June 22, 2011, Three Sisters, Various
6/22/11
OR elsewhere
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We did a bit of a traverse of the Three Sisters wilderness area yesterday. Starting at Pole Creek at 5am, we hiked for over a mile on trail with little sign of snow. Eventually the trail disappeared under snow and we worked our way up to treeline.
Our first goal was the Diller Headwall on Middle Sister. The bergschrund is wide open, with a tiny bridge in the middle.
We headed up the SE ridge with easy skinning conditions to the summit.
Skiing on the upper Diller cut loose sloughs that became impressively large. We should have woken up earlier.
It seemed a bit risky dealing with the bergschrund issues down low with all the snow above that we couldn't cut loose on such a hot day, so that plan was scrapped after a bit of the upper section was skied.
We skied down the SE ridge on decent corn around 10:30am.
We slogged across Chambers Lakes to climb the North Ridge of South Sister. After a monotonous skin, we booted up to the summit through a steeper constriction. Clouds were starting to pick up.
We skated across the summit crater and down the south side. The south side was a combination of mush and rime ice. I've yet to ski it in good conditions. It remains extremely easy to ski to the road via Devil's Lake. There are places to sneak a car in on the side of the road, but watch for high-speed boaters heading to the lakes.
Our first goal was the Diller Headwall on Middle Sister. The bergschrund is wide open, with a tiny bridge in the middle.
We headed up the SE ridge with easy skinning conditions to the summit.
Skiing on the upper Diller cut loose sloughs that became impressively large. We should have woken up earlier.
It seemed a bit risky dealing with the bergschrund issues down low with all the snow above that we couldn't cut loose on such a hot day, so that plan was scrapped after a bit of the upper section was skied.
We skied down the SE ridge on decent corn around 10:30am.
We slogged across Chambers Lakes to climb the North Ridge of South Sister. After a monotonous skin, we booted up to the summit through a steeper constriction. Clouds were starting to pick up.
We skated across the summit crater and down the south side. The south side was a combination of mush and rime ice. I've yet to ski it in good conditions. It remains extremely easy to ski to the road via Devil's Lake. There are places to sneak a car in on the side of the road, but watch for high-speed boaters heading to the lakes.
Awesome! My buddy and I are hoping to ski Broken Top later next week. Looks like it should still be good, weather depending. Nice pics of your trip!
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