Tam McArthur Rim, March 17-20
3/15/11
2851
3
I spent the weekend with 8 other friends camping and ski touring along the Tam McArthur Rim located in the Three Sisters Wilderness just outside of Sisters Oregon. We stayed in style in the yurts provided by the 3 Sisters Backcountry guides and toured day trips from there. The nice thing about being hauled in by sled is you have more time to ski... I didn't keep track but I think the sled ride in is about 1/2 hour.
Kudo's to my friend Andrew who organized this trip and led a well done safety meeting prior to hitting the slopes opening up the conversation to everyone. Three of the people in our group I had never skied with before yet the level of respect for each persons abilities and expectations was exceptional. Nothing perfect of course... and our transitions were painfully slow, but for a group of 9 sticking together we managed quite a few runs. There was a good thread here in TAY about GD where one person mentioned something about following the person with the least comfort level as opposed to a majority rule... Liking this concept, I brought this up and in the end applied it to a situation... more on that later :)
Prior to our arrival I monitored the Central Oregon Avalanche Association web site, but never found any avalanche forecasting rating/data, only incident reports and observations. We were told by the guides on arrival the avi danger was high... after arriving at the yurts we set out for the trees and glades just behind the yurts for safer touring. A quick CT test on an open more exposed glade proved stable showing a weak layer at about 12" and then about 3' down (CT30) that did not propegate on the ET test. At this site, the second skier set a small point release at the 12" layer that sluffed nicely. this would be the trend for the weekend.... lots of sluffing everywhere.
Friday, still concerned of the high avi danger and zero blizzard visibility, we toured across the valley to a place I think the locals called the Pyramid where we skied tees and glades on an ~east aspect due north of the Pyramid feature. Knee deep hero powder here... thigh deep in places. Easy touring and great skiing in lustful powder was the order of the day.
Saturday gave us our first real temporary break in the endless blizzard. Great clear views of the terrain, the rim, and an occasional peak of N Sister and a one minute appearance of Broken Top. The place was buzzing with the sound of weekend snowmobiles operating at lake level just outside the wilderness boundary. This also brought a crowd of weekend warrior ski tourers operation in the area as well. We toured high up on the rim and out into the more open bowls. Stability observations were in our favor we skied off the nose of what I think is called the East Peak, east aspect... I stayed lower along the rim positioned adjacent to a cornice with partner Colleen to observe our group descending where another skier entered the slope next to me fracturing the cornice about 15 feet each side of me. I tried to set it off, but it wouldn't budge. With pressure to connect with the rest of the group, now all safely down I was tempted to jut across this slab onto the slope (now tracked out by the many groups up there) but my partner was not comfortable with that at all. Radio contact with the group increased the pressure to get moving... but I realized what I brought up in the safety meeting mentioned earlier. Interestingly enough when I asked her where she wanted to ski out of here she pointed to the top of the nose of the highest point... also the steepest point! With our skins already peeled it was an easy boot pack up there. We skied this one at a time, it was fun to see her push her telemark skills on the steeper longer slope she did a great job and huge grins the rest of the day. Separated from the group now, we checked in via radio and then skied more runs together in the "playground" area well into the evening ...enjoying more deep powder was the order for the day :)
Sunday came with rising temps and a huge shovel session just to get out of the yurts. We only did one run while waiting for the guides to pick us up for the sled ride out. We toured up to the rim just above camp, snowing but heavy and wet I was getting soaked. I called it quits in trade for the last of the keg at the yurts and the rest of us did not seem to argue. Enjoyed a good long run in more typical heavy cascade snow right to the yurts where the next group was arriving....
memories to last a lifetime :)
Kudo's to my friend Andrew who organized this trip and led a well done safety meeting prior to hitting the slopes opening up the conversation to everyone. Three of the people in our group I had never skied with before yet the level of respect for each persons abilities and expectations was exceptional. Nothing perfect of course... and our transitions were painfully slow, but for a group of 9 sticking together we managed quite a few runs. There was a good thread here in TAY about GD where one person mentioned something about following the person with the least comfort level as opposed to a majority rule... Liking this concept, I brought this up and in the end applied it to a situation... more on that later :)
Prior to our arrival I monitored the Central Oregon Avalanche Association web site, but never found any avalanche forecasting rating/data, only incident reports and observations. We were told by the guides on arrival the avi danger was high... after arriving at the yurts we set out for the trees and glades just behind the yurts for safer touring. A quick CT test on an open more exposed glade proved stable showing a weak layer at about 12" and then about 3' down (CT30) that did not propegate on the ET test. At this site, the second skier set a small point release at the 12" layer that sluffed nicely. this would be the trend for the weekend.... lots of sluffing everywhere.
Friday, still concerned of the high avi danger and zero blizzard visibility, we toured across the valley to a place I think the locals called the Pyramid where we skied tees and glades on an ~east aspect due north of the Pyramid feature. Knee deep hero powder here... thigh deep in places. Easy touring and great skiing in lustful powder was the order of the day.
Saturday gave us our first real temporary break in the endless blizzard. Great clear views of the terrain, the rim, and an occasional peak of N Sister and a one minute appearance of Broken Top. The place was buzzing with the sound of weekend snowmobiles operating at lake level just outside the wilderness boundary. This also brought a crowd of weekend warrior ski tourers operation in the area as well. We toured high up on the rim and out into the more open bowls. Stability observations were in our favor we skied off the nose of what I think is called the East Peak, east aspect... I stayed lower along the rim positioned adjacent to a cornice with partner Colleen to observe our group descending where another skier entered the slope next to me fracturing the cornice about 15 feet each side of me. I tried to set it off, but it wouldn't budge. With pressure to connect with the rest of the group, now all safely down I was tempted to jut across this slab onto the slope (now tracked out by the many groups up there) but my partner was not comfortable with that at all. Radio contact with the group increased the pressure to get moving... but I realized what I brought up in the safety meeting mentioned earlier. Interestingly enough when I asked her where she wanted to ski out of here she pointed to the top of the nose of the highest point... also the steepest point! With our skins already peeled it was an easy boot pack up there. We skied this one at a time, it was fun to see her push her telemark skills on the steeper longer slope she did a great job and huge grins the rest of the day. Separated from the group now, we checked in via radio and then skied more runs together in the "playground" area well into the evening ...enjoying more deep powder was the order for the day :)
Sunday came with rising temps and a huge shovel session just to get out of the yurts. We only did one run while waiting for the guides to pick us up for the sled ride out. We toured up to the rim just above camp, snowing but heavy and wet I was getting soaked. I called it quits in trade for the last of the keg at the yurts and the rest of us did not seem to argue. Enjoyed a good long run in more typical heavy cascade snow right to the yurts where the next group was arriving....
memories to last a lifetime :)
more pics, for some reason they wouldn't go with the OP
sorry for the low quality pics, but I ran out of patience editing copies down to the measly 260kb size limit.
Sweet! I love Tam McArthur and the huts! Stability has been sketch this year, but finding plenty of safe powder in there hasn't been too much of a problem. The area and scenery are second to none for central Oregon. Glad you had a good time!
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