Majestic High
When our helicopter shoots skyward, my stomach collides with my heart. Thousand-foot cliffs loom around us as our flea-sized craft rolls and pitches in its flight toward British Columbia’s Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park.
Here, the oldest cross-country ski lodge in western North America – once a place where prim ladies were urged to leave their long skirts home – lures skiers with its taste of history, warm smells from the kitchen, and skiing in the remote, high-mountain-rimmed valley.
Dwarfed by neighboring Grande Dames of the Canadian Rockies, Mount Assiniboine is often overlooked in favor of more well-known destinations like Banff. But its log lodge and cabins with the intimacy of a bed-and-breakfast are the best secret.
Flanked by miles of wild country – Banff and Kootenay national parks – Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park is a remote island. No roads access it. You only get here by skiing 18.5 miles in winter or by a 25-minute helicopter ride from Canmore, Alberta.
A UNESCO World Heritage Site, the provincial park covers 96,495 acres of untamed rugged wilderness. As Jane Myers, one of my skiing buddies from Bainbridge Island, Wash., said: “These mountains are pretty huge when they make the Cascades look puny.”
Historic rusticity
Created in 1922, the park centers around Mount Assiniboine, which spirals to 11,844 feet high – a mirror of the Matterhorn.
Named after the Assiniboine or Stoney Indians, who once roamed the high meadows here, the peak commands attention – not only from its skyscraping spire, but its blue glaciers and avalanches crashing down vertical cliff walls.
At the foot of its namesake peak, the red tin-roofed Mount Assiniboine Lodge stares across the flat frozen expanse of Lake Magog (aptly named for a biblical giant). Smoke rises from the cozy log building, diminutive amid these geologic monoliths.
Built in 1928 by the Canadian Pacific Railway, the lodge originally slept guests in banana beds – canvas sling mattresses strung between two poles. In late fall, horse pack trains hauled dried food up to the lodge to stock it for ski season; hams were hung from the rafters. Skiers arrived dog-weary after 35 miles of schussing from Banff.
An early lodge brochure claimed, “The food is excellent, and the cook agreeable. If we don’t feed you better and make you more comfortable than you expect to be that far from civilization, then you expect too much!”
Contrary to that early rusticity, today the lodge holds 28 guests who sleep in real beds with flannel sheets and down comforters.
Warmth, both real and visual, comes from a sauna, hot shower and propane lights and heat. Wash water – so hot we could barely touch it – delivered to our cabin before breakfast transported us beyond the fact that we must don our boots to traipse outside to the outhouse.
The scent of freshly baked bread wafted from the kitchen, where gourmet meals waltz onto the dining tables to rival any classy restaurant in town – complete with fresh, helicopter-delivered fruits and vegetables. And the lodge’s beer and wine license fills the gaps for missing beverages.
Owned by B.C. Parks and run by Barb and Sepp Renner since 1983, the lodge sits at 7,200 feet – high enough for some flatlanders to feel the elevation in shortness of breath when skiing, and sometimes a bit of a restless sleep.
Everyone from young children to grandparents drop in for two-night to weeklong stays, the duration timed to one of three weekly helicopter flight days. During our stay, one family celebrated a reunion with three generations.
Six lodge rooms, sleeping two people each, are conveniently cozy above the living room, but you’ll find ear plugs helpful when snores from the room next door resound through the historic walls. In one of the six adjacent cabins, you won’t have to worry about neighbors snoring – only members of your own clan.
No lift service here
Open in winter between mid-February and mid-April, the lodge cowers under voluminous snows. On average, 6 to 9 feet of snow piles up – enough to bury small trees. No wonder skiing is so ideal.
Daily guided tours, from beginner through skilled, launch cross-country and telemark skiers off to such aptly-named places as Wonder Pass. For those preferring a slower mode of travel, the lodge has snowshoes available.
Sepp Renner, certified through the International Federation of Mountain Guides Association, teaches all of his guides, some of whom are his own children.
After outfitting us with avalanche transceivers and a brief lesson on their use, his daughter Natalie set an easy pace for our sunny-day ski tour to Og Pass. Frequent stops allowed for plenty of photos, hydration, snacks and sunscreen additions.
Natalie, who was 5 years old when her parents started operating the lodge, regaled us with stories at each stop – some tattling on her father’s habits of lunchtime napping or changing trip mileage by the end of the day to double what he claimed it was at breakfast.
Atop each pitch, Natalie suggested the route down with a smile: “Here’s an opportunity to traverse or to crash straight down hill.”
On one descent, she called it right as a cluster of us standing at the bottom scattered in four directions to make room for one guy yelling “look out!” as he splatted at our feet.
At Og Pass, named for another giant, we surveyed a view worthy of much grander efforts. Peaks of all shapes march in a majestic opera of geologic upthrusts gnawed by glaciers. Intermittent loud, cracking rumbles riveted our eyes across the valley as monstrous snow slabs fractured and gathered momentum in an avalanching white cascade that settled beneath a billowy puff of snow crystals lingering in the air.
On the return to the lodge, the changeable weather deteriorated, as it is wont to do here along the Continental Divide. Gray descended, cloaking Mount Assiniboine with an accompanying wet snow. We returned to the lodge living room a little soggy, greeted with spinach-phyllo turnovers and lemonade before skittering to warm up in the sauna.
It’s not all about skiing
With easy hospitality, the Renners amused us at meals with a rich story repertoire of mountaineer history, grizzly bears in the kitchen, and the come-from-behind finish of their daughter Sarah’s recent World Championship Nordic skiing bronze medal.
With meals served family-style in several courses, food seems to flow endlessly out of the kitchen in menus reading like the pages of Bon Appetit.
Breakfast woke us with homemade fresh coconut muesli, feta and red pepper baked eggs, and lemon muffins. Jane pointed out our morning dilemma: “You have to be careful you don’t inhale too much or you won’t be able to ski.”
After breakfast is whisked away, lunch makings mound onto the table for the do-it-yourself affair: Grab a bag, build a sandwich on fresh, home-baked bread with deli meats and cheese, and pack your snacks.
I always sneak an extra one or two of the powerhouse oat, sesame seed, coconut and peanut butter Great Divide Cookies – from the lodge’s own recipe.
Ravenous after skiing, we drooled at the thought of dinner. And the dishes didn’t disappoint.
Starting with salad greens tossed with homemade beet chips, we piled our plates with rosemary and curry pork tenderloin accompanied by sides of diced apples and potatoes, squash and pea pods.
Of course, we couldn’t pass up dessert – fresh strawberries on biscotti topped with sabayon cream.
Stuffed from the hearty meal, we ambled back to our cabin under an icy sky spilling with stars.
It’s a toss-up whether the skiing, views or food is better. But in Assiniboine Lodge’s case, you get them all.
As Jane says, “With its backcountry scenery, skiing, and a little rustic luxury, you just get it all in one fabulous shot.”