Home > Trip Reports > June 10, 2012, Mt. McLoughlin, North and NE Bowls

June 10, 2012, Mt. McLoughlin, North and NE Bowls

6/10/12
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Posted by skiology on 6/13/12 5:37pm
Haven't seen much up here for the Oregon volcanoes so thought I'd throw up a TR for McLoughlin, which we did last Sunday, June, 10.

Access:
We approached via Fourmile Lake on the east side of the mountain.  We arrived late Saturday night and slept at the Fourmile Lake campground.  Road was clear except for a few remaining drifts that were easily passable except for one immediately before the campground that took two try's in my Sub Outback.  I'd expect it to be entirely clear by now.

Approach:
We had a very casual start of 8am hiking in trail shoes with skis/boots on pack for about 2miles (see map - red hash) using visual bearing that began with homogeneous dirt/downed trees/crap, then gradually transitioning to larger more frequent sections of snow.  We did not boot/skin up until we reached treeline and even then had to boot across for few lateral lines of rock/moraines in the first few minutes of being on skis.

Climb:
From treeline we worked our way (map solid red) up toward eastern edge of the northeast bowl and booted the eastern most couloir - if you can call it that - to grab the east ridge trail.  This was mostly for fun, though we did throw on boot crampons and use an axe which was needed toward the top. We were treated with exceptional views from the ridge including Mt Shasta to the south, Fourmile lake and Klamath lake to the east and the myriad of Oregon's volcanoes to the north.  We continued to boot just below the ridge line on the south side to stay on even snow and off loose rock which took us to the summit after a few breaks at about 1230/1pm.

Ski:
Once we gained the summit it was easy to see why so many people fuss about the exceptional ski lines off the north and northeast bowls.  Both have aesthetic lines crowned by large and small gendarmes.  Of the north and north east bowl, the north definitely has some 'pucker' factor, but not to say the NE isn't without its own consideration. After a good 30 minutes of hymm-and-haw, two of us skied the north bowl and two skied the northeast bowl (map- both in solid blue).  The north (as did the NE) skied right off the summit with time for about one or two turns before hitting the 'crux' of sorts, which is a rollover close to 50 degrees before dropping into the remaining 800 feet that sloped somewhere between 45-50 degrees.  The snow at top was firm but more 'Styrofoamy' and edge-able than icy.  At the bottom of that section we skied to the right of the bowl's prominent center gendarme into an incredible couloir of sorts (by Oregon standards) that went for another ~ 500-800 feet.  We traversed to the northeast bowl through a notch just above the main saddle of the ridge separating the bowls so that we could watch the rest of our party ski the NE bowl and take that last turns together.

Return:
After the prerequisite high fives and pics of our tracks we worked our way down on skis to nearly a mile of camp, returning at about 430/5pm
Thanks for the report, I'm thinking of heading down there in a week.

Thanks TR, skiology,
Welcome to TAY.

Thanks for the detailed report. Almost skied McLoughlin yesterday on the way back to Seattle from Shasta, but opted for several short easy roadside laps at Crater Lake instead (Hillman Peak and The Watchman, very nice corn on those NNW aspects from noon to 2pm).

How bad were the mosquitoes on McLoughlin?


author=Amar Andalkar link=topic=25100.msg105993#msg105993 date=1339692062]How bad were the mosquitoes on McLoughlin?




I was wondering the same thing, Amar : )

Mosquitos were not too bad.  But there's plenty of standing water so I'd suspect they'll become a problem once the temps start rising... but I'm no mosquito specialist.

John is somewhat underselling how unbelievable the descent was.  the NE bowl was velvety corn all the way down.  No hardpack, no crust, no runnels, no suncups.  Four mile lake campground is a spectacular place to base from.  Just don't bring the minivan.  Nice breezes off the water keep the bugs at bay.  No other skiers on the mountain; just two hikers postholing down....
Dave.

Wow, looks great!  And thanks for all the details -- definitely not a frequently skied (or at least posted-about) volcano.
Any hunch as to whether those bowls will still be good at the end of the month?

Hard to say how long McL will be skiable this year. From the ridge line the south face actually looked pretty good and I'd expect that to turn to before the N and NE bowls for obvious reasons, but that was over a week ago now. At a minimum, I'd think there'd be something to ski by the end of the month, but weather will determine if it's worth your while.  Maybe keep an eye on the snotels down there (http://www.or.nrcs.usda.gov/snow/maps/oregon_sitemap.html)...?

Attached is a pic of us coming up from the south side which shows pretty good coverage.

While I have the pics out, here's a shot of the north bowl.

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2012-06-14 00:37:43