June 12 Alpental / Lower Phantom Descent
6/15/08
WA Snoqualmie Pass
3201
1
The intent was to skin Summit West to get my wife and I used to the equipment and practice this funny "skinning" technique (hint - don't lift the ski). Summit West turned out to have melted a lot in the last week -- continuous snow only started about halfway up the slope. We drove to Alpental instead, which looked nice.
There is still a good 18-24 inches at the bottom, mostly wet soft snow. It looked like it had gotten some nice powder followed by rain, but it's melting fast in any case. I saw several others skinning up or skiing down, so even at 3PM on a weekday there were others out there.
After a little practice, I ended up skinning up the Phantom Descent on the other side of the river, up to the bottom of the waterfalls. This west-facing slope may only be skiable another day or two, but gave me a nice set of turns and some beautiful waterfall shots that normally require some hiking. I would have lapped it, but my son had decided he didn't want to ski and was getting bored of playing in the snow (gasp!), so we headed back down the mountain.
There is still a good 18-24 inches at the bottom, mostly wet soft snow. It looked like it had gotten some nice powder followed by rain, but it's melting fast in any case. I saw several others skinning up or skiing down, so even at 3PM on a weekday there were others out there.
After a little practice, I ended up skinning up the Phantom Descent on the other side of the river, up to the bottom of the waterfalls. This west-facing slope may only be skiable another day or two, but gave me a nice set of turns and some beautiful waterfall shots that normally require some hiking. I would have lapped it, but my son had decided he didn't want to ski and was getting bored of playing in the snow (gasp!), so we headed back down the mountain.