Feb 26, 2008, MRNP Cowlitz Rocks/Paradise Glacier

The day did not get off to an auspicious start when I received a text message from my partner for a planned trip to do Lichtenberg 5 minutes after we were supposed to meet at the Park and Ride informing me that he couldn't make it. I made a quick decision to head down to Rainier by myself, instead, although the building clouds were not doing much to improve my mood. By the time I arrived at Paradise, however, the weather was improving a bit. Since I was alone, I wasn't keen on anything difficult and wasn't even going to look for any turns, planning instead to head out to Cowlitz Rocks... a mellow tour with great scenery once you're up on the ridge.

The snow getting up to the ridge was about 1-2 inches of crusty new snow on top of some wet, somewhat mushy base. Expecting conditions to be so-so at best, once I got up to Mazama ridge I skied right by the bowl without even looking to go down. As I headed out towards the Paradise Glacier caves, the snow started improving... very soft, powdery snow on a firm base. Made it out to Cowlitz Rocks in good time and with the sun shining. The entire second half of the ski out there, the slopes up and to the left of the Rocks were looking pretty inviting so rather than stopping at the Rocks, I opted to head up the ridge to the left of the area working my way up onto the Paradise Glacier, eventually stopping at about 8500 feet. The skins did gom up with snow a bit and needed some waxing after which things improved a lot. The snow down from my turn-around spot to the Rocks was pretty good... 1-2 inches of soft powder or some mild, easily skiable wind crust on top of a very solid base. Great turns all the way back to the Rocks so I decided to head up and do it one more time. Well worth it as the snow was just as good the second time.

Once down, I headed out back towards Paradise. As I got back towards Mazama bowl, I noticed some tracks heading down the south facing aspect of the bowl so I decided to give it a shot as well. That proved to be a good call as the slope had corned up nicely over the course of the day. Used that group's skin track to get out of the bowl (thanks for those!) and then had a pleasant ski down from the ridge to the road. The slope that is usually a death ski for me of skied-out snow from oodles of snowshoe tracks and other skiers was covered in nicely by the recent snow and was also corning up nicely.

Altogether ended up being a pretty sweet Plan B of a day which made the endless series of lights through Puyallup (is it me or is this stretch getting longer and longer each year) seem not that much of a big deal.