East Ridge of Panorama Ridge | Ski Touring in Banff National Park

01 East Ridge of Panorama Ridge | 2010-12-18

East Ridge of Panorama Ridge

Location: Banff National Park
Activity: Ski Touring
Height: 2,563 m (8,409 ft)
Elevation Gain: 1,200 m (3,937 ft)
Distance: 19.5 km / Round Trip (12.1 mi)
Avg Steepness: 7.0°
Estimated Time: 5-7 hrs
Technicality: Advanced
Fitness Level: Athlete

Download GPX: [Trail] East Ridge of Panorama Ridge.gpx
OpenStreetMap: See track recorded by GPS
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Related Trips:
- Panorama Ridge
Conditions:
- Weather
- Avalanche Bulletin

I was once again invited to a ski trip from Benther (Ben & Heather). So I joined and went to east ridge of Panorama Ridge in Banff.

Unlike the scramble route to Panorama Ridge in Kane’s book, for east ridge we started from Taylor Lake parking lot after Castle junction. We followed Taylor Lake trail for most of the way until near the lake where it’s flattened out. We skied east side of the lake towards NW (page 4). At this point view opened up and we could see very impressive cliff face of Mount Bell and Panorama. On the other hand, east ridge of Panorama was a gentle hill (page 7). The ridge continued all the way to higher points of Panorama Ridge but it looked very difficult. Probably beyond scrambling level. Anyway that wasn’t the objective for this trip. We settled at a very small peak on the ridge.

I have to say the route really did highlight the advantage of ski ascent this time. Descent was super fast and with no efforts required (Well except I went off trail and had to take skis off to back up to the trail… errorrrrrrrrrrrrr). The skis simply kept running.