Home > Trip Reports > Nov 10 - Heliotrope Ridge, Butter Snow

Nov 10 - Heliotrope Ridge, Butter Snow

11/11/13
WA Cascades West Slopes North (Mt Baker)
3076
5
Posted by kciari on 11/11/13 3:31am
Given how many people were up on Helio yesterday, I'm surprised no one else has written a TR.

We were able to drive all the way to the trailhead in a VW Golf. Someone else showed up in a Honda with bald tires. There was a bit of snow on the roads at the trailhead, but totally doable in pretty much any vehicle.

We started hiking just after 9am with high clouds and good visibility. They've rebuilt the bridge, so follow the trail from the parking lot. We quickly came to snow on the trails, but it was a long way before it was consistently skinable. We definitely got ambitious and put skis on too early. Especially with the warming, I'd recommend hiking all the way to treeline (about 5300') before you skin up. Bring approach shoes, that trail on the way out is brutal in skiboots.

We reached the ridge where we saw a number of tents and other skiers ahead. From there we could see our high point, and mostly just followed the skin highway to the top of of the ridge. We all regretted not having skin wax as our skins clumped up on the way up.

The snow at the top (~7300') was sticky but fun - kind of sliced like butter - definitely very carveable. Visibility was okay, with  mostly flat lighting, making it was hard to get good pictures of our turns. We only had time for one lap (lost time when we had to mobilize a ski recovery after one got away - word to the wise: buy leashes) but we made it count, skiing down a little past treeline. There were definitely rocks, but no one got a core shot and we all had an awesome time. Great way to spend my 25th month in the backcountry!
Thanks for posting the beta… I'm glad to hear the road is easy

That tutu is going to be awesome on a waist deep blower pow day.

author=ND link=topic=29563.msg124082#msg124082 date=1384202578]
That tutu is going to be awesome on a waist deep blower pow day.


Thanks! I'm looking forward to skiing some tutu-deep pow!

thanks for the report Kristina

Awesome!

Looks like Baker is the best place for the foreseeable future to still get the goods!


Reply to this TR

11369
nov-10-heliotrope-ridge-butter-snow
kciari
2013-11-11 11:31:11