October 31, 2004, Stevens Pass

Kenji and I headed to Stevens Pass with the telemetry reports indicating 12" new.  The original plan was to ski Rock Mountain.  Heading over the Pass at 8:00am, we found limited visibility and LOTS of new snow.  Winter was definitely here!  As we anticipated, the Smith Brook road was snowbound, and rather than attempting to find the summer trail from Hwy 2, we opted for the lift area which offered plenty of easy access options.  

We managed to get into the parking lot, while bottoming out the car and wondering about getting out.  Two other parties were gearing up, and we were soon on the climb up the Big Chief run.  7th Heaven was tempting, but seemed surer to have hidden rocks.  We found 2' deep snow with protrusions of brush, making the going slow for the day.   But wow, who's complaining with powder in October.  Soon found ourselves at the top of Southern Cross and after a quick bite, traversed toward Big Chief Mtn for a nice 1000' tree run in 2-3' of powdery conditions.  Found ourselves being cautious keeping tips up, without a firm base and lots of evident brush and underlying tree limbs.

We worked our way back to the main runs, and back up with time for another run on the backside after a tiring break of trail.  A really nice run down with afternoon sun breaks gave us plenty of smiles.  The doubleblack diamond and big chief runs turned out better than expected back to the car, with brush dodging turning into an imaginery salomon course.

Gladly we were able to get out of the parking lot without incident as we passed by the KOMO 4 News van missing out on the evening news interview opp.

This was my first year of turns all year for 12 straight months -- getting Oct 1st on the Palmer Gl in summer conditions from the Silcox hut, then winter conditions at Stevens.  Doesn't get much better for Oct in my book.