Willamette Pass
It snowed another 6" overnight. Karl drove today so I got a ride and someone to ski with. It promised to be a pretty decent day.
Jarod (also from EWEB) and Karl get their stoke on!
The new snow covered up most of the crust that was lurking below yesterday. Not all...most. That said, there were a few places that were outstanding. The meadows, Eagle's trees and Cherokee Ridge.
Karl dodging trees on Cherokee Ridge.
I've been noticing a new trend as I get further into the trees in my effort to discover new places. Others have discovered many of those places. Some of them are kind of obvious, but overall it seems like the trend is towards more people wanting more adventure. That would be consistent with the hype you see in the magazines. These days it's all about the backcountry. Or closer to home, the "sidecountry."
Sidecountry is out of bounds areas accessible by lift or by lift with a short hike. Willamette has lots of it. I've discovered a lot of it. I plan to discover more of it.
Today felt a tiny bit like Colorado. All of the inbounds areas were pretty well ravaged by 11am. I started getting nervous when we saw a gang of kids heading down to the meadows. Those areas are VIP and should not be accessible to just anyway. We persevered and just started heading a little further into the woods. That strategy paid off big. Both Cherokee and the Eastern slopes of West Peak were pretty much untouched. We did four or five laps...up the front, down the back, up the back, down the front. I developed a system years ago of swapping fast rides and slow rides. It works pretty well.
In late morning we saw some insane kid drop down the Dragon's Back. I've seen tracks down it, but I've never seen anyone ride it. It's about 60 degrees and a few hundred vert into a dense forest. Serious injury awaits if you were to fall. Not to mention the rocks protruding everywhere. We saw them again on the last ride up.
Dragon's Back I
Dragon's Back II
The kid billy goated over to the right by the rocks and then disappeared. We didn't get to see the whole run, but assume he got down...somehow. I looked for a video on YouTube, but none were posted. The kid had a selfie stick so I know he recorded it. I'll stick it in a future post if I find it.
All together a great powder day skiing with Karl. Good snow, good trees, good company.
I'll be back!
