Sept 30, 2011, Mt. Hood Cooper Spur part 1

I had intended to ski Mt. Baker, (thanks to Lynden Don and Jesski for the offers to join them), but realized with a little coaxing from a friend that those plans might be a little overzealous with Mt. Hood being much closer to home. So the shorter drive from Boise won out.

I left Boise at the crack of 10am, rolled into Hood River at 3pm. Did a little food shopping and then headed for Cloud Cap. Snow coverage looked very acceptable from the road on the way up, there was a little smoke in the air from a couple fires still burning in the area, but nothing to bad. I set up camp in the back of my Subaru, fired up the propane grill, ate some chicken sausages, and hit the sack.

Then the wind started..... and as the little suby got blown around with the gusts, I began to think of all the standing dead trees from previous fires around the campground. Then spent the rest of the night trying not to think about all the standing dead trees around the campground... 

Woke at 5:00, realized that was too early, way to dark, I had never been there before and didn't want to hike by headlamp. Slept a little more, then got on the trail about 6:30am. The weather was great, partly cloudy skies, warm temps, still windy though. Made good time on the trail up the Cooper Spur, hiked to the bottom of Tie In Rock in my trail shoes and was making my first of three laps at 10:30am. The next two laps were from the top of the Tie In Rock, about 9300',  since I now had my Ski Boots on and was crampon equipped.

The snow was surprisingly good. No suncups to speak of, a lot smoother than I had expected it to be, a couple ice patches, otherwise an inch of mildly dirty soft snow on a firm base. Back to camp by 2:30pm.

September 2011, month 11 in the bag......To Be Continued.....