Early Winters

Tim, Dale, Mary and I were moving from the Blue Lake parking lot shortly after 8am. The snow through the trees was sun cupped and covered with pine needles, but it was an easy skin and soon we were out onto the open slope. Two groups of climbers were ascending Early Winter Spires and we could hear them yelling directions as we skinned toward Blue Peak Col. At the bench before the final climb to the Col, a group of telemarkers came down and went into the chute leading to the hairpin turn on the East side of Washington Pass. We made it up to the top of the col and took a long break, enjoying the view. We skied down towards Blue Lake, although we stopped well short of the Lake as the snow became mushy and sticky.

Skinning back up to the Col, we skied down to the chute and then picked our way through the rock debris and snow until we reached the skiable part of the chute. The chute short but nice, and once reaching the snowfield below the chute the snow was really good and I was able to make nice, long GS turns. The rest of the ski down was good and we followed the snow down to the hairpin turn, where we had to take of skis off and hike about 15 years down to a car we had left earlier in the morning.