Beating the Shoulder Season Blues in Canada

For those of us that live in a place with four distinct seasons there is a dreaded period called Shoulder Season. This generally occurs twice a year in Canada. It is the season changeover time. Summer outdoor activities can’t be done because there is a snow/rain/ muck cycle that ruins everything. Or, in the Spring, the same thing happens in reverse. Also see Cabin Life.

Right now it’s early November which is hopefully the tail end of Shoulder Season this year, maybe. Lately with the crazy weather, this season can sometimes extend past Christmas!

Should Season is characterized by the following:

• Snow and -15 one day, sunny and +25 the next
• Rain turning to snow, turning to rain, turning to snow and so on
• Muck. This is the best definition I found: Muck – ‘foul matter that mars the purity or cleanliness of something’
• One foot of snow on the ground, three feet in the mountains and gone two days later
• Ice forming, ice falling down, ice forming etc.
• Rock skiing (it’s as terrible as it sounds)
• Great snow in the mountains and nothing down low, so you can’t get to the good stuff

People who like their outdoor activities try to combat Should Season by doing the following:

• Buying new skis, ice climbing gear, sled equipment etc.
• Starting up their snowmobile and fiddling with it
• Going online to read snow/ice/avalanche reports and realizing they aren’t up and running yet
• Following the weather and believing anything that looks favorable eight days into the forecast period
• Finding a post on one ice climb that’s ‘IN’ early and joining the hopeful masses to check it out
• Leaving the country and heading somewhere that has a real season happening

Last week it snowed a lot in the mountains and nothing down low. If we could just get up there the skiing might be good. So we loaded the family (Carl, Twig and I) on the quad with our ski’s and headed out.

The quad ride up was okay. Twig enjoys riding but often becomes too comfortable and doesn’t always think of the consequences of her actions. See Twig canoe here.

Once we bogged down too much to carry on with the quad we parked it, put on our ski’s and started walking up. We headed to an area we were familiar with and had seen in summer conditions. There was just enough snow to hide all the rocks. It was low angle, slow, easy skiing. Hitting rocks slowly is better than at full speed obviously.

One good thing about low snow amounts is that Twig can can come with us. She runs around like a maniac and tries to die by jumping in our way as we ski down.

We did four runs, trying to find the one epic spot. This of course doesn’t exist yet. We eventually headed down the mountain. Carl took the quad and Twig and I ran/skied for as long as we could. Everyone is happier this way.

And so ends a quasi successful Shoulder Season outing.

Later that week it warmed up and a lot of snow melted. Now it’s cold again.

Conclusions:

• Should Season exists and often lingers
• You can fit three beings on a quad but no one enjoys it if one of them is a dog
• Dogs don’t mind Shoulder Season