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Feb 4, 2014, Paradise Powder

2/4/14
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
3482
4
Posted by GoodLife on 2/4/14 12:26pm
There's already a few reports from the past few days, just wanted to say that the powder is still going strong!  We found 1-2ft of very unconsolidated light snow, and still tons of fresh tracks left to be had.  We skied laps on various aspects of Mazama Ridge and on the either side of the Alta Vista ridge.  Mazama appeared to be super stable, with no sluff and no whomping or any other noise.  We did discover some wind loading along the west side of the Alta Vista ridge, with a few inches of sluff in the trees at the top.  We even got a tiny bit of sun at the end and a glimpse of the upper mountain!! Hopefully the forcasted wind doesn't screw too much up!
Thanks for pointing us in the right direction!  We went back the next day and the wind had done some damage, but still lots of good snow around. 

Here is some video...

https://vimeo.com/86054094

Hot damn! That looked really fun.

Beautiful vid & soundtrack, thanks Carl!  'Bundys' is one of my favorite powder runs, but it's no longer as fine as a couple days ago.

Took a short spin this afternoon up to the base of Pan & down Edith Basin.  Telemetry remains broken, but there must have been tremendous E winds the past two days before the most recent 2-4" of freshies.  Exposed areas like the base of Pan, Edith and Bundys are about half smooth powder and half sharp-crested 2-3' snow dunes with patches of foot-high fluted semi-sastrugi, tough to see in the flat light.

I'd guess there is potential for 'reverse-lee' windslabs on the normally windward west-facing slopes, so take care this weekend, folks.


Beautiful skiing and photography!

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feb-4-2014-paradise-powder
GoodLife
2014-02-04 20:26:42