Home > Trip Reports > February 10, 2018, Snoqualmie Pass

February 10, 2018, Snoqualmie Pass

2/10/18
WA Snoqualmie Pass
2930
8
Posted by silaswild on 2/10/18 8:19am
.5-2" dust on a firm base made for reasonable skinning with a few slippery spots for folks without wall to wall skins. We enjoyed skiing the dust most on untracked south slopes 5400-3400'. We heard north facing slopes had a breakable crust at similar elevations. The air was calm and skies were blue, but we never found the creamy conditions we'd hoped. It was a beautiful day in the hills, especially with three dedicated sitters, plenty of bacon, and apres hot tub. Thanks ladies.
Damn Silas, ladies and bacon? Sounds like a great day!

author=silaswild link=topic=39654.msg159738#msg159738 date=1518308352]
We heard north facing slopes had a breakable crust at similar elevations.

Not sure where that was, because we didn't find it at all. I skied the Chair circumnav (counter-clockwise) for the first time and really enjoyed the tour and ambiance.

We found a nice 2-4" of fluff-on-crust above roughly 4k that skied nicely on low angle slopes. The main issue is the avy debris that has come down any steep slopes in the last rain-on-snow event. Skinning was slippery in many places. Ski crampons came in handy and we needed to boot a few places. N slope of chair was deceiving: nice snow on the upper low angle slopes but treacherous avy chunder below. Chair peak lake had good snow that warranted a hot lap, as did the smooth areas of Great Scott bowl. Towards the end of the day, snow that had softened earlier in the sun was refreezing into a breakable crust.

It was the busiest day I've ever seen in the backcountry! Lots of big groups enjoying the sun and low avalanche danger. We watched about 9 people descend Kaleetan peak, other folks hit the Holy Diver, saw a skinner to the Slot (bet that was an ice-fest), upper Chair peak basin, climbers plugging up the NE butt, etc.

author=kamtron link=topic=39654.msg159759#msg159759 date=1518380998]
It was the busiest day I've ever seen in the backcountry! Lots of big groups enjoying the sun and low avalanche danger. We watched about 9 people descend Kaleetan peak, other folks hit the Holy Diver, saw a skinner to the Slot (bet that was an ice-fest), upper Chair peak basin, climbers plugging up the NE butt, etc.


One day there will be 60+ people touring on the runout slopes of chair/ bryant couloir and many will get hosed at once.  I know it was pretty firm out there this weekend, but today's crowds can't seem to differ yesterdays conditons from 20'' of new in regards to travel practices. 

Groups of 10+, separated by maybe 50' or less, seems to be standard practice for popular S PASS routes on weekends. 

On a sunny Saturday last spring, I actually counted over 70 (for realz) people on Bryant/chair runout slopes, most in uphill travel mode within snowball-throwing distance from each other; that same day I had 2 friends involved in a serious wind slab incident on Bryant.

Over one shoulder I gazed upon the crowds climbing out of source lk. from my perch, over the other shoulder took photos of friends skiing a steep line above Bryant couloir.  They both skied into 2 different pockets that broke, took a ride in really steep terrain, and both landed on a small bench above large cliffs near the the bottom of the couloir.  Observations along the way on a variety of slope angles, elevations and aspects indicated 0 instability aside from loose snow.  I digress with this mini TR..  I guess my point is you can never be too certain of what instabilities are above your head, and how they might be triggered.  That's just one reason why 'we' implement safe travel practices on any given day.

Aside from the travel practices, today's group sizes are pretty distasteful (do I only speak for myself with this opinion?).  I wish folks would consider this, and how it affects the mountain experience for others when making ski tour plans/climbing plans/assembling a group.

I'm going to step out on a limb here and speculate that many of these travelers are inexperienced (1-2 seasons with touring gear), and with that feel less confident about terrain choice/decision making in small groups, so they sub-consciously gravitate to the "safety in numbers" mentality and invite the entire office/ cell phone contacts list-  in order to attain some sense of confidence in terrain they wouldn't know what to do with if each were alone. Or something to that effect..  I'm totally open to being wrong here.

I think it's important to allow for a slower, organic progression into the backcountry that is built off experience from trips taken with more 'experienced' partners and bc veterans who have a really good idea of how to approach things, learning from them along the way.  Even if you're a mega-ripper at the resort.  Also, a lot of the persons I see on skis in the mountains appear to have never downhill skied once in their life, but hey, the slot sounds good..


Though I agree completely with your sentiments, I simply can't help myself.


Ha! I did chuckle out loud from that... maybe because I am 32 y/o.

Frank writes truth!!

author=dberdinka link=topic=39654.msg159775#msg159775 date=1518408779]



This really captures the spirit of TAY these days ;-)
Frank, you're right. However, at the same time I think Saturday was a fine and safe day to be out.

author=kamtron link=topic=39654.msg159759#msg159759 date=1518380998]
Not sure where that was, because we didn't find it at all. I skied the Chair circumnav (counter-clockwise) for the first time and really enjoyed the tour and ambiance.



I think we leapfrogged with your group up to Chair Peak basin and dropped right behind you towards Snow Lake.  One of our party also prereleased on his first turn, then his heel tower popped off the post in the avy chunder, so we abandoned our circumnav attempt in favor of the 5040' hump east of Wright Lake.  Glad you guys had a good tour; sorry we forgot the keg!

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february-10-2018-snoqualmie-pass
silaswild
2018-02-10 16:19:12