Feb-11: Baker BC -- Moonlight and Saragustri
2/15/06
WA Cascades West Slopes North (Mt Baker)
2191
0
Reports last week confused me. NWAC's weather station at Baker showed temperatures up to 43 degrees, freezing levels were reported up to 8500 Ft, including night temperartures. Yet, the Baker site spoke of 30 degree morning temperatures and reports were trickling in mentioning patches of skiable snow on some northern aspects. By noon Friday I had been made so disoreinted by these reports that I was no longer able to properly perform my assigned economic functions, so I called in a sick half-day and headed for the upper parking lot. I had accidentally put my skis and winter camping gear in the Rav in the morning.
I skinned past gleeful boarders speaking of face shots in the BlueBerry chutes. (For you from out of the PNW, you have to understand that the concept of "face shots" hereabouts often gets extended to include a spray of crystals under the chin.) It was a hopeful sign.
By two thirty I was on the Swift/Wells Creek divide, under Ptarmigan's north side, looking at the results of extensive wind. The snow's surface was alternating patches of somewhat frozen saragustri, pebbled boilerplate, and the occasional patch of windblown silt not yet congealed into the pervasive concretity of the pack.
That bowl/chute on the right side of the picture is where the blown snow landed. It looked like the goods, but the slab chances were too high to ski solo. Here is another view of that NW chute on Ptarmigan: http://media.admcs.wwu.edu/video/test/stills/web/ptarmigan-nw.jpg
I dropped down into the Wells Creek drainage and found a patch of trees that provided enough respite from the constant winds to allow for a meagre camp.
Camp set up, I returned to the Col to seek continuous lines of the uncongealed silt. Each lap was made on less fresh, and more saragustri and boilerplate as the afternoon cooling commenced. After dinner, I took a sunset lap, and found even less loose snow.
By 2:30 AM, I was out of sleep positions that did not hurt, and the moonlight called. The light was bright enough to ski, but I found a headlamp needed for the customary fiddling with Dynafits -- locating the toe holes, getting the ski pole tip into the volcano. The run back down was less fun than the skin up. There was too dim a light to be able to discern the subtle colors indicating looser snow, so each turn had to be prepared for anything -- or everything. In fact, the run down was so disatisfactory that I was reduced to the only logical alternative - I took another moonlight lap!
In the morning I could see that the 'schrund under the Park Headwall that had been covered last weekend was again open and gaping: http://media.admcs.wwu.edu/video/test/stills/web/park.jpg . On the South sid of Table I found a set of tracks on a rib coming down from about where you would jump into Little Alaska on the north side. I have never seen tracks here before, but have considered this line on occasion http://media.admcs.wwu.edu/video/test/stills/web/table-s.jpg.
I clattered back to Artists's Point, only to witness the beginnings of the most horrendous invasion ever experienced. There were at least a hundred people trundling around the Artist's Point ridge, most on snowshoes. Skiing down, I passed another hundred on their way up. In the upper parking lot, there were 116,825 people milling around with snowshoes, goretex peddle pushers, and no limits of unbelievable pieces of snow equipment. OK, I lost exact count, but surely there were more than necessary!
Oh yes, the best snow of the trip? It was in the Blueberry Chutes. Cheap data was stupendous! Sometimes a guy just thinks too much.
For Sunday, I think if you find a steep slope of NE to SE exposure that has not been scoured by the wind, you would likely find decent snow. The Cornice Gully on Herman was producing squeals of delight, but the slightly more south facing Rock Garden was crust.
I think that the Stoneman might be facing away from the week's sun enough to be a go, but the approach would be horrendous.
I skinned past gleeful boarders speaking of face shots in the BlueBerry chutes. (For you from out of the PNW, you have to understand that the concept of "face shots" hereabouts often gets extended to include a spray of crystals under the chin.) It was a hopeful sign.
By two thirty I was on the Swift/Wells Creek divide, under Ptarmigan's north side, looking at the results of extensive wind. The snow's surface was alternating patches of somewhat frozen saragustri, pebbled boilerplate, and the occasional patch of windblown silt not yet congealed into the pervasive concretity of the pack.
That bowl/chute on the right side of the picture is where the blown snow landed. It looked like the goods, but the slab chances were too high to ski solo. Here is another view of that NW chute on Ptarmigan: http://media.admcs.wwu.edu/video/test/stills/web/ptarmigan-nw.jpg
I dropped down into the Wells Creek drainage and found a patch of trees that provided enough respite from the constant winds to allow for a meagre camp.
Camp set up, I returned to the Col to seek continuous lines of the uncongealed silt. Each lap was made on less fresh, and more saragustri and boilerplate as the afternoon cooling commenced. After dinner, I took a sunset lap, and found even less loose snow.
By 2:30 AM, I was out of sleep positions that did not hurt, and the moonlight called. The light was bright enough to ski, but I found a headlamp needed for the customary fiddling with Dynafits -- locating the toe holes, getting the ski pole tip into the volcano. The run back down was less fun than the skin up. There was too dim a light to be able to discern the subtle colors indicating looser snow, so each turn had to be prepared for anything -- or everything. In fact, the run down was so disatisfactory that I was reduced to the only logical alternative - I took another moonlight lap!
In the morning I could see that the 'schrund under the Park Headwall that had been covered last weekend was again open and gaping: http://media.admcs.wwu.edu/video/test/stills/web/park.jpg . On the South sid of Table I found a set of tracks on a rib coming down from about where you would jump into Little Alaska on the north side. I have never seen tracks here before, but have considered this line on occasion http://media.admcs.wwu.edu/video/test/stills/web/table-s.jpg.
I clattered back to Artists's Point, only to witness the beginnings of the most horrendous invasion ever experienced. There were at least a hundred people trundling around the Artist's Point ridge, most on snowshoes. Skiing down, I passed another hundred on their way up. In the upper parking lot, there were 116,825 people milling around with snowshoes, goretex peddle pushers, and no limits of unbelievable pieces of snow equipment. OK, I lost exact count, but surely there were more than necessary!
Oh yes, the best snow of the trip? It was in the Blueberry Chutes. Cheap data was stupendous! Sometimes a guy just thinks too much.
For Sunday, I think if you find a steep slope of NE to SE exposure that has not been scoured by the wind, you would likely find decent snow. The Cornice Gully on Herman was producing squeals of delight, but the slightly more south facing Rock Garden was crust.
I think that the Stoneman might be facing away from the week's sun enough to be a go, but the approach would be horrendous.
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