June 10, 2012, White Pass - Sea to Ski

Last weekend we spent three nights in the Ocean Shores area with a group of people who have Road Trek vans like ours (40+ RTs).  When we told them that we were going skiing after we left there, they thought that we were either kidding or crazy!  After having freshly backed cinnamon rolls Sunday morning we headed for the mountains.  We arrived at White Pass around 3:30 and started climbing by 4PM.  We had to climb about 100 yards before reaching the snow.  We then followed the main lift up the Poma Face to the Cascade Cat Track that wraps climber€™s left around the mountain, then up to the Cascade Cliff where we traversed in and skied back down to the bottom.  The snow was great, the best that we€™ve skied so far this spring.  It made for some nice turns coming down.  It was deserted, there were no tracks where we skied although there was a layer of fresh snow, and the snow was continuous almost to the bottom except for the last 50 feet or so. 

From there we headed towards Mt. Rainier.  Just outside of the MRNP we followed a forest service road down into the forest and along the river where we found a perfect spot for spending the night €“ deserted and quiet except for the sound of the river.