A 2-night (3-day) trip to the main range to make the most of the promising spring snow. We will be camping in the Blue Lake area to explore the main range, including some of the western faces. Note that this is an advanced trip, you should be an adept skier with some backcountry experience and preferably snow camping experience.
Day 1 - Sep 6
We will aim to leave Canberra around 6:30 am. We will drive to Guthega and park in the overnight car park before heading up the east side of the Snowy to the Illawong bridge. Once we've crossed the river, we will continue to traverse up under Little Twynam to the main range track. We will camp near the track close to 36°24'32.9"S 148°18'20.8"E, outside the lake catchment area and ~50m above Carruthers Creek. Here we can drop our packs and ski some of the lines into Blue Lake. There are a good range of difficulties here, from the mellow loop east of the lake to the steep chutes to the north west.
Alt. route. If the road is open to Charlotte's Pass, we will follow the main range track in as it is a slightly shorter ski.
Day 2 - Sep 7
We will make the most of the middle day to explore the main range, leaving camp set up at the same spot. If the weather is clear, it would be nice to use the morning to head up Mt Townsend. As the sun shifts around and softens the snow (provided there hasn't been enough fresh snow to cause worry for avalanches), we will look at some of the lines on the west of Twynam, Sentinel Ridge and maybe Little Austria. After a few laps, we will head back down to camp for the night.
Day 3 - Sep 8
Depending on how the legs are feeling, we will look at two options, but take it a bit easier either way: a) ski over to Mt Tate and run a few laps on the north/west slopes that typically have good snow and open lines before returning over the dam. In this case, we would aim to be back at the carpark around 16:00 and Canberra 19:30. b) Come back the way we came in, but skiing a few laps on the long vert. of eastern Twynam. This would likely finish earlier and be at the car around 14:00/Canberra 17:30.
https://www.alltrails.com/explore/map/map-august-26-2025-a292f1c?u=m&sh=qgxc8h