Retallack lodge
“One can never be bored by powder skiing because it is a special gift of the relationship between earth and sky. It only comes in sufficient amounts in particular places, at certain times on this earth; it lasts only a limited amount of time before sun and wind changes it. People devote their whole lives to it for the pleasure of being so purely played by gravity and snow.”
We arrived in late afternoon to snow falling from a gray, early spring sky. A week prior, warm weather, snowmelt and mud threatened the season; today, six inches already blanketed the ground and plenty more was falling up high. Smoke invitingly billowed up from the chimney. Two snowcats purred next to a small bonfire outside, resting after a long day’s work. The forecast here, at Retallack Lodge in Interior British Columbia, called for heavy snow over the next 24 hours. Our group—a collection of FREESKIER staffers, product testers and reps of outerwear manufacturers—carried with us heavier bags than most traveling skiers; we packed suitcases full of jackets, snowpants and midlayers to be worn over the next three days exploring Retallack’s nearly 10,000 acres of steep, skiable terrain. The goal for the inaugural FREESKIER Outerwear Test was: evaluate the finest threads from the industry’s top brands based on fit, material, and function in Interior British Columbia…
