Epic early season in the Cascades

One day, the hills are brown and wet, three days later, they're blanketed in deep white powder. The excitement of the first big dump of the year is tough to contain, but in order to avoid breaking board or body, it's a good idea to try to reign it in. The season is still young and there's no reason to push it when rocks, logs, and other lurking dangers are only slightly hidden. Right???

On November 7th and 8th we made our first tentative powder turns of the year at (the closed) Crystal Mountain, one of the local ski areas. The first day was full on wind and snow for the skin up, giving us a vivid reminder of what it's like to be out in a storm during winter, but thankfully the weather opened up a bit while we took a couple of short runs. Some cracking, wrinkling, and a lack of avy gear made these mellow runs a little spicy, but the snow was good and the turns were excellent.

The next day, the weather was much better which brought out the ravenous hordes. Since we were there the day before, we bee-lined it to an area that we knew would hold deep snow and also be a little bit removed from the ongoing frenzy. This was an absolutely incredible season opener, one to remember for a long time.

Season Opener, Nov. 7 & 8, 2009 from Preston Few on Vimeo.

The Mount Baker area, as usual, received about twice as much snow as the rest of the Washington Cascades during the storm cycle of early November, so on the 14th, off to the Baker backcountry we went. Since the visibility was -- as it often is in the PNW -- lacking, we took a couple of runs in the steep north facing terrain under Huntoon Point, where trees and gullies could give us a little depth perception.

Awesome, classic adventure riding: with 5 feet of unconsolidated snow, the tops of small trees poking up, and waterfalls that were not quite covered, this was definitely a "no fall" type of day. The early season coverage made this zone steeper and more technical than it would be with a fat snow pack, and the snow, which was stable with just a little bit of sluffing, rewarded us with a whole lot of time logged in the white room. Yet another day to remember...

Baker BC, Nov. 14, 2009 from Preston Few on Vimeo.

Recently we've been suffering through some dust on crust, and now we're in the midst of absolutely arctic temps, but we've still had some fun times in the mountains, although we're pretty picky and I'm anxious for the flakes to start flying again.

Some Sinners setting a track.

Looking down a chute in marginal conditions. Dust on crust and avy chunks. Yum. It was still fun.