Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Snoqualmie Skiing - 01.28.09

Steve called at 8:30 this morning and said he wasn't working. He wanted to know if I wanted to go ski. I told him to pick me up in an hour.

Since I wanted to be back in town at 4pm, and since avy conditions weren't great, we decided to poach some lines at Snoqualmie West, which was not opening until 4pm for night skiing.

We skinned up from the far west parking lot through the trees. There was about 7-8" of fresh snow on top of the previous crust. Steve was able release a few small slabs just above the water towers. We skinned to the top of the Pacific Crest Chair and transitioned for a run. West of the chair was ungroomed, while everything east of the chair had been groomed. We made a run down the lift and through Julie's on surprisingly good soft powder. At our bottom transition, a ski patroller came by on a snow mobile and told us to watch out for the groomers, and to have fun. For the second run, we decided we would hit the 360° bowl for more powder. However, conditions had changed and lighting was so flat we were having difficulty reading the slopes. The snow wasn't as good as the previous run. Most likely due to wind and periodic sun. So we skinned up one more time and hit the groomers all the way down to the lot.

The first run was best, and they deteriorated from there. Snow pack is horrible right now, and I would imagine the pass will get closed once or twice in the next few days due to avalanches.

We drove back and were in Seattle before 3pm.

Some pics are here.

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