Heliotrope Ridge 10/3

The rumors are true!  The new snow season has indeed started.  I decided to go up north and see how things are on Baker.  Driving up the road the weather alternated between pouring rain, being sunny, or pouring rain in the sun.  Snowline was literally at the parking lot at the trailhead.  There was some sort of construction or destruction on the trailhead restroom which was making a god awful stink when I got there.  Luckily that was quickly left behind as I started up into a very drippy forest.  Within a couple of hundred feet of vertical things became progressively more frozen.  By the time I made my way up the climbers trail to the Hogback I was breaking through shin to knee deep fresh snow.  Not the lightest snow but not mash potatoes either.  All day it kept snowing off and on from tiny little ice crystals to big fat flakes. 
I took 2 laps on the hillside at the beginning of the Coleman Glacier.  Below that the rocks are not quite covered enough.  The light was horribly flat to the point of being completely blind but instead of everything being black all I could see was the same grayish white.  Complete skiing by braille.  Despite trying to stay close to the tracks that I had cut on the way up for some relief to see the snow by even that didn't work.  I skied off a 5 foot ledge that was right next to my trail that I didn't see at all until I went over it.  Being on teli gear I immediately assumed the perfect olympic ski jumper pose before face planting into the snow below.  Luckily I landed in deep soft snow instead of rocks so I came up laughing instead of in tears.  After the second lap it just wasn't worth continuing to struggle so I headed down.  Despite the challenging conditions I pretty much was grinning from ear to ear the whole drive home.  Snow is continuing to fall so Thu/Fri should have potential.