Ruby Mountain

January 26, 2019

With another high-pressure forecast and relatively stable snow conditions, Kelsey and I agreed to get back out for another backcountry objective, prioritizing views and trying to optimize for snow conditions on a north-facing aspect.

We left Seattle at 6am on Saturday morning and departed the car at the Ross Dam Trailhead right at 9am. We skinned the road and were able to skin a little ways up the Happy Creek trail before deciding it was too thin and that we needed to pack our skis. We paralleled the highway for a ways on the trail and realized we should have just stayed on the road much farther and connected with the trail where it was only 30 feet from the road before turning south. A set of boot tracks doing exactly that made it even more clear.

We booted through the forest to the South, following a trail for a ways and then going cross country until we reached about 3,200 feet where the snow was continuous enough to start skinning. We followed a skin track for a bit before running into a party of 2 headed up for Ruby and planning to overnight it. We chatted with them for a ways and slogged together through the stickiest snow I’ve ever experienced, making each ski feel like a 20-pound weight.

The other party eventually peeled off to set up camp while we continued up, finding better snow up high, but still needing to put a lot of energy into breaking trail. The snow was quite stable and we stuck mostly to ridges on the way up until we decided to take the path of least resistance through a low-angle gully. The final headwall to reach the summit ridge looked steep from below, but wasn’t too bad once we were on it. I got into a rhythm for the last 2,000 feet of vertical or so and just put my head down to break trail—it was a great workout!

As we neared the top, the views were awesome. Ross Lake appeared like a fjord below us and all of our favorite North Cascades peaks were visible. We reached the summit in 5.5 hours despite our errant trail choice at the beginning and trail breaking, which we were pretty happy with. It was breathless on top and we hung out for a bit to soak it in before gearing up for the descent.

The skiing was tough. It was pretty heavy and necessitated sitting way in the back seat to be able to turn. Lower down, we experienced the sticky snow again, which was mind-bogglingly sticking to my bases and making it nearly impossible to go down (guess I need to wax my skis, eh?). Trying to get away from the sticky snow, we traversed to the West, which got us onto snow we could slide on, but took us through tight trees and spit us out above a steep section we had to down-climb. Oh well.

Some more survival skiing got us to where we’d transitioned on the way up and an easy walk through the forest and on the road got us to the car at about 6pm, just over 9 hours after starting. Beautiful day!

Ruth Mountain

January 12, 2019

With a promising weekend forecast and a substantially-lower avalanche forecast than much of the winter so far, Kelsey and I hatched a plan to ski Ruth Mountain on Saturday as a day trip from Seattle. We knew the ski conditions wouldn’t be great, but the views would make up for it. We left town early and were able to drive most of the forest road, parking a little over a mile from the trailhead where the snow got too deep and a tree blocked the road. Another car of 3 guys had just parked before we rolled up and we ended up spending most of our day together.

We left the car at 8:30am. About 25 minutes of skinning got us to the trailhead and then we followed the summer trail since coverage wasn’t great in the valley. Lots of old avalanche debris in the gulleys and frozen snow made the long side-hill approach a bit painstaking. It took about 2.5 hours to get to the clearing below Hannegan Pass. As we climbed, the snow finally turned from a hard icy crust to lighter, fluffier happiness.

We took the shorter approach on the South side of point 5930 and started getting awesome views of Baker and Shuksan as well as The Pickets as we gained Ruth’s North Ridge. The snow became harder and the winds increased as we neared the top. We took in the views from the summit about 5.5 hours after starting our day. Being about 2pm, we didn’t linger long up top and quickly clicked into the skis to head down the north face.

With some wind loading, we took a conservative line toward the East and finished up down the face on some fun spines to stay out of the wind loaded gulleys. We traversed the terrain lower down and slid our way across the still frozen snow in the valley, eventually putting the skins back on to get up to the summer trail and keeping them on for the rolling, frozen terrain from there on out. We got to the car right about 9 hours after starting, just before a headlamp was necessary.

Fun day. A bit more horizontal and rolling travel than I was expecting. The views were stellar and the skiing up high was better than expected.

Table Mountain Circumnavigation

April 22, 2018

Kelsey and I originally planned to ski Ruth Mountain this weekend to soak in views without worrying too much about avalanche potential after recent spring storms and warming temperatures. We drove up to the Hannegan Pass Road on Saturday night, planning to drive up to the trailhead, but quickly encountering more snow on the road than we could drive through. We called it a night there and gave it a brief shot early in the morning, but quickly discovered that the road was melted out further up, which would have meant walking over 6 extra miles each way, so we bailed and drove up to the Baker ski area instead, took a nap, and then headed off for a tour around Table Mountain.

We left the car just shy of 9am under clear skies with awesome views around the range. We made it to Artist Point in about 35 minutes, ripped skins and did a long traverse below Table's South face, and climbed up to the base of Ptarmigan Ridge in about 70 minutes from the car. The ski down to Mazama Lake was pretty fun, though short lived. We skinned back up here and cruised across Iceberg Lake and up the steeper section to the saddle between Table and Mazama Dome about 1 hour and 50 minutes in.

The first 500 feet or so was pretty fun skiing on easy terrain before finishing the ski on increasingly heavy, wet snow and traversing, then skinning out to the car, finishing in 2.5 hours. Beautiful day and great views with better-than-expected snow. I just wish we'd gotten on top of something a bit more ambitious!