Ahhh, the luxury of a gondola five minutes from the house.  On a greyish day in January I met Greg at the top of the Stoke Chair at noon, intent on adding to my local knowledge of the terrain that lies to the east of Revelstoke Mountain Resort.   The East face of Mt Mackenzie was to be our point of access, a coveted line that Greg and Scott skied/boarded almost a decade ago!  After a quick skin up the  S ridge,  we ripped ’em and dropped into the abyss… 

Greg on the upper face.

The traffic in RMR’s slackcountry is skyrocketing, with all kinds of steep lines off of Mt. Mackenzies shoulders and faces showing tracks within 2 days of any storm.  We have not seen any precip in a while, and after following a set of tracks down the E face and into the bowl and better visibilty, there are sweet turns down  most  of the skiable features we can see.  Always liked the look of these couloirs to the SE, so we did a STEEP skin and a short bootpack up the left and skied down the right.

Looking back on the E Face.

We pulled a nice high wrap around the NE ridge and back into RMR boundaries via a cool chute right above the lake. 

 

Three fun new lines for me, and we even squeaked onto the gondola for a download, avoiding the uninspiring  mid to low elevation skiing. What a great afternoon!

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