June 8, 2010, Park Butte, Nordic Style

Paul and I skied up to Park Butte. Even if these pictures were good, they wouldn't do the trip justice. It was gorgeous and the skiing was fabulous. I wore plain Nordic gear (SNS, not SNS BC) with relatively short, skinny skis: Rossignol Evo Tour (no metal edges). Paul had beefier stuff.

We parked the car about a quarter mile from the trailhead. After walking the road a few feet, we skied to the start of the trail. We had to take off the skis before the bridge (the bridge was bare) but put them on after. Schriebers meadows didn't have much snow, but we managed to ski it just fine. We then went up the creek, staying to its right. We had to take off our skis to cross a tributary coming in from the right. This was a pretty easy rock hop, so our feet stayed dry. We then skied up high enough to cross the main creek. Even with less snow it looks like you could always go high enough to cross the creek (unless there is so little snow that you can't ski Morovitz meadows). After crossing the creek, we traversed up the big hill to the left of the creek. The snow was solid, so we just aimed for a spot a ways up. We took off our skis towards the top and kicked steps until we got to the top. We had to do a little bit of steep dirt climbing, but only a few feet.

From there the skiing became fabulous. We cruised to the other side of the meadows and then on up. We decided to follow the trail route up, mainly because it was so scenic (once you get close to the top, you can shortcut the trail by just following the ridge up). After cruising around and up, we took off our skis and walked the final few feet to the lookout. The clouds were moving in, but moving in slowly, so we had a fantastic view of everything.

The ski down was just as nice. It's almost all easy skiing from the lookout to the ridge above the creek. There is just a bit of challenging stuff, and even that isn't that hard. From the ridge next to the creek, we jumped over the top and headed down. I glissaded down, carrying my skis for a bit before traversing. Paul made a couple of parallel turns, followed by a long traverse and then two really pretty telemark turns. We crossed the creek again (higher this time) and made our way down. This was the most challenging part of the trip (especially for me). The snow was a bit faster and the slope a bit steeper. To make matters worse, things narrow a bit, so you get a bobsled effect. If there was a bit more snow, then I could have done a few more switchbacks. As it was, I had to snowplow a bit, which became tiring on the heavy snow and my light skis. I fell down a few times, but mostly just to stop myself from going too fast. After rock hopping the tributary, the slope eased and became nice again. We got back to Schriebers meadow and it was even more fun coming down. Despite the low snow, we could ski this way and that. This would make a very nice, easy destination in itself. The road skiing is pretty easy and the view of Baker from the meadow is really nice. Some pictures here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rossbl/sets/72157624245554368/