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December 29-30 Kendall Adventure Zone hero pow

12/29/15
WA Snoqualmie Pass
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Posted by kamtron on 12/30/15 11:02am
I spent the last 2 days in the Kendall adventure zone. Yesterday we went in via Gold Creek sno-park, toured through the lakes, and skied the mainline chute. Setting the bootpack out had us worked, so we skied S facing slopes back to the 2nd lake and departed. Today we went in via Commonwealth and skinned up to the top of Stirling Direct. Two of our party skied that while two of us climbed the Spoonman face. The snow was incredibly stable and shred-able powder, so we skied that line. Our beta was limited, so we chose conservative lines down the steep convex spine face. This was followed by a lap of the Silver Twins, and out via the Commonwealth again by dusk.

The skintracks and bootpacks are in, and the powder is top-quality! Get some. Photos later.
sounds like a great day! definitely post some pics.


Some photos of the 2 days are here:
https://goo.gl/photos/y8jjMfUkQBwjNfva9

Thanks to whoever put in the track to the top of Stirling, and to my awesome partners Brendan, Marina, and Will.

Nice, saw ur tacks as I headed up to Alpy yesterday. Very inspiring. Good work!!!

Mike and I followed up on this tour today (31st), and several others approached via Kendall, leaving any remaining untouched hero pow lines to the more creative out there. Really nice out, and thanks for the skin track! Beautiful bluebird day with some stiff winds on the ridge tops, blowing beautiful snow plumes all around.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLtkw6wuYAs

As I was to discover, some of that snow is blowing onto hoarfrost crystals in places. I set off a small, shallow windslab while skinning up to the 'mainline' chute, which carried me about 50-100 feet. Luckily small, shallow, and open terrain. We found that it was safe to alternatively skin up one the other chutes which had not yet experienced wind loading, but there was surface hoar on these slopes, and others. Something to watch out for (and avoid) while it remains cold and windy!



just a conditions update... 

here's a  pic of  Kendall west ridge area Dec. 30 -


We traveled through the same area the next day Dec. 31. None of the ski tracks in the above photo were extant. They were all blown over and there was a lot of highly reactive wind slab -

This cracked while skinning (our skin track is just above to the left of photo). Wouldn't want to be on a steep slope with a lot of this. We didn't go higher here...

but changed plans, did a lot of testing, and still had a great day.

Encountered several other instances of wind slab along the way. I imagine today and the next couple of days with all the wind we've been having will entail even more tentative travel.






I'm glad to hear people got out again yesterday! Those winds were brutal (I tried going up Mt. Snoqualmie's S ridge for a change and got shut down by wind).

Here are a couple inline photos.

Opening the Mainline chute on a rope:




Trying not to overstoke as we approach Spoon Man:


Our tracks on Spoon Man (next time, more fall line!)


Marina shredding hero pow in Twins!

author=cumulus link=topic=35268.msg144646#msg144646 date=1451683448]
here's a  pic of  Kendall west ridge area Dec. 30 -


Cumulus, I'm curious, where exactly is this W ridge spot?

Kendall W ridge right where the skin track pops out. Super popular of late. You may have gone by it when you exited via the Commonwealth from the twins...though you may have dropped in earlier, rather than traversing. Lookers right of the Kendall Peak Avalanche of April 9th, 2010.

Great to see slope testing  before skiing. Once a skin track is in place seems some folks don't test at all, not even a ski cut, just drop right in, hand over all authority...



Nice pics and nice spine line too!

Went back yesterday 1/3/16 and found such different conditions! A lot of tree bombs had brought down the quality of the tree skiing, while the wind had scoured pretty much everything else. We went with the plan to ski CT chute, but bailed due to difficult travel and some wind slabs on the approach. It still was nice to get out and tour through the lakes. The chutes need a refresh before they're worth it again.

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december-29-30-kendall-adventure-zone-hero-pow
kamtron
2015-12-30 19:02:21