Chinook Pass - August patches?

...you could always drive around the south side of Rainier through Paradise and then shoot east from there via Stevens Canyon/123/12 to Yakima...It might add say an hour to your total drive...

Allow extra time if leaving Paradise for Yakima:  "Up until September 4th, visitors should be able to anticipate 20-minute delays, Monday - Friday, through each of two segments of roadwork on Stevens Canyon Road."   
www.nps.gov/mora/parknews/stevens-canyon...biliation-update.htm

Well...
We went in early Saturday to Sunrise and we were able to link a few turns below the 1st Burrough. There are a couple of patches that still exist, although skiing the ones with vertical would require some tricky transitions on pretty steep areas and with the 8am snow conditions neither one of us felt inclined.

The wife and I skied the "almost" flat patch just below Frozen Lake and I'm not proud of the skiing quality/quantity, but putting skis on snow each month makes for some interesting journeys and that is why we like it so much.

Rusty, you were right. We didn't see any (real) patches from the highway on the way over Chinook Pass.

Mack, yes we could have done the P-patch and in hindsight it would have been the way to go. I forgot about the fact that a south loop around Rainier wouldn't add too much drive time.

Thanks all for the beta... I'll try to throw up a picture of what the Burroughs patches look like as of 8/25 later today.
-Nick

As promised...

August turns: check.
I've used that triangular snowfield for late summer turns several times. I call it the Poser Patch
'cuz it's visible from the road & trail. It's 1.1 miles from the car with about 400' elevation gain.

Just a word to the wise.

Late summer skiing at Sunrise and Burroughs has been a source of contention with the NPS because of the unique fauna at Burroughs and the accusation that off trail hiking to reach patches causes damage.

Many of the disputes with the NPS and their "conservation "surrogates over the opening of Sunrise ASAP when the road clears has been over this issue.

I'm not suggesting that any harm was done on the aforementioned TR's but frankly there are better areas to get summer turns that aren't quite so controversial.

Carry on!

Scotsman,
That was in my mind as we scampered down to the patch. We made sure to use the large boulder field as access as to have an alibi if a ranger had questioned our tactics.

After seeing meadows trampled around popular hiking destinations, I admit that I enjoy seeing the push to make the undereducated (i.e. "visitor center" hikers) more aware of their very real impacts.

That being said, I accessed that snow and therefore I am complicit...
N