The Stash

Thursday.

Thursday is a great day.

Thursday is a great day to go skiing.

Thursday is a great day to go skiing if it snowed three feet last week.

So we did. It is unusual that I have a day that does not have a bunch of meetings scheduled from end to end. Particularly when I spend 80% of my work days in meetings. At any rate it was a great reason to play hookey from work.

It is noteworthy that Willamette Pass was one of the first resorts to go to partial week operations. Starting maybe a decade ago, they went to Thursday through Sunday operations during the regular season. I'm pretty sure it kept them out of bankruptcy since very few people were going up during the early week. The other benefit of Thursday is that any snow that falls from Sunday night through Thursday morning is essentially untouched. So we got three days of accumulation before today. Three days, 36".

The lot is relatively empty on Thursday. But more people were there than we had hoped.

Thursday, apparently, is Gapers day at The Pass.

The logjam is Gapers Paradise.

The logjam is also kind of flat, and the snow is very deep, so the Gapers get stuck.

When in doubt, you can either swim or walk. Either option is tough going when you are wading through waist deep snow.

The snow, it be deep. Deep enough to swallow up small groms.

The Gapers ravage Eagles Flight in one giant herd.

Thirty-six inches of snow slows the Gapers down.

Yes, Thursday at the Pass is Gapers Paradise. Come on up and get yourself stuck.

All joking aside, it's good to see everyone of all skill levels out and enjoying a day on the mountain. I bet they had as much fun as I did, although from my experience with things I'm less skilled at (tele-skiing, mountain biking, playing guitar) being really good at something tends to enhance the fun factor.

This hardy skier brought his black lab along for the fun. I'm pretty sure the dog was having more fun than the skier. He was up to his waist in waist deep pow with no skis.

Dylan and I found ourselves in a similar situation on our first lap down SDN. Absent the packed "get back," Dylan cruised right down into The Hole at the Bottom. The Hole lives up to its name. I followed him down to help pack a track out. We had some assistance from a couple other riders who followed us into The Hole. Ten minutes later and a fair amount of sweat and we had climbed out of the hole.

Dylan does his best Gaper impression.

Enough Gapers already. Well, not quite. The good news is that the runs are Gaper magnets. The bad news is that the Gapers ski them out pretty quick.

The good news is The Stash. If you are a local at your local mountain, you best have some secrets. You know, places that you know about but don't share with anyone else. It's probably not the case that nobody else knows about it, but it should be the case that as few as possible do know about it. Ours is SDN.

I've written about the stashes on SDN frequently...as we are frequent visitors. I've also posted lots of pictures. Just for context, SDN is a 50 degree tree shot on the west side of Eagle Peak. Actually, it's a lot of shots--the entire face is more than a half a mile with lots of options. Lots of options.

By 11:30 most everything was skied out. Except The Stash. Even after the patrol dropped the rope on the backside, The Stash was largely ignored.

Exhibit A: The Stash from the top. Note the depth of the snow at the top and the lack of tracks.

Exhibit B: Looking up The Stash from the bottom.

Yep, that was a great line indeed. The Stash is actually a Douglas Fir grotto. It looks kind of thick, but the reality is that the trees are ideally spaced--especially on a day with as much snow as today.

Exhibit C: Shredding The Stash

Exhibit D: Launching of rock features in The Stash

Exhibit E: Launching off rock features in The Stash

Exhibit F: The Rossi's float pretty well in 3' of snow on a 50-degree slope in The Stash

The Stash is rife with rocks and cliff bands and drop-offs and big Douglas Fir trees. Dylan launches off a 12-foot drop in the woods.

The drop did not go as Dylan wanted. What you can't tell from this photo is that his board is grinding on the rock which then throws him a little forward. He drops the 12-feet and then leaves a huge crater. It was pretty cool.

We're finally back to winter, and with more storms on the way over the next couple of days. The base is getting built back up to the level it was a month ago.

See ya in The Stash!