March 25, 2005, Paradise

Due to the forecast Pineapple Express tdave and I each decided to pass on a weekend overnighter to the N. Cascades and opted instead to head to Paradise today for some fresh turns under generally overcast skies.

Pulled into the lot around shortly before 9 and saw one other vehicle...which had departed by the time I made it out of the can.

Skinned up through Edith Creek on 4" of light fresh.  Dug a pit at 6000' on Golden Gate face, 32 degree south facing aspect:  24" on top of the faceted early March crust.  The new snow had 4 crusts evenly dispersed in the new 24 with the top crust resting under the 4" of fresh.  In the compression test the top fresh crumbled on the the underlying crust at strike 6. The column remained intact thoughout the ensuing 24 strikes.  Sheared the top 4" off with relative ease.  Then broke the remaining 20" off the faceted March crust with moderate leveraging.

Traversed across Golden Gate and Geech faces over the ridgelet and into Super Bowl where we skied down the footbridge and crossed over to the Mazama Ridge uptrack.

Skied south and north facing slopes in Mazama Bowl.

Checking out the results in Mazama Bowl:


Worked our way up to Golden Gate, dropped in and enjoyed some nice turns there.  Then skinned up Geech Face next to Golden Gate and found the best snow of the day there.

Then down Bundy's and out the road to the lot...

Nice day.  Interesting to note that the west aspects held notably lighter snow than others that had received more direct light.  Many changes in snow conditions depending on aspect and altitude...  Interesting.  

On a photographic note.  Can anyone tell me why my inserted (linked) TR pics show up so pixilated?  The originals are much clearer.  Is there a solution to this blurriness?