A lot of my blog trip posts tend to focus on spring/summer/fall adventures, figured it was time to throw in some winter trips in the Bella Coola area!
One of our favorite weekend trips is to take advantage of the awesome Tweedsmuir Ski Club Cabin which is available for overnight rentals and is located at locally known “Eastbranch” or “the top of the Hill” in Tweedsmuir Park.
The trip in to the overnight cabin is about 2km and then about another 1.5km to get in to the Ski Hill and day use Round Cabin which is about 3.5km from the East Branch Parking lot just off highway 20.
It’s an easy hike/snowshoe/ski or snowmobile ride in, on a typically groomed trail. Follow the orange trail markers on the trees.
The overnight Cabin is maintained and looked after by the Tweedsmuir Ski Club and can be booked for overnight rental – it is $60 a night for members and $80 a night for non members, the cabin sleeps 9 people with 3 bunk bunk beds (double bottom bunk single top bunk). for booking information see www.tweedsmuirskiclub.com
A sleeping bag and food is pretty much all you need to bring for an overnight stay at the cabin. – Kitchen wear, toilet paper, propane for the cookstove, BBQ and stove top is all supplied. – Water is melted from snow on the woodstove or by using the auger to drill a hole in the lake and collect water. There is a nice outhouse with toilet paper for all of your bathroom needs!!
Just down from the cabin is another small lake, that we like to snowshoe down to in the evenings. It is is well stocked with fish and makes for some great ice fishing, and is well worth the effort!
Getting into the skihill with all of your ski gear is best done with a snowmobile (aka sled) we have an old mountain max 600 that somehow seems to still keep running despite often being loaded down with a family of 5! – Usually Alex tows the kids in with their skis, while I typically take 45min to hike in from the road with snow shoes. – Its an easy hike and I love the time to myself and the exercise! if you dont have a snowmobile, you can hike in towing your skis on a toboggan or if you get to the parking lot early you can often hitch a tow in with a local!
The hill itself is open every Sunday during the ski season, as long as there is a volunteer ski tow operator available. You can confirm if it is going to be open on any given Sunday by checking out the Tweedsmuir Ski Club Facebook Page
The hill itself consists of a handle rope tow, and has a whats known as a the round house day cabin, which has a woodstove and tables.
Usually you’ll find untouched powder, cheap prices, no line ups and crisp cold blue sky Chilcotin weather. For those of us that live down in the Valley it can be a great place to soak up some winter sun
Glacier Creek Outfitting (currently closed) 