Experience with Wintertime "Recreation Rentals"?

Hi All,

I was looking at "recreational rentals" at fire lookouts, and found two that seem like they could be used as wintertime ski huts (for like $50 a night!). Anyone have any experience doing that at the Table Mountain A-Frame (at 6150 ft elevation) or the Teanaway Guard Station (3200 ft)? Both located in the Wenatchee National Forest...

www.fs.fed.us/r6/recreation/rentals/docs...able-mtn-a-frame.pdf

www.fs.fed.us/r6/recreation/rentals/docs...-wen-teanaway-gs.pdf

-Matt

The Table Mtn. A Frame is about a 7 mile hike on a groomed and heavily used snomobile road. I snowmobile in winter and mtn. bike the area in summer. Behind the hut 1/4 mile or so is an open slope with 500 or 600 vert. Lion Rock is a couple of miles away, and heavily overrun with snowmobiles. When I snomobile the area I see folks with big weekend packs occasionally slogging up the road on tele or randonnee gear en route to the Table Mtn. A Frame.

I've stayed a number of times at the Table Mountain A-frame. We've never had to ski in with big packs as we have a friend with a snowmobile and cargo sled or a gentleman from Ellensburg with a 10-passenger snowcat to carry our kit and sometimes us to and from the cabin.

As Randonee mentions the area is lousy with snowmobiles, particularly on a weekend. On the upside, the access road is groomed regularly and with certain protocols, peaceful co-existence is to be expected. A route is possible from the Pipe Creek Sno-Park that avoids most of the snowmobiled roads. The skiing around the cabin is mostly in dense forest so you will see no machines in there. There are some slopes nearby for downhill jollies.

Thanks for the tips so far.

The lodge sounds good.

So is the skiing any good? Are the trees too dense for skiing? And is the open slope steep not that far away steep enough?

This sounds like it could be a fun Turns-All-Year type thing since it can hold 10 people!

Thanks...
-Matt

The skiing is quite pleasant. I usually go on light touring skis and just poke around in the woods. The trees are spaced widely enough that touring is easy. Slopes dropping off the escarpment to the west are plenty steep but often windscoured with lots of shattered basalt poking through or lurking below the surface. You'd hope to be lucky with the snow conditions if you were going for turns. There are shorter, more leeward slopes to the east but with a longer tour to the goods.