Mara Peak

December 13, 2015

1801m

Manning Provincial Park, BC

Mara Peak is the unofficial name (obtained from bivouac.com) of a small peak immediately behind the “blue chair” in Manning Park ski resort. There’s really nothing interesting about this forested summit other than getting some exercise and the ascent can be easily done in 2 hours on skis… Alex and I still had half a day after finishing Mt. Kelly and we figured this peak could be a perfect objective to spend the afternoon.

Mara Peak from Manning Park ski resort. GPX DL

The road to Manning Park ski resort was slippery and the parking lot was full. Thankfully I managed to squeeze in a spot and 10 minutes later we were skinning up the ski hills. One ski patroller came down questioning us where we were going but thankfully he’s a friendly guy and didn’t kick us out, so we resumed the ascent. We followed the “green run” all the way to the top of that chairlift and it’s a bit foreshortening and quite boring.

Skinning up the ski hills

Skinning up the ski hills

Arriving at the top of the "blue chair"

Arriving at the top of the “blue chair”

The section immediately above the ski hills was steep and bushy but short-lived. The summit was actually much farther away than we thought and we had to traverse up and over a few bumps along the way. There’s no views from the top thank to the weather and the forest, so we immediately headed down.

This is that steep and bushy part

This is that steep and bushy part

Typical terrain along the ridge

Typical terrain along the ridge

The true summit ahead

The true summit ahead

Alex jumped off a cornice here

Alex jumped off a cornice here

Descending off the false summit

Descending off the false summit

Me on the summit of Mara Peak

Me on the summit of Mara Peak

As far as the summit views go

As far as the summit views go

We kept the skins us for the ridge section as there’s a lot of up-and-downs. Skiing down the steep and bushy section was interesting but not as bad as I thought it’d be. Lower down we entered the resort and dropped down the “black bowl” and in no time we were back to the parking lot.

Heading back

Heading back

It was still very early (just after 2 pm) but we were too tired to think about something else so just drove home, and of course, once entering the Fraser Valley it was pouring rain just as expected…