March 23, 2003, Snoqualmie Pass
3/23/03
WA Snoqualmie Pass
2738
2
Headed up one of our late-riser favorites today. Snow on roads and in clearcuts and woods is sketchy below about 3000ft, and gets to be pretty OK cover by about 3300ft. We climbed on top of wet new snow until finally seeing true powder by about 4700ft, and enjoyed that through old growth to 5700. We were hammered by snow and graupel at our summit and for the top part of our descent, which was a gas - creamy turns, though there were spots where it was easy to penetrate *quite* deeply near the top. Still - worthy of a yo-yo up high in the old growth. Under trees was pretty nice, and we did powder turns at will until we met back up with wet snow, which was covered with about 2" of fresh powder by the time we returned to it. Below 4400 there were various crust and thick snow layers that were a little tricky but nonetheless turnable, and we had good fun pretty much the whole way back down. Better than I expected, and if the wet snow froze up under the new snow, it would be even nicer.
Jim, sorry I didn't get myself organized to join you today. I agree with your last line - things would have been much better everywhere if that underlying wet snow had had a chance to freeze.
That said, despite a bit of variability, the skiing under the trees above about 4500ft was pretty darned nice, as long as I anticipated the softer deeper hollower stuff in open areas in glades (which I mostly avoided by skiing near to the trees) and at most of the wind rolls. The tree bombs were adequately buried, but provided a nice firm base.
A day like yesterday reinforces my feeling that it's nice to have a very famliar tour that you've explored a bit, so you can more effectively seek out the micro-zones that hold the decent skiing on iffy days. I've watched guides do this up in Canada and have learned a lot about snow sense from watching them work.
I will admit that we bailed on snowmobile road for our last 1K of vertical at the bottom, which was covered with 2" of fresh snow, making for pretty decent "green run" turns.
A day like yesterday reinforces my feeling that it's nice to have a very famliar tour that you've explored a bit, so you can more effectively seek out the micro-zones that hold the decent skiing on iffy days. I've watched guides do this up in Canada and have learned a lot about snow sense from watching them work.
I will admit that we bailed on snowmobile road for our last 1K of vertical at the bottom, which was covered with 2" of fresh snow, making for pretty decent "green run" turns.
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