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The middle of November means it’s time for the patrol room cleanup, and although this year’s event was both delayed and much smaller than usual due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I still found myself heading up to the pass looking for some double duty of work and play. With the avalanche gear in tow, I arrived at the Pass a few minutes before 9:00 am. A short time later, there were six of us that were organizing gear, checking evac equipment, and restocking medical supplies. Dan arrived around 11:00 am, and after an hour of making sled packs and checking the Cascade 100’s, it was time for a bite to eat and to don skins and head out for a few laps.

We set out and headed up KP, which looked like a herd of elephants had trampled all over it, and eventually worked our way up towards Charlie. The skin track, such as it was, had been post-holed by numerous people, and also had snowshoe tracks in it.

 We worked our way up Charlie, abandoning the track less than half way up as it crisscrossed the run numerous times. Eventually, we topped out, and headed back to see what Peak 2 looked like. A few minutes later, we arrived at the top of Peak 2, and the snow state read 42 inches. There were several tracks down Northern, but skier’s left looked pretty good, so we cracked a beer, had a few swigs, and prepared to drop in. My beer for the day was a tasty Batsquatch Hazy IPA from Rogue Ales. 

After stepping into our bindings, I dropped in first, made five or six really nice turns, and set up to shoot a few shots of Dan as he rolled over the top.

We skied the run to the bottom, and were surprised to see that there wasn’t a skin track up Escalator. Regardless, we set one up and out and headed back to the top for another run down Northern. At the top, we finished our beers, and then headed down. Our second run was equally as nice as the first, and it was nice to utilize our skin track back up.

The light was starting to wane, so even though it would have been nice to get a 3rd run in on the backside, we decided to head back to EPA to check out RTS. It was starting to get a bit chilly by the time we stepped into our bindings and slipped off the top, but the snow was soft and the coverage was looking pretty nice…

RTS skied was in decent shape, however there were two to three large trees down on the upper half of the run on skiers right. Most likely they had fallen a few weeks prior during the big wind storm. Otherwise, the work we’d done cutting over the few seasons appeared to be paying off…

We skied Lois Lane out, and headed over to make turns down to the bottom via Swoosh. Cruising by the intersection with Duck, I was reminded of the last time we were there, when I tried to ride a 50 foot dirt patch in much less snow. We hung to skiers left on Swoosh, and the turns were quite nice tucked in close to the trees.

We worked our way down Swoosh, and the light was getting pretty flat by the time we reached the bottom. After a brief stop, we skied down to the lodge and our cars in the parking lot. We hung out at the cars for a little bit, eating a bite and changing into warm clothes, then pulled out past the gate just as it was getting dark. Dan locked the gate behind us, and that brought another patrol room cleanup day to an end. All in all, it was a pretty good day, and I’m looking forward to the season starting at the Pass soon!

 

Friday was shaping up to have the potential for being a good day of storm skiing, so I flexed my schedule to be able to take off in the mid-morning after my morning work commitments. My day started early, and I was in the office by 6:30 am, but by 10:30 am I was out the door and on the road heading to the pass. I hoped my timing would work out nicely, because it looked like the storm was going to start out warm, but be cooling down in the early afternoon. It was raining as I neared the Pass, but turned to a rain/snow mix when I pulled into the parking area, where Dan and Joe were already parked.

A quick phone call to them confirmed it was snowing up higher on the hill, so I shouldered my gear quickly and headed out. It sounded like they were on Peak 2, but the weather was so inclement they were going to head back over to the frontside. I followed their skin track up KP, and it was faint in places. Travel was quick, and soon I made it to Eagle’s Flight and started up. There wasn’t a skin track on Eagle’s, and it was deep — probably 18 inches of new snow or more. I was about halfway up the run when Joe and Dan came into view, and it was refreshing to see them make nice turns on the way down. I pulled out my camera and took a few pics as they skied by me.

I continued breaking trail, and worked my way up to the top of the run, and took shelter in the trees while it continued to snow heavily. About 15 minutes later, Joe and Dan crested the top of the run, with big smiles on their faces. We agreed to head up and check out Good Time to see if it was skiable. That turned out to be an excellent choice, as the turns were prime…

We started down, and the snow and coverage both exceeded expectations. I took a few photos of the skiers on the first half of the run, then Dan grabbed the camera and snapped a few shots of me enjoying the fresh snow.

We skied our way down the run, and headed back to the skin track on KP, fully intent on another lap. It was snowing so heavily that by the time we got to Eagle’s our skin track from just a half hour ago was pretty faint and somewhat difficult to follow. Joe did his best to follow it, and we headed up.

We worked our way up Eagle’s and decided it was worth heading to the top of EPA to get a run in from the top, as well as check out the new addition for patrol this season, which was the old summit lift motor shack. Given the concerns with COVID-19, the motor shack will serve as a place for patrol to bump this season out of the inclement weather and away from the lift ops. On this day, it certainly proved to be a well-positioned spot out of the weather, and we were thankful to spend a few minutes inside while drinking a cold beverage as the storm raged on outside. My beer of choice for the afternoon was a super tasty Pass Stout, appropriately named for both the beer and the location, from my favorite brewer Goodlife Brewing Company.

After a nice break out of the weather, we made the short hike to the proper top of EPA, and prepared to ski another lap. A few pictures ensued before we stepped into our bindings, including the two shots below.

We slid down the hill, and decided to check out High Lead, but quickly aborted that plan as the coverage looked a bit thin there, and headed back over to Good Time, which proved to be just as good, if not better, than our previous lap. It had snowed so much since our last run that our tracks were almost entirely filled in. Like before, we traded the camera and snapped lots of pics….

As before, we skied down to where it was time to cut back to KP, except this time I bid Joe and Dan farewell. They were heading down after a long day of climbing and skiing, and I was jonesing for one more run. It was still snowing hard, but there was enough daylight for one more lap, so I headed back up. This time the skin track on Eagle’s was entirely gone, so I got the opportunity to break trail again, but soon found myself at the top of EPA once more. After a quick call to my wife at home, I dropped in for some more powder turns.

The run was superb, and I tried my best to follow Joe and Dan’s tracks out on the runout. I was able to make it out to KP before I lost their tracks entirely. It was a slow ride down KP, but eventually I made it the bottom and made the short hike back out to the car. Fortunately, I didn’t have to dig out, and was able to get back onto the highway without much fanfare. I made the short drive down to the cabin to join Dan and Joe for a dinner of ‘brats.

After some good food and conversation, it was time to hit the road and head home, fully satisfied with an excellent day of a little work and much play. Until next time, here’s a parting shot from the day of Dan skiing mid-November pow on Eagles!