Report

Map

Itinerary

Dawn: 4:52 AM, Sunrise: 5:28 AM, Sunset: 8:27 PM

• 1:30 AM – Leave home (3:10 hr drive + 5 min buffer)
• 4:45 AM – Arrive at Blue Lake TH, drop off stuff and people
• 4:50 AM – G and Andrew both drive down to hairpin, leave G’s car, come back
• 5:00 AM – Back at trailhead, gear up
• 5:15 AM – Start uphill to Blue Lake Peak (1.4 mi, 2,257 ft gain, 2:15 hr)
• 7:30 AM – Transition to downhill
• 7:45 AM – Ski down Madison Ave (1,588 ft descent, 0.8 miles, 30 mins)
• 8:15 AM – Transition to uphill
• 8:30 AM – Uphill for 0.8 miles, 1,289 ft (1hr)
• 9:30 AM – Transition to downhill
• 9:45 AM – Ski down 2,178 ft, 1.8 miles (1hr)
• 10:45 AM – At hairpin
• 11:00 AM – Drive to pick up car and come back
• 11:10 AM – Both cars at hairpin
• 11:30 AM – Head home (or to Mazama)
• 11:55 AM – At Mazama grocery store
• 12:40 PM – Cragging in Mazama
• 3:30 PM – Head home (3:40 hr drive)
• 7:10 PM – Home

Weather

27 degrees at start, 27-30 degrees for most of the time, maybe 35 when we end. partly cloudy (50% clouds), 5-10 mph winds (Mountain Forecast and NOAA)

Gear

• Avy gear
• Ski crampons
• Skins
• Poles
• Thick gloves, puffy jacket, ski pants (dressed for 30 degree weather)
• Helmet
• Headlamp (probably basically not needed except for gearing up)

Avy considerations

My guess is green, or at most yellow, conditions. Additionally, time spent on 30+ slopes is probably only 30 minutes.

At 5,000 feet (lowest elevation), both Friday and Saturday’s weather is quite similar ????, both a high of 37 degrees ????, partly cloudy ????, maybe an inch of snow Friday. Weather seems like it’s been consistent ????. Next week it gets drastically warmer (50’s), that would be danger time for sure.

Temps over the past week have been higher, it’s cooling down now ????. Previously was hitting highs of 50 and 53. Likely there were a few slides Thursday. It hasn’t snowed/precipitated in the last week ????.

The cornice

Sounds like it could be nice to have whippets, but sounds like people do it fine without too. This is the steepest ascent.