and we decided to stop and check it out. We didn’t have any information about the trail or potential slopes to ski out there. A party of three skiers were already in the parking lot, getting ready to head out. We confirmed that one of them had skied there before and we decided to follow their uptrack.
Our route is the dark blue line on the map below, recorded using GaiaGPS. We started on Highway 93 south of the Trans Canada Highway. We skied to the lake, out and back.
The route is similar to the summer trail in the AllTrails app. You can download the trail for navigating. Find it here.
Trip Report
To the Lake
There is a big parking area near where the trail starts behind the sign.
There are picnic tables, covered in snow on this day, at the start of the trail.
Early on, the trail crosses a bridge over Boom Creek. The trail is wide and the track is well laid.
The trail is easy to follow and easy to ski. It gains elevation quickly for a short distance as you move away from the highway.
After that, it has gentle ups and downs until it starts to drop gently to the lake shore.
About an hour up the trail, we came to a junction. A small, faint trail to O’Brien Lake and Taylor Lake heads up the hillside. The main trail continues to Boom Lake.
It looks like the other trail does not get skied. There were no tracks.
The snowy forest was beautiful and quiet with that deep winter silence.
On our way down to the lake, a small side trail to the right had seen some skiing so we checked it out. Unfortunately, the tracks went nowhere. There was an open field of boulders but nothing to ski there.
We hoped for some open slopes near the lake.
At the Lake
From their tracks, we could see that the party of three ahead of us had gone left at the lakeshore.
We didn’t see any slopes in the area that we wanted to ski. However, we noticed that the party of three was on the steep slope across the lake, heading up. We learned later that this is the Kindergarten Couloir – close up below.
The following photo is a close up of the Kindergarten Couloir. If you zoom in, you can see the party of three, they are black dots, and their uptrack zigzagging across the slope. This was well above my paygrade on this day – know your limitations, they say. So we looked for another slope to ski that would be more suitable for me.
Unfortunately, we didn’t find any skiable slopes at the lake.
Across the lake, up the valley, we saw some interesting ice formations. We decided to turn right and follow the lakeshore. We wanted to check out the ice climbing for potential future outings.
The ice looked steep but climbable. We found out later that one of these flows is a WI4 called Birthday Present.
We didn’t get any closer, not wanting to cross the lake so early in the season. Perhaps later in the winter, we’ll come back to climb.
End of the Day
I enjoyed our Boom Lake ski tour. We didn’t get to make any turns, we didn’t even take the skins off, but the route was beautiful. The weather was perfect and the forest was so peaceful. It was a lovely day in the mountains.
Return to the main backcountry skiing page.
Have you skied to Boom Lake? We don’t do a lot of ski touring but this was very enjoyable. I’d love to find more places to ski tour. Please share your favourites in the comments below.
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