During my frequent ski day-dreaming I have ofter thought of trying to retrace the route of the group of old-timers who crossed the Olympics in winter around the turn of the century, I think it was.<br><br>That would be a burly trip to say the least. ??? Anybody know if that trip has been repeated. There is a brief paragraph about winter touring in the Olympic Rock Guide and about the early exploratory trips.
<br><br>You're thinking of the Press Expedition, I think. My history project has a little information about it:<br><br>
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www.alpenglow.org/ski-history/notes/book...88.html#omr-1988-p22
p. 22: During the winter of 1889-90, an expedition organized by the Seattle Press and led by James H. Christie crossed the Olympic Mountains over the Low Divide by following the Elwha, Goldie, and Quinault Rivers. The epic was published in a special 24-page edition of the Press on July 16, 1890.
<br><br>This trip was on foot, mostly in low-elevation valleys. Eric Burr told me he did some winter ski trips like that when he worked as a ranger with Jack Hughes. I don't know exactly where they went. (Jack Hughes is somebody I want to interview.)<br><br>The classic high-level ski traverse in the Olympics is from Deer Park (site of a ski area in the 1930s thru 50s) to Hurricane Ridge. This route was first skied in 1938. There was no Hurricane Ridge lodge in those days, so they continued down the old Idaho Camp road to the Elwha River. They did it in a single day. I don't think this route gets done much anymore, since they no longer plow the road up to Deer Park in winter. A detachment of the 41st Division ski patrol led by John Woodward and Ralph Phelps repeated this traverse in 1941. The same Army patrol also skied from the Quinault to the Dosewallips over Anderson Pass in winter.<br><br>In general, I've found historical records of skiing in the Olympics very sketchy.
