TR Replies

Chris, I think that was someone else - the only tracks I put in Silver Basin were going downhill, but I'll be happy to accept your chocolate next time I see you!

Way to get the TR and pics up in a timely manner, Jibber; High Five.
Yeah, we certainly had our way with that gulley:

Here's the Jibber in a magazine pose:

Hi GregL,
            I think I used your skin track up silver basin. I was lapping from the lifts but had my skins with me so couldn't resist another lap. Nice skin track, thanks and sorry I had no chocolate( someone in your group said I had to pay the trail breaker with choclate) ;D

Well then, I think you mean the top of Skyline (sometimes called Heather) Ridge. That big bald hill to the west is generally called Tye Peak. My previous comments refer to that one. No real name to drainage separating the two. I call it south fork of Nason Creek.

Glad to help, Nick. I should clarify the location a bit. This is not the face that leads down into the Tye lake basin. It is the NW face off peak 5476 that leads down to the Nason creek drainage. The face above Tye lake had some tracks on it yesterday, but I can't say how old they were.

Thanks for info Pat. I was thinking of visiting this slope tomorrow but will revise plans. We have had a lot of east winds in last few months. Tye Peak gets heavily loaded on SE aspect and is bare for a reason. That steep NW is often stable but the east winds can funnel through the Nason drainage. I have seen large amounts of debris on the NW slope over the years. All aspects of that hill require lots of respect. NWAC and this site have mentioned bad layers in isolated areas where close by it mi...

Nice ptarmigan!

Similar conditions where we skied - down the back of Silver King to Crystal Lakes there was about 6" of fresh on a soft-frozen bed of crust and avy debris but still great turns. We skinned up Crystal Peak, then around the back (west) side of the cirque where we saw a mountain goat family on the side of Point 6706 . . . earlier in the day we had seen goat tracks (but no goats) at the entrance to the Goat Chutes in the far Northback.

Nice pics.  That was my first time riding Granite.  The approach was pretty easy, on wide trail. From up on top there appeared to be a lot of good looking faces high on the surrounding mountains, particularly this year.  The snow was good on top, but got pretty heavy down low where it slid.  After the main slid, we had several small wet slides break as we worked carefully to safer terrain.  

Way cool.
Maybe we should make that another annual Wild Hearts event??

did you all get a chance for a closer look at the "boot up" to the upper bowl this time?

Yeah, Michael, we got real close to it, but the sweet snow below was beckoning like a siren.  I think we could have skinned into the upper bowl from the top of our climb.  We also refined the route to make the approach much more straightforward and less time consuming. Shoot me your addy, if you like, and I'll send you a map of out track.

Great trip and good pictures.  

Turned out that the death cookies were not as hard as they looked as this "death cookie buster"
(MadDog) demonstrates.

More pics posted HERE.

Thanks for the info about the ladybugs.  I've seen other insect swarms at mountain tops before.  Very cool phenomenon.
Thanks too, for the picture of Hawkins.  I skied there with Pico a few years ago, but it was very cloudy and I had no idea of what I was on.  Now I see that we were on the central ridge leading up to the left summit, but got a little right on the way down, ended up doing a bit of contouring to get out.  Lots of skiable terrain there, though.  

Nice video J.  Looks like you and Jen had a great time.

Today my wife accompanied me back to Mt. Lillian. We had a great lunch on the 6191' summit with great views despite the high overcast. The southerly ridge had nice corn at a moderate angle for 1k falline half on an open ridge and half through open forest with big old Doug firs and Tamaracks. My wife skied very well on her K2 Summit Superlight 8611 skis. She said that she enjoyed the tour.

It was more than 10 degrees colder today, so the snow was set up nicely.

It is a 10 mile road...

Hi JW,

Looks like you had a great time! I absolutely love Big Mountain. Thanks for sharing.

Hey Randonee, we should have joined up and headed for the same Lillian! Thanks for the snowpack info.

I enjoyed your trip report from Keiths hut.  Spring skiing at the hut can be wonderful. I look forward to your return trip.

bc_skier:

Thanks for the pix. I'm not sure mine would do any better justice to Wasilla's backyard playpen! I only wish that I'd had a tour group and my rando gear. But, skinny skis got me far enough to take a nice look!

Memories from the 80's...Here is a shot from 'April Bowl', we've seen great powder well into April.



Early days of Hatcher Pass Lodge



Independence Mine

Nice report Telemack, now if you could only figure out how to post the pictures you took, we could share our adventure in glorious color with these nice folks. ???
You need to cast aside your luddite tendencies and learn to post those pictures. ;D
Great day, strange snow in the pit. I told the guys who I was skiing with on Sunday about my "graupel layer" and they looked like I was smoking the "wacky baccy" again.
Anybody else ever come across such a deep layer of gra...

the back bowl is often a consolation prize, but it is quite a reward in itself.  

Yodelin is sweet, though lower than the Pass so heavy at times.  I have a soft heart for it too, cuz my wife and I skied there in '90 on an anniversary in December.  the clearings only had little bitty saplings.  Since we were staying at The Bush House in Index, we returened to the Lower Town Wall and I got to BC ski and climb granite in the same day....

I've got the goods for ya ;) See ya tonight at the Mountaineers