Ottawa Ski Club - the Gatineau Valley Historical Society

YEAR BOOK 1951-52 39
IT'S SPRING-TIME IN THE ROCKIES
by BARB IRVING
It didn't seem possible that we
were actually going out 1to Banff, but
on Eastel" Sunday, after rushing
around, we picked up our passengers
-first, Bill's s·ister and brother, Dora
Paisley and Bob Irving, · and then
Helen .and George Brittain (Helen,
by the way, comes from Banff). We
managed to get away around 9 a.m.,
and four and a half days later we
arrived there. The roads were marvellous,
no floods or 25-foot drif·ts. that
we were warned about, the only mishaps
were two blowouts and running
out of gas. First, a new set of tires
fixed us up; and secondly, George
mana~ed to find us a bit of gas in
a nearby farmhouse. This was very
fortunate, as we were in the middle
of the prairies ll!t the time.
Banff certainly looked very impressive,
·as it nestled in the mountains
with Mount Rundle towering
over it. We registered rut the Mount
Royal Hotel, then proceeded over to
Helen's home. We just had time for
a swim in •the ·Sulphur pool-so away
we went. The upper Sulphur pool is
about 95 to 10·0•° F. in temp·erature.
It's. outdoors-it seemed so funny -to
be in swimming, with snow all
around. After the swim we were exhausted,
but were quickly revived by
te.a and some ·of Mrs. Bowke·r'·s
(Helen's mother) •cookies and cake.
On Friday, after a very necess•ary
visit to the Bank, we went .skiing at
Mount Norquay-what a mountain!
The Olympic •teams. were having their
last race, they were certainly skiing
beautifully. It was good to see
the familiar faces of Harvey and
John Clifford and Art._Tqmmy. The
chair lift at Norquay takes you up
about 4·,000 feet. The mountain is
very steep-between 35 and 45 degrees
all the way down. Bill, Bob and
I hopped a chair and before we knew
it were at the top and wondering how
to get down. We looked over the
side and de-cided there must be an
easier way but after !thoroughly investigating
the alternatives, which
proved to be cliffs, decided we had to
go. My knee-s shook all the way
down but after a couple more rides
I began to like it. By this time :there
was no h'olding Bill and Bob. George
and Dora decided to give it a whirl
-George made it O.K., but the- next
thing we saw was Dora going down
on the chair lift!
·Saturday morning H was time to
go up to Sunshine Lodge, where we
h·ad res.ervations for a week. You are
not allowed to drive your own car
into Sunshine. They have a speciallygear·ed
bus, .and since the roads are
quite stBep, with a couple of dangerous
switchbacks, only very experienced
drivers are allowed to
drive. The trip from Banff to Sunshine
was only 15 miles but took 1lh
hours.. The- bus had a glass top,
which gave us a wonderful view of
the mountains. Banff itself was completely
bare, but when we reached
Sunshine there was 1Qo feet of windpacked
snow, and .a couple of inches
of loose snow on top. The altitude was
7,200. feet at Sunshine, 3,o.oo feet
above Banff. It was amazing the difference
it made. The altitude hit us
and W€ ·didn't feel too energetic the
first couple of days.
Sunshine Lodge was a skier's par·a-