In today’s fast-paced world, true wilderness is hard to find. Yet part of the character of the Columbia Mountain ranges is that isolation and awe converge—especially 53 kilometers up the remote mountain valley in the Purcell Range that is home turf to our newly renovated Bobbie Burns Lodge. Built in 1980 as one of the original CMH lodges, the Burns is a favorite of longtime CMH guests not only due to its vast reserves of terrain but also its intimate European feel and the peaceful, poetic isolation of the Purcells.
A spectacular and dramatic sub-range of the Columbia Mountains and a parent to the famous Bugaboos, the majority of peaks along the 300-mile spine tower above 10,000 feet, many with thousands of feet of vertical relief. Marked by U-shaped, glacially carved valleys, the vast range is stacked with cirques and moraines, spires and arêtes, glaciers and icefields—yet sees few visitors to its backcountry. With mind blowing landscapes and peaceful isolation, it’s a location that inspires the mind and fuels the soul like few other places on earth.
The location for Zilmer was never certain but as the team of ten select CMH guides with extensive ropework experience began scouting a location, it opened up before their very eyes. With limited overhead hazard and a zone naturally cleaned by geologic forces of water, snow and ice, they found an ideal spot to build and started in on the alder.
“As we rappelled down that canyon and started to pull back the alders and piece this puzzle together of how we were going to build a via ferrata—there it was. It just lent itself to perfection,” Mellis says. “Everything just really unfolded for us and the rock quality was excellent and the beauty of the hundreds of millions of years. The waters come pounding down there and the glacier used to be all the way to the bottom as well.”
While most CMH guests start their summer tour in Banff, more of our self-drive visitors are choosing to link up their journey with a stay in British Columbia’s beautiful Okanagan Valley wine country. With more last-minute availability and greater destination flexibility in the high season, the region is an undiscovered gem for oenophiles, for sun worshipers and for those who would rather chose the less crowded self-drive route to or from our summer lodges.
Flying into Kelowna International Airport, travelers can head south to explore Canada’s premier grape growing region through winery tours and tastings as well as finding more late-booking availability for accommodation en route at luxury spas such as Sparkling Hill Resort, off-season ski resorts such as Sun Peaks or in a cottage on one of the region’s 50-plus lakes. The region is also a hub of pedaling potential, featuring the Kettle Valley Trail, an iconic and historical 500-kilometer rails-to-trails bikepacking route.
With a sunny high-desert climate that is warmer than California’s Napa Valley—and distinctive in tasting circles for longer summer sunlight but cool, Canadian nights—the Okanagan Valley has produced wines consistently ranking among the world’s best. The lakeside region is also a hot bed for microbreweries and microdistilleries with many offering educational tours and tastings—but with so many tasting options you might get a bit waylaid for a few days.
After four days of heli hiking heights or via ferrata climbs at CMH, your legs might scream for a soak. For our self-drive visitors, or those that flew into Kelowna, that prescription is easily filled by heading south for a road trip diversion through hot springs country on the drive back toward the coast. It’s a perfect diversion to take in search of a few days of rest and recovery.
While mountain activity predominates in BC’s booming adventure towns of Revelstoke and Nelson, the scenic winding route between these trailhead epicenters also provides alluring hot spots for rest, recovery and relaxation. Known for endless lakeside vistas, hidden gem geography and iconic small towns with historic mining-era character, this route is punctuated by a high concentration of mineral hot springs that provide immersive experiences to soothe the muscles in vista-perfect surroundings.
In winter, this tucked-away region is a haven for skiers of all kinds—cat, heli and backcountry—due to the Selkirk and Monashee Mountains that rise from each side of the natural range boundary of the 230-kilometer long Arrow Lakes. But when summer sun shines on these mountain towns, this lakeside route, that was once the domain of steamboats connecting Revelstoke to the Columbia River, inspires at every twist and turn with its endless trailheads, provincial parks, historic mining-era towns and relaxing, restorative soaking spots.
