After a good dump of snow from the South or East this huge western face of St Bathans can make for an awesome back country ski tour. The face is very rocky so make sure there has been a good solid metre of snowfall. The ascent is easy skinning, the ski descent all fall line, making for a reasonable day trip from the car (4wd).
Access is from the Lindas Pass road (SH8). Turn-off on Goodger Road. We used a 4WD Jeep and off roaded along a farm track to the top of the Chain Hills.
These are a small barrier range to the St Bathans Range which obscure the views, and must be crossed to get into the St Bathans Valley. From the top of the Chain Hills we walked for about 45 minutes till we were able to start skinning up St Bathans (complete with a wet foot from slipping in the river crossing). Time up was a only a couple of hours.
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