It brings a lark to your hand

The second day of the season had far better snow than the first. It was confidence inspiring.

It was quite a morning.

Penguin points out one of our several skintracks.

It might’ve been scratchy, and I might’ve pansied around like a North Carolinian church group student on a green run at Winterplace, but they were turns nonetheless. The upper mountain had been rained on late in the week, forming a 1-2″ thick ice lens. 1-2″ of snow last night softened things up considerably. Even with my late start (10:30 or 11:30, depending on your temporal viewpoint), it was cold enough to drop twinkling weightless ice flurries on my way up.

I booted to just above Pebble Creek, then skinned up to the top of Moon Rocks, where it became apparent that the rest of the route to Muir was barely-textured blue ice. A large congregation of skiers had decided to turn around there, and it seemed rather sensible to join them. It turned out to have been a wise decision – after clicking in, my confidence in my skiing ability suddenly evaporated. Between unwaxed-for-summer bases, unsharp edges, and a fractured brain, it took a little while before I started making sensible turns. I managed to work in five or six good solid kick turns on the sub-twenty degree slope. You gotta do what you gotta do; some of the confident-looking skiers wiped out…..

On to the goodies!

Whoever this guy is, apparently he’s back in the mountains

The Aquatic Arctic Avian was stoked – he’s been brushing up on his Tuxracer or something. Note blue ice behind the blue bird.

It wasn’t all windraked and rimey. Some motivated folks found fine snow on the other side of the skating rink.

When the wind is just right, there are consistently magical clouds at the outlet to Pebble Creek

Hop.

Turn.

What time is it? Erm. Time to go home?

The glacier portion of the extraction went from the rock wall at extreme upper right to the lateral moraine at extreme lower left. Perhaps thirty or more feet of snow has melted since then.

I spent a lot of time looking into the hole for insights. I may have gotten some, we’ll see. Sure is pretty.

Writing a magazine about backcountry skiing in Washington State? Here’s the background to your table of contents.

Evening light.

Moonlight.