Snow had been falling throughout the week and more was on the way for Saturday night. Conditions looked prime to head to Mt. Hood Meadows for a day of powder riding with my buddy Andy. We spent most of the day lapping powder runs in lower Heather Canyon since the upper mountain was closed due to low visibility. The glades and trees of the lower canyon made for excellent turns and the pitch on some of the runs (Absolute Magnitude for instance) is nice and steep! After a long day of fun, we headed back down Highway 26 en route to the southern Willamette Valley, but not before a stop for a warm cup of coffee in Rhododendron. Today was a great day, and marked my 15th month of consecutive snowboarding…..
Andy and I headed to Hoodoo for a little lift serviced riding, knowing that the backcountry would be unstable given all the recent snowfall in the past few days. It was snowing as we left the valley (elevation 400 feet), so we knew conditions on the hill would be good. We arrived in the parking lot and there was over a foot of fresh stuff. Most of our day was spent riding the east face of the mountain, where the snow was super light and deep. Very few people were at the hill, in part because an avalanche on Highway 20 closed the road for the better part of the day. The result was fresh runs all day long…..
Riding the deep powder I always dream about
Cold Blower!
The nice thing about Hoodoo’s east face is that when it’s windy, the tracks fill in by the time you head back and it’s like riding untracked lines all over again! This happened to us for most of the day – every time we went back for more, our previous tracks were gone and fresh powder was waiting!
Andy getting some of the sweet stuff!
We finished our day making runs off of Chuck’s Backside. By the end of the day, my legs were pretty tired, but this day went down as one of the best lift-served powder days I’ve ever had!!!!
I headed to Meadows on Sunday with Andy, and the plan was to use our free lift tickets courtesy of the Warren Miller flick from earlier in the year. We arrived to about 6 inches of fresh powder with all the lifts running. After some initial avy work by the ski patrol, Heather Canyon opened up. Patrol was successful in getting some slopes to slide earlier in the day higher up. There was some early sun, but it yielded to fog and snow for the remainder of the day. Upon entering the canyon, one could hear much hooping and hollering in the distance. Here’s a shot in the upper canyon of Andy skiing with my tracks from a cornice drop in the background…..
Andy skiing Heather Canyon – April 2007
The lines throughout the day were endless, deep and fast. We traversed over to Clark Canyon for some more fresh lines….
Towards the afternoon it warmed up some, and we decided to head into the in the lower canyon, on runs like Jacks Woods and Absolute Magnitude. The day ended with clouds moving in and more snow falling. We snapped this shot at the top of the Shooting Star Express right before closing…..
Back at the car, we gulped some food and hot coffee and headed for home after another fun day of Spring pow in the Oregon Cascades!
It had been snowing hard all week and the Oregon Cascades were blanketed with another round of late season powder, so Andy and I made plans to head back over to Mt. Bachelor for a day of riding. The forecast was calling for clear skies and cold temperatures, which meant the summit chair would likely be spinning. We arrived at the hill early after making the long drive from the valley and found very few people in the parking lot – typical for later in the season.
Andy getting ready to drop into the south side
We made a few laps on the front side of the mountain and headed for the summit chair as soon as it opened. Dropping into the summit bowl was tempting, but we opted for the long continuous untracked vertical of the southside. As is typical, the upper 500 feet or so of the backside was wind blown and crusty, but below that the snow was fresh pow!
Andy enjoying some nice turns
The run back to the Northwest Chair along the cat track is always fun, with lots of natural features to ollie, jump and jib. We repeated the southside route for most of the day, dropping in off the top at various places and taking slightly different lines each time. I love the backside of Bachelor. It has a bit of everything – open bowls, cornice drops, glades, and trees. At the days end, we loaded our gear in the truck and headed out, stopping in Sunriver for a well earned hot coffee, satisfied with a great day of April snow riding!
I made the long drive to Mt Bachelor from the Willamette Valley with my buddy Andy for some spring snow riding. We arrived in the parking lot to clear skies and a bit of fresh snow and knew it would be a fun day. Most of the day we spent riding off the backside of the mountain, finding numerous stashes of fresh snow in the open bowls and glades. Gotta love the long winding cat road to the Northwest Express though after riding the goods. I took some riding shots, but only retained a few after a computer crash shortly thereafter (none which were worthy of posting).
Below is a scanned shot from a point and shoot film camera of some powder turns at Bachelor from a few years earlier that kind of sums up how I remember this March day going. Needless to say, it was an excellent day of riding in the sunshine at Bachelor!
Early morning powder turns at Mt Bachelor – Photo by Andrew Sahalie
