Oct27/07,Table Mountain

Nick BC and I were approached last week by a TAYer, who shall remain nameless, about the possibility of skiing at Baker this weekend. Communication lines were interrupted Friday, but Nick and I decided to go ahead on the oft chance that we would still cross paths. We had just arrived at the upper Baker Ski Area parking lot when Scotsman and his husky pulled in beside us. So one TAYer replaced another TAYer.

    The snow volume had shrunk from last Saturday's reports of 1-2 feet at car level, but there was still more than my first trip of the month. There was enough snow coverage by Austin Pass to skin. However, we abandoned our original plan of climbing to the top of the Shuksan Arm. It appeared that there was more rock than snow. The snowfield on Table's eastern flank looked ski able, so we took some turns there (photo 1). We dropped around to the summer trail on the south side of Table. Snow was absent from the first section just past the trees so we decided to follow a reasonable smooth 300' line down instead of staying on the trail. (photo 2+3)

  Traveling cross-country we worked our way through the rock gardens and drainage systems to reach the starting point of the Ptarmigan Ridge trail. Here we met Slo-Steve and his brother who were exploring the area for the first time. After some refreshments we had several rewarding runs in soft snow on the east side of the ridge connected to Ptarmigan Mountain. We returned on the Table Mt. trail which turned out to be about 90% snow covered. After skiing down to Austin Pass we still had not had enough ski time , so we slid down the road to the Meadows visitor center. Except for the hikers on the road we had only seen a few people all day. We got our share of the sunshine, enjoyed good companionship and even made some decent descents.