Monday, May 22, 2017

Rattlesnake ski traverse, 2017 edition

Well, life is busy and I’m behind on write-ups.  But let us jump back to a beautiful spring day in mid-April, for one of my best ski days of this season.  
the classic view looking north from stuart peak
I joined John and Justin for a Stuart Peak to Snowbowl traverse, despite having done the same tour with Jeffrey a few weeks prior.  However Jeffrey and I encountered horrible breakable crust conditions on nearly all aspects and all elevations.  It was so bad we cut it short across the grant creek basin from atop mosquito peak, without even skiing a run down to glacier lake.  So I was excited to return for better conditions and excited to share this outstanding tour with John and Justin, who have both spend extensive time running through this terrain but never on skis. 
justin in the eagle chute
We made good time up the ravine trail on foot before hitting snow and transitioning to skis and continuing up to Stuart.  On the summit, John wasn’t feeling well and decided to head back down, but encouraged Justin and I to continue on together.  We reluctantly parted ways before skiing great boot-top powder down the N side of stuart to upper twin lake.  The short climb to eagle point ensued, before skiing again excellent powder down the eagle chute to mckinley lake.  (note- this was my third time in the past 12 months (and second time in the past month) skiing the rattlesnake traverse and boy did it feel good to finally hit it in great condition).
eagle chute
adjacent run just E of the eagle chute.  the cliff band at mid-height
does not appear to fill in even on a big snow year
We botched the route-finding a bit on where we chose to gain the main ridge S of mosquito. However it worked, and we both breathed a big sigh of relief as we got off the steep-ish E facing slope, sluffing warm storm snow under the strong sun.  We continued up to the summit of Mosquito where we discussed our descent options down the N side (at least 5).  I voted for a particular couloir that I had not yet skied and Justin was game, so we skied down the NW ridge to the entrance, followed by nearly a thousand feet of outstanding steep and deep couloir skiing down to glacier lake.  Under the glaring sun, the ensuing climb up the S ridge to sanders peak was a hot, sweaty grind but we were rewarded with another excellent powdery descent of the N couloir to the bench above sanders lake. 
steep powder on the N side of mosquito
apron below the N face of mosquito
We strategically used the shade cast by the NW ridge to climb to the saddle in relative comfort.  From here, we elected to skip murphy peak due to condition of its S couloir on such a warm afternoon so we made a skins-on traverse to the W before dropping into the grant creek basin.  I had promised Justin hours earlier that we would find access to running water down in the basin but alas we did not (granted we didn’t look very hard but in the past I’ve always readily encountered it while crossing the basin).  Therefore the ensuing climb up point six was a hot and thirsty one but we slowly grinded our way to the top.  We opted for the S ridge to snowbowl over a mega-slushy jenny bowl descent and then ripped down a fun, slushy paradise and the standard 5 minute walk to the car.  All in all one of my best ski days of the year, with great weather, great terrain, excellent snow and a fun new partner. 
justin atop sanders with the N face of mosquito behind
sander's N couloir
Stats: about 20mi and 9k vertical in 11 hours car-car

Rose: finally nailing this classic tour in perfect powder conditions
Thorn: hot, sweaty and thirsty climbs the latter part of the day
Bud: a full stuart to mcleod traverse awaits