www.turns-all-year.com September backcountry skiing photos: Moon Rocks, Muir snowfield, Camp Muir, Mt. Rainier Turns All Year: Previous Home Page Galleries This is a gallery of September backcountry skiing photos which appeared on the Turns All Year home page in the past. Thumbnail images on this page can be clicked to view the full-sized photos, and lead into a slide show sequence for the gallery. These backcountry skiing photos are from an early September backcountry skiing trip to the Muir snowfield and Camp Muir, above Paradise on the south side of Mt. Rainier. Enough new snow had fallen on the Muir snowfield above Moon Rocks that we enjoyed perfect corn snow skiing conditions, and a ski run of 2500 vertical feet. List Galleries            < Older  Browse Galleries  Newer >

Turns All Year CD-ROM The complete version of this photo gallery is now available on Turns All Year CD-ROM. Below you can view thumbnail photos from this gallery. Turns All Year CD-ROM contains over 180 photo galleries, containing more than 3200 full-sized photos, from backcountry skiing and snowboarding trips in the Pacific Northwest.

from September 13, 2004: Muir Snowfield, Mt. Rainier, Washington, September 6, 2004 Solitude in Paradise? Not on a sunny Labor Day Nisqually Glacier Approaching Moon Rocks September new snow on the Muir snowfield Approaching Camp Muir Silas skiing just below Camp Muir Pete Becky skiing upper Muir snowfield Pete Silas skiing September corn snow Becky Becky skiing upper Muir snowfield Pete Pete skiing September new snow Pete Silas skiing upper Muir snowfield Silas Becky skiing upper Muir snowfield Pete Silas skiing dirty snow near Moon Rocks Becky Becky skiing below Anvil Rock Pete Silas Pete Three skiers in a crowd Nisqually Glacier Silas and Mt. St. Helens Mt. Adams over Tatoosh Range Photos by Charles Eldridge

Associated skiing trip report: Silas and I headed up to the Muir snowfield on this beautiful Labor Day to get our September turns. There had been new snow on the upper part of the Muir snowfield a couple of days earlier, and we hoped that some of it still remained, thus sparing us yet another September of skiing old dirty snow.    We left the Paradise parking lot at 9:30, Silas hiking in his tennis shoes, me in my lightweight leather/fabric telemark boots. The air was very clear, and as we gained elevation we got good views of the volcanoes to the south of Mt. Rainier: Mt. St. Helens, Goat Rocks, Mt. Adams, Mt. Hood, and, in the far distance, Mt. Jefferson. There were only a couple of small snow patches left before Pebble Creek, but the section of the lower Muir snowfield just above was in better shape (quality and quantity) than in recent Septembers, with remnants of the new snow, especially along the edges. At about 8000' there was a very short rock band to cross, but otherwise it was all snow to Camp Muir. Near Moon Rocks the new snow was completely gone, exposing the nasty snow for which the Muir snowfield in late summer is famous. Right along Moon Rocks there was a nice strip of new snow, and from there to Camp Muir the snow was all new and smooth, with firn spiegel in many areas (a usual sign of good turns to come).    Sea level to 10,000 feet in 5 hours takes it toll on me, so I dozed a bit in the warm sun when we got to Camp Muir. There we ran into Pete (aka Bud) and Becky, and we decided to ski down together. The first 1000 feet of skiing were fantastic! The Muir snowfield is certainly not steep, but the new snow was so perfectly corned - softened on top, frozen underneath, fast, smooth - that it didn't matter. When we got to the old dirty snow, embedded with rocks, near Moon Rocks we traversed carefully to the left to get back to new snow, then skied to the short carry. Surprisingly, below the carry the skiing was (mostly) not too bad, though there was not much cover of new snow left. While hiking back to the car along Alta Vista we saw both the pile of bear scat reported by wolfs, and its likely source foraging down by the stream below us.     Charles

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