April 25, Olympics, Steeple Rock

Last Saturday Chmnyboy (Tyler), dk_alaskan (Eric), my friend Alex and I headed to Steeple Rock. As Telemack described it in an earlier post, it is "that big spiky thing" a couple miles out the Obstruction Point road, east of Hurricane Ridge. Our goal was to ski the north facing slopes that drop into the headwaters of Morse Creek. The weather was great, clear skis and 25 degrees.
The road approach was on "very firm" refrozen snow, so when we reached the slope we needed to climb to access the north side and the route to the summit, we packed our skis and  booted up to the saddle which is about 100 ft below the summit. Once on the north facing approach to the summit, snow conditions improved to a couple inches of soft snow over a very skiable base. We quickly booted up the 50 degree pitch to the summit. Against better judgment, Alex and I had left our skis at the saddle, so we watched the other two ski the short, steep pitch from the top. We then skied the 1400 vf to the valley in great snow conditions through open glades. On our climb back out, we met Randobro and his friend Mike who had dropped one of the steep chutes off the summit ridge. By the time we regained the saddle to the east of the summit, the fog had set in. When we arrived here we met our friends Greg (Stormking) and his wife preparing for their ski descent. 
Pictures at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/GaryJanH/20090425SteepleRock#