April 6, 2005, Chair Peak NF

Inspired by reports of powder on Snoqualmie Mt. khayak and I met in the Alpental lot shortly before 10:00 today looking for a nice day tour - unfortunately Sky's blower pow seemed to have evaporated, or at least turned to a slightly heavier form of water over the last two days.

Since the bottom 1,000 ft of Snoqualmie looked like boot packing over mineral and vegetable matter, we turned our attention to the Source Lake Trail and headed for Chair Peak. An ocean of mank awaited for our skinning pleasure; a slow and tedious slog in beautiful hazy sunshine and spring temps. Fresh snow was well bonded to the multiple crust layers underneath; our main concern was staying out of the path of the boulder-sized "pinwheels" rolling down the hill and the torrents of wet snow, ice and rock flowing down off the cliffs higher up.

Skiing down the back side of Chair Peak (north face) was actually pretty good; about a foot of heavy fresh (but not so heavy as the south facing aspects) - again, the main objective was to stay out of reach of the snowballs chasing us down the hill.

Skin across Snow Lake was quite slow as well (forget about skating) due to the depth and stickiness of the snow.

Decent turns were had coming back in the Chair Peak basin as well, but the ski out along the Source Lake Trail was really a workout - each creek crossing required side-stepping up the opposite bank, more work than skinning up the hill!

More pictures here . . .