November 22, Rock Mountain

Drove over Stevens Pass yesterday morning for about 8.5 miles to the Rock Mountain TH.  Started up the trail at 7:30.  I was pleasantly suprised to see that someone had hiked the trail maybe the day before.  Unfortunately that person turned around at about 4500' in about waist deep snow...poor guy...anyway donned skins and continued upwards towards the ridge top.  The winds were really strong along the ridge so skinned just below the ridge on the E slope.  Continued along this route to the ridge above and W of Rock Lake.  The winds were really ripping here.  Made 6400' at about noon, and had to hunker down amid a patch of trees to keep from being blown back down the mountain.  The winds ripping from the N-NE. Hung out in the trees thinking that the winds might subside somewhat but they kept up and got stronger the longer I waited.  Decided just to descend from that point instead of continuing up any farther.  Skied SSE towards Schilling Creek.  Awesome turns on open slopes from 6400'-5500' where you enter sparce trees.  Continued down to 4500' into Schilling Creek drainage where I started to contour along the slope back towards the hiking trail.  The snow was super deep all the way down to 4500' where it started to get a little thin especially on the S aspect of the hikers trail.  You could probably ski down a little farther into Schilling Creek before contouring, but you start getting into more alder the lower you go.  As you get lower towards the creek the slope gets steeper and there are some tricky areas as you're contouring, but the snow was super stable, so that eased the nerves in a couple spots...  Anyway, so much for the forecast sunny skies, but a great tour.  
~Ros