 |
Kris Haskins Staff Webpage |
Rainier NP - Castle Ski |
| February 28th 2009 |
The last week it had dumped a ton of snow in the mountains (and some in Seattle as well), so we decided it would be a great time to get our and do some backcountry skiing. Brian checked the avy conditions, and they were low to moderate below 7K feet, so we decided it would be a go. Brian, Jim, Evan and I headed out from Brians house around 6AM down towards Rainier NP. We made pretty good time, and got the parking lot around 8:30ish or so. We were kind of suprised that we only ran into two other groups at the parking lot, but we started pulling on gear and got ready for the skin up. From the parking lot, there was a steep slope that we went up to get to the road that is closed for the approach. About half way up that, Evan realised that he was gonna need to make some adjustments and Brian skied down to give him the keys while we continued to the top. After a bit of waiting around and discussing the merits of the bottle cap economy (post nuclear apocalypse of course), Evan joined us and we were off.
Skinning up the road
Waiting for Evan worked out pretty well as we had a nice skin track to follow, and we quickly got to the turn off for Castle. At the turnoff, we had a quick beacon check and we were under way. We again reaped the benifit of a little waiting around as there was a nice skin track to follow from the party of 8 or so ahead of us. Brian and Jim who had been here last year remarked that it was a bit different from the whiteout conditions, as we had some nice overcast skies(which really turned out to be about perfect weather). Soon enough, we caught up with the party that was ahead of us, and Brian started breaking trail as we headed out into the open Meadow by Castle.
Heading up after the turn off
Jim enjoying the skin up
Brian catches the party ahead
The Castle
Brian Broke trail all the way up to the saddle by Castle, and we stopped up top to have some food and decide where we wanted to go. The original plan was to head down towards an unamed peak (kind of towards Unicorn), and get to the top of that for a ski down. We decided to keep the skins on for the short ski down to the approach for the unamed peak. After a little ways down, we quickly decided it was a bad idea as the South facing slopes had a terrible crust on them. I think it must have gotten sun, melted a bit, then froze up. We truned around and I broke some trail back up to the ridge.
Brian approaching our snack point
Adams in the clouds
The new game plan was to lap the area by castle we had just come up. Round one had everyone feeling a little sluggish as we tried to remember how to properly ski nice powder untouched by the hordes and grooming machines. After a couple of turns, it came back to me. Everyone else had varied results, but mostly started to feel good after the first lap
Our playground
Jim loves the snow
Evan on the way down
Brian on the way down
At the bottom, Evan said he was kind of feeling bad so he opted not to go up again. He said it was cool for us to take another lap, and we parted ways with him and decided to meet at the turn off by the road. Lap two had all of us really enjoying ourselves and coming down some great terrain. I found a stellar pow filed that sucked down into a chute and skied that while Jim and brian opted for more wide open spaces. We then skied to the bottom and found Evan taking a nap on a tree branch off the side of the road. At the bottom, we had another snack and skinned back out to the car
Awesome Chute I came down
As we came back down, the weather started to come in a little so we probably left at the right time. It was a great day of skiing out in the backcountry with some great people. It was nice to earn some turns, and be rewarded with absolutely perfect snow conditions. In other words, Good Times!