Mt Shasta - Hotlum/Wintun Ridge - June 26-27, 2009

Drew and I had such a great ski last weekend that when Rick mentioned he had Friday off and would like to ski Shasta (he missed last week due to a meeting) and jumped at the chance to make one more trip! With a couple days on our hands we decided to camp on the mountain. It was a great trip, met up at the Hi Lo Motel in Weed, headed up the mountain to an amazing camping area, great skiing still above 10k, lots of suns (and suncups), a great dinner at Vivify in Mt Shasta City (who would have thought, great Organic Japanese food in Mt Shasta), and finished it off with a little relaxing at the Stewart Mineral Springs!

Rick packed for a week :)

This camping spot at 9600' is simply amazing. Flat, soft ground, and beautiful views. It would be the perfect place to land the alien spaceship.

Moon over Shasta

Heading up

And skiing down! Great summer corn!

Lassen National Park

Still hoping to get my 100 days in for the season I thought I'd head home from Shasta through Mt Lassen National Park (making it 3 weekends skiing in the park in a row) and stretch the legs a little after yesterday's big climb/ski. The weather was looking kinda iffy as I headed out from Shasta City but I decided to go for it and was rewarded when I discovered it was one of the "Visit Your National Parks for Free" weekends and saved the $10 entry fee.

I'd been eyeing some short steep lines across the street from the main summit on previous trips and decided to make a quick run up one I haven't skied before. Good snow, legs feeling good!!

Hard to believe Rick, Erin, Adam, and I skied this face 8 days ago. A bit of new snow up high!

There's a bunch of short steep lines like this one across the street from the peak. I hadn't skied this one before, perfect for stretching the legs!

Hotlum-Wintun Ridge - Mt Shasta

Got a call last Monday from Drew who was up in the PNW, good looking weather forecast, reports of smooth snow above 8500', and positive beta from ASI's newsletter and my friend SMG guide David Marchi so we decided to take a shot at Mt Shasta this weekend. The forecast headed down hill a bit by the end of the week, chance of thunder showers Friday, Saturday night, and Sunday but Saturday still was "mostly sunny" so we decided to make a one day push up the Hotlum/Wintun Ridge Route.

The day started out looking promising:

But clouds started coming and going:

And eventually it looked like this:

After ~5300vf we decided to turn around at the point where the route crosses the ridge and makes a steep climb to the summit.

Drew and I took video of the ski down which I'll try to edit and post soon. The top 2500 feet or so was perfect, smooth corn, some of the best I've ever skied!! The snow transitioned a bit down lower but still wasn't sticky at all and great to ski. The last 800 feet or so was a bit sun cupped, but Drew still gives it a thumbs up! It was about 1000 foot hike between snow line and the car.

Shasta once again delivers!

Mount Lassen 6/12-14/2009

Rick, Erin, Adam, and I decided to brave the rain/thunder showers and headed up to Mt Lassen for the weekend. We were chased off the mountain on Saturday by weather moving in but skied a great run down the South Face and then skied a couple fun runs across the street from the summit parking lot (as featured in the video below).

Despite some threatening weather we made it to the top on Sunday and were able to ski the NE face back down to the car we had left in the Devastated Area parking lot. We had to hike down about 1000 feet from the end of the snow, so around 3000' of skiing!

As always, we ate extremely well, this trip's menu included grilled chicken salad with peanut sauce; scrambled eggs and sausage; buffalo burgers; marinated flank steak, corn cooked over the fire, sauteed veggies with peanut sauce, and potatoes; and sourdough blueberry pancakes and bacon!

Mt Lassen - East Couloir

The road through Mt Lassen National Park opened last Thursday afternoon so a bunch of us that were on the ill fated Mt Lassen trip last Memorial Day weekend planned to head up for a weekend of skiing. Unfortunately, the weather around here has been rainy with thunder showers and more of the same was forecast through the weekend.

As the weekend approached the weather forecast started looking more promising. Snow was forecast for Friday/Friday night, 50% chance of showers on Saturday, and partly sunny for Sunday! Saturday's forecast held, 10% chance of showers on Sunday so I decided to head up, although no one else seemed inspired to leave with me in the rain on Saturday morning.

Well, the rain stopped before I got to Susanville and I didn't see any more rain for the weekend. Coverage is great in the park, the skies were sunny, and the snow was great. I decided to ski the East Couloir which isn't often skiable by the time the road opens. It involved some slide slipping over rocks 1/3 of the way down, but was a great ski!

A damp Manzanita Lake campground, this seem familiar

Blue skies @ the summit trail parking lot!

Knee deep powder :)

Up top, Shasta looking good!

I'm sure there's a way through those rocks!

The East Couloir