December 1, 2007, Mt. Margaret
12/1/07
WA Snoqualmie Pass
3604
1
Charles et. al. are encouraged to move this over to December reports!
Tracy L. and I toured into the snowcovered glades of Mt. Margaret. Snow conditions took the form of ~18" of mostly unconsolidated barely wet powder overlying a moderately soft crust (wimpy pencil?) which, above ~4600ish feet, overlays soft stuff. As the snow coverage was insufficient to bury the flora, route finding was uncharacteristically interesting. Perhaps another 2' of consolidated snow is needed before it's in shape for quick and easy jaunts.
Test slopes in the trees on the steeper West facing slopes near the summit yielded easy shears on the crust, which seemed icier, less textured, and more poorly bonded to the overlying powder than that found in the clearcuts on SW aspects.
Morning snowmobilers were nice and courteous, a couple of evening snowmobilers were a little less so. The trip back to Seattle on the snowy roads was fun. Perhaps 2" of new before ~4 pm.
Great to get out and play in the snow!
Tracy L. and I toured into the snowcovered glades of Mt. Margaret. Snow conditions took the form of ~18" of mostly unconsolidated barely wet powder overlying a moderately soft crust (wimpy pencil?) which, above ~4600ish feet, overlays soft stuff. As the snow coverage was insufficient to bury the flora, route finding was uncharacteristically interesting. Perhaps another 2' of consolidated snow is needed before it's in shape for quick and easy jaunts.
Test slopes in the trees on the steeper West facing slopes near the summit yielded easy shears on the crust, which seemed icier, less textured, and more poorly bonded to the overlying powder than that found in the clearcuts on SW aspects.
Morning snowmobilers were nice and courteous, a couple of evening snowmobilers were a little less so. The trip back to Seattle on the snowy roads was fun. Perhaps 2" of new before ~4 pm.
Great to get out and play in the snow!
I definitely wouldn't go so far as to call it 'user group conflict', just that their throttles were a little more open before/when/after they passed us for comfort. As the SW side of Margaret's not yet filled in, we only interacted with them on the road up, not in the open areas. My limited experiences with snowmobilers at the Gold Creek access are invariably 90-95% positive.
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