Home > Trip Reports > Nov 22, 2013, Mount Snoq, Slot ice

Nov 22, 2013, Mount Snoq, Slot ice

11/22/13
WA Snoqualmie Pass
5338
13
Posted by tabski on 11/22/13 6:57am
Went to "check it out," ended up extreme skiing. Bootpacked on firm snow intermittently following an old track from the car to the top. The group who set the track was a lot smarter than us; their tracks showed that they descended back down instead of testing their edge sharpness in the Slot. 

One of our group members skied in from the ridge, the other two of us downclimbed 100' before attaching skis to feet. We found extremely slick, uneven, generally non-breakable rain crust from top to bottom. Significant 6-8' bergschrund halfway down, passable on left. refrozen grapefruit-sized wet rubble near the bottom, some smoother, chalkier ice offered less treacherous conditions on gentler slopes. Noticed a very small slab release while skiing some sluff-deposited snow over rain crust; will be interesting to see how the interface between the crust and new snow plays out. Made a quick exit with boot crampons, glad to have the pointy stuff.

"Skied" down the Phantom to near the second rockband in the forest, tromped the rest of the way out, back in Seattle for lunch.

All in all, we encountered some of the most treacherous conditions I've ever seen on a non-volcanic Cascades peak, accomplished our first ever "skins-free" Slot lap, and had an excellent time.

Go north, man.



Sounds like a "wonderful" time. I was afraid of all the rain and the cold temperatures afterwards. Danger lurks everywhere!

Definitely sounds like a double black diamond!


Sounds as though you got to ski in typical East Coast conditions.  With some more practice you'll be ready for a trip to steep rinks of the Northeast!

Of course there are a number of us that left there for deeper pastures...

Good Work!!!

And I thought we had it funky being the likely first errant team down that thing last November. 

Interesting how obstacles reveal themselves early season: that 'schrund, and giant shark-fin boulder that gets entirely covered pretty quickly.  You probably boosted a stunt off it, eh?

Thanks for the info.

Thanks Drew and Jesse for an incredibly gorgeous hike, great humor and a reason to put the spikes on and enjoy winter...your humility allowed us to occasionally use the adverb 'terrifying' with comfort and ease...let's hope after this high pressure, the next storm comes in wet!

how very euro.  I hope someone followed your tracks.....


training for alaska.
b

Good show.  A good example of the axiom "There are only two types of snow: good snow or a bad attitude".

Many a trip to the White Mountains of New Hampshire ended up like your trip - you made the effort to get to the "skiing", might as well go through with it...I can remember being completely gripped from top to bottom on the Hillmans Highway - delightful skiing when good snow - absolutely terrifying with boilerplate!

Thanks for the info. Was on the other side of the coin on sunday and it was t-shirt margarita type stuff.

https://vimeo.com/80238938

That was a nice video - I liked the different viewpoint of a day out in the BC.  It's not all about the down (almost though!)

Plus exquis! Now you know how the snowbroers feel on anything besides sick pow! ;D

Reply to this TR

11408
nov-22-2013-mount-snoq-slot-ice
tabski
2013-11-22 14:57:25