Snoqualmie Mtn, 05/06/07

Gordy and I ascended glades on the SW side of the mountain to the W ridge where we looked into the back side.  A rising traverse on the S face took us to the false summit.  We skied the glades straight off the peak.  The corn was heavy, and the top 3-5 inches were unconsolidated.

Several hundred feet below the summit the south-facing snow was very unstable and started sloughing under the weight of our skis.  I unwittingly turned back into a slough I'd started above me and found myself on my butt taking a magic carpet ride.  My initial annoyance quickly turned to terror as the slough accelerated to about 30 mph.  I was headed straight for some trees and a convex slope and cliff band beyond that.  I was able to get my ski edges into the snow and slowly traverse off the magic carpet into some stationary snow.  More adrenaline than I needed.

After that we stuck to tight trees and did a lot of traversing for a about 500 vert.  The snow was quite consolidated for the last 2,000' and we only had to contend with the usual route finding problems.

Watch out for the mushy corn on steep south-facing slopes!