May 11-13, 2018, Benzarino

5/11/18

1570

3

Posted by radka on 5/15/18 2:55pm

Friday – We leisurely drove up to Rainy Pass since highway 20 was opening at 10am. Cascadian Farms was open so the first milkshake was had. The snow banks at Rainy Pass were still about 5 feet deep and the DOT plowed lots of space for people to park. We skinned up to frozen Lake Ann and across, then onward to Heather and Maple Pass. Then we found a spot to set up camp on the ridge and melted snow for water. A few passing sprinkles occurred during the day. By dusk, the sky was clear. The evening was pretty calm until early morning when the wind really picked up.

Frisco

nighttime skies

the other end of Milky Way

Chateau Chapin

Saturday – The wind was strong enough that we decided it would be best to take down camp and stash it in a tree well. Our objective for the day was Benzarino and we didn't leave until a little after 11am. We thought the wind would be keeping the snow firm. Turns out the wind was only on the ridge. Everything else was already getting cooked. The ski down to Maple Creek produced good turns. Then we did a long traverse on the west side. It became pretty challenging in the trees due to the spring snowpack and tree wells. At some point it's more efficient to transition back to skinning.

From Maple Valley, the first 600-800' feet up to the bowls below the 2 summits of Benzarino is pretty steep. The drainage gullies here are melting out quickly and slide alder is popping up all over. Once all annoying the kick turns were out of the way, we reached easier terrain, and headed over to the SE ridge of the SW summit (the higher summit). Once we got there, we realized it was a lot more involved than we thought – many rock ribs\steps and steep gullies. So, we decided to head to the saddle between the 2 peaks, as the CAG reports the N Ridge to be class 3. Once we reached the saddle, the N Ridge looked a lot harder than class 3. The views were pretty great from here though, and we were satisfied with the tour. The ski back down to Maple Creek was better than expected, but certainly not hero corn.

We managed to find the last open water source on Maple Creek while heading back to camp and it wasn't a crazy steep snowbank dropping in to raging water either. From there it was another hour back to Maple Pass and we arrived around 8pm. We set the camp back up in a different spot once we figured out where the wind was calmest. By midnight, the remainder of the night was calm.

skiing from camp, Corteo

Goode

ascending the saddle

Benzarino

Goode, Stormking, and Logan

back at camp

Sunday – While packing up camp, the east face of Corteo was angry and shed snow multiple times. The plan was to exit via Rainy Lake. We considered skiing down to Lyell Glacier then up to the notch north of Frisco. But the day was already so hot by 11am that we decided to just ski out. Exiting via Rainy Lake is tricky business and we had to downclimb a steep 50-foot section before accessing the steep gully on the west side of the lake. We knew about the ramp between the waterfalls at the south end but didn't feel confident we'd be able to find it from above. This would the ideal exit though. The lake itself was still frozen but there were a few soft sections where water ran over my skis. I wouldn't bet on it still being frozen enough to cross next weekend though it wouldn't surprise me if it still was. From the outlet, we skied straight down to the highway, then skinned the snowbank along the road back to the car.

On the drive home, shortly before Diablo, traffic stopped in both directions for an hour while a motorcycle accident was cleared from the highway. Then more milkshakes were had at Cascadian Farms.