September 3, Paradise Glacier

Greg, Chuck, and myself headed out early on Saturday morning with not so high expectations for our September "ski" day.  We traveled in fog and breezy conditions until we arrived at the snout of the PG.  After a heavy stream of expletives crossed our minds, we continued up the far side of the PG on the ridge between the PG and the Cowlitz.  Rock fall was hazardous as I was struck a few times, but only a few bruises.  Realizing we couldn't safely go any higher with the decreased visibility and rock fall, we decided to "ski" a patch of dirty, blue, solid, mangled, glacier ice.  The scariest part was getting the skis on our feet while attempting to stand on the glacier!  Ice axe replaced ski poles b/c I thought it would be better to risk putting a small hole in my leg than fall in one of the bottomless crevasses that were just to the side and below us.  Crazy you say? Maybe just a wee bit.

Nevertheless, we "skied" it, only making 2-3 turns on the 30ft of solid, ridged, ice.  Greg didn't think that was enough, so he ended up skiing a patch of ice (maybe 80ft?) down on what used to be the lower PG.  Go Greg!

So, today was like, "Hey, let's go hiking...oh, is that something we can ski? Well, gee, I just happen to have my skis on my back-let's go for it!".  And then after laughing a bit this came out of our mouths: "What the hell were we thinking?" :)

To redeem ourselves, we will be looking for more Septemeber turns, but still count this one in these desperate times.  Sorry, have some good pics, but unable to get them on a web page at this time.  If you're really interested, I can email to you-let me know.

~Lara