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Mission RidgeSubmit a report
01/22/09 1/22/09 – Mission Ridge virgins pop their cherries. Driving up the dozen miles from Wenatchee where it was low low clouds and cold (20F), we rose up thru the cloud deck with it’s frosted firs and into the sun. Parking lot was pretty empty with mostly retirees getting their gear on in the relative warmth of barely freezing temps and calm air. Chatted with the ticket window and found that we could get a price break for having season passes at Snoqs. $38 v 50 = free lunches. :-). Made opening lineup along with the other 20 or so early risers, and Chair One loaded promptly at 9. Hopped onto Chair Two, the HSQ, and scoped out the hill. We were advised by many locals that this was a groomer day due to the lack of any recent snow and the VERY thin cover off-trail. Mission’s layout is basically a big bowl that faces north-ish, so the western runs were getting some of the morning sun that peeked over Microwave’s eastern ridgeline. We cycled the West rope line run Boundary Road + Bomber Bowl (where we learned the “touch the wing – bong!” tradition) since were both nice and wide with some sections that lent themselves to really opening up the throttle. Zoom! :-) Once more people started to show up, we took the unnamed cat track and headed east into the shade and took Chair Three’s Tokitie, Tillikum, and Skookum runs, again enjoying the wide runs with maybe three other parties to pass. Tried one short foray off-piste and it was as bad as expected. 1-1.5” of barely breakable raincrust well-bonded to 3-4 inches of consolidated snow. Not fun. Went a little further afield and farther east to try out under the not-running-today Chair 4 where Castle and Sitkum runs were hard-frozen ruts leftover from the weekend. Double plus unfun, so back to the groomers for the rest of the day. All in all, I’d have to rank Mission as #3 in WA, Just below Crystal and Baker, but above Stevens and White Pass. TomK & Kerry.
12/31/08 Skied 12/29 - 12/31. Snow quality on groomed runs was excellent; the usual dry Ridge quality. Even with the low snow pack, did not run into any rocks on the mainstream runs. On other runs (Tillicum, Skookum) that were exposed to wind, there were more rocks showing. Even the expert runs open (Alah, Lemolo, Johnson's, Wawa) had decent quality with some excellent patches of pow to be found for those in the know. Castle was great, with some thigh-deep in places, though I dinged up my skis where the coverage wasn't so great.
1/31/08 Great powder on Thursday--3 days accumulation totaling 10-12". Good coverage, but a few shallow spots still exist off piste--that's the Ridge for you. I wouldn't consider it "early season conditions" anymore. Face shots galore down the middle of the mountain.
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