East of The Whaleback

The road to the Deer Mtn/Chuck Best Sno-Park is plowed and accessible to 2WD vehicles without chains, though there were a few icy spots. Started skinning up the FR19 road from the Sno-Park (5800') at 12pm. Temperature was in the high 30s F. FR19 was not groomed but was well-tracked by snowmobiles. There was about 40 cm of snow on the ground at the Sno-Park--plenty for skinning on the road, but not really enough to easily ski over vegetation off of the road. Snow depth increased to 70 cm at 6500', making off-road ski travel fairly easy. Snow on flat and solar aspects was becoming wet and sticky. Climbing through ~6500' I noticed a temperature inversion and by 7000' air temperature was somewhere in the mid 40s F. The inversion also made Fata Morgana apparent on the horizon to the north. Once I got into the lumbered area above about 6600' I started noticing wind affected snow. The wind affect got stronger as I climbed through the lumbered area, resulting in ski penetration varying from zero on the hardest wind slabs to ~20 cm in the softest areas. There was some isolated cracking of the ski-breakable slabs around my skis, but no propagating cracks. Slabs were deposited on north aspects of the micro-terrain. I traversed the lumbered area to the southeast towards denser trees where I found little to no wind effect and cold dry snow (still a north aspect). I then climbed the northeast ridge to the easternmost sub-peak, where I got a view of Ash Creek Butte and the north side of Shasta/Shastina. South aspect of the peak had wet sun-affected snow, and temperature at the top (~7936') was still in the mid 40s F at 3:20pm. Descended the northeast ridge through treed terrain until just past the eastern edge of the lumbered area where I could descend the rest of the way to FR19 in the trees. Above ~7000' the snow was still dry though slightly denser than I was expecting. Below ~7000' the snow surface became noticeably wet and the density increased. The lower slopes were shaded by the time I skied down them, so I'm not sure how much of this was from earlier solar exposure on the flatter slope angles or just the air temperature being well above freezing. Returned to FR19 at 6600' and followed it back to the Sno-Park. Because of the well-packed snowmobile tracks I was able to pole/kick/glide most of the way back to the Sno-Park, so the 3 mile downhill return on the road only took about 30 minutes. Minor cracking on ~5 cm thick wind slabs in the lumbered area. Cracks didn't propagate beyond my skis.

East of The Whaleback

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