|
|
|
|
| |
Willamette PassSubmit a report
2/20/09 Day 2 at Willamette Pass Ski area, we got a bit of a late start
as we had to pack up all our gear. We hit the slopes around 10,
which was fine, we're just skiing left over pow anyway and given
this was Jay's 2nd and my 3rd resort day of the year we were
pretty thrashed from the day before - or maybe it was all
the beer :-). We hit the backside, since Jay was on my long Piste
Stinx, he stayed on the runs, which still had pretty decent snow
and I headed down the trees. The first run was off of Destiny and
I was struggling a bit, not feeling real sharp, so as I came down
I didn't quite hit a turn and whacked my shoulder against a big
Doug Fir - ouch, nice bruise there. Friday was a big sunny day,
but the backside was pretty unaffected, we continued to hit the
North facing runs, with Jay going down the open runs and me hitting
the trees along side. Early on the trees next to Northern Exposure
were really nice and of course out of bounds off Where's Waldo
continued to be excellent. By about 12:30 we were getting to the
point of cramping up so we headed down for lunch, getting a nice
run down the sun soaked front side. We hit Eagle's Flight,
staying on the sunny run and out of the trees where I rag dolled
in the crust yesterday afternoon. Nice smooth corn all the way.
After lunch, back to the back side for some runs, some more tree
runs, then June's run a little late - I had a great shot on the
trees on the edge, one of the best runs of the day, but Jay went
down the middle where it had started to set up. I hit some nice
turns off the little ridge below that which were in the sun. We
did a couple more shots down the trees off Where's Waldo as I
was still finding pillows of untracked there. Getting pretty
thrashed I landed on a small tree - didn't really fall - I was
on the tree, lost my pole as I pushed off, had to retrieve it.
About 3 we headed over for a few final runs on the corn on the
front side. Jay headed over to Eagle's Flight again, but I
wanted something steeper and more sustained so I headed down
High Lead, which basically heads straight down to a short run
out at the bottom. A great, thrashing run, long, steep, some
bumps, good, soft corn snow. A nice little jump near the bottom
and cruise out. We did one more run, Jay again on Eagle's Flight
and I stayed with High Lead. Another awesome trip to our favorite
Oregon ski area. Great slopes, no crowds, steep, the backside
holds powder as well as any place. We'll be back at some point,
though next year we may have to check out White Pass as they
finally got approval to expand up onto the Hogback basin,
depending on when the new lifts open.
TeleMurray
02/19/09 Freeheel Jay and I headed up to the ski area from Odell Lake
Lodge, arriving at around 9 - not quite first chair, but we knew we
were going to be hitting the left over powder in the trees on the
backside anyway. This is our 5th year at Willamette Pass, I think
we know most of the runs and hidden stashes by now. Lot mostly
empty, we headed up the lift and skied the connector run heading
into the trees just to the left of Escalator. As expected we found
boot deep powder, with some tracks from Monday, but still lots of
good soft turns. A great first run, at the bottom we crossed over
the run and skied through the trees to the lift. Next run I think
we headed over to the trees out of bounds off Where's Waldo. The
snow was a little deeper and a little less tracked here. Great
turns, traverse over and head down the more mellow tree shots and
come out right above the lift. We hit Cherokee - out of bounds on
the other side, the snow wasn't quite as good here, more crusty
spots under the trees - more sun to melt the clumps of snow out
of the trees. Another run or two in the trees and then coming down
between Escalator and Destiny Jay yells out his binding released
(old Voille, can be very hard to get back into). I cruise down
and drink some juice and wait, and then "catastrophic failure",
broken binding. I came out of the trees as he hiked down. I suggested
I could help him ski down to the lift on one ski by supporting
one side - the 3 legged skier. Got some good stares from the lift!
I happened to have my old Piste Stinx in my roof rack (they don't
rent tele equipment at Willamette Pass), so I got a run down the
front side trees while Jay waited for a ski patroller so he could
ride down the lift to the lot. The trees on the front weren't as
bad as I expected - the front is all South facing. There were some
definite crusty/icy areas, but for the most part there was skiable
powder. It was a long run, but I skied the trees all the way to
the lower run out and met Jay at the car where we had an early
lunch. After lunch we again headed to the backside, Jay, now on
my longer, not quite as wide skis, preferred to stay on the runs
out of the trees and I continued to hit the tree shots, including
the one between Destiny and Boundary Pass which has the about the
steepest shot I've skied - short, but really steep and in the
trees. I took one shot down the open glades next to the lift, it
was pretty chewed up, but still pretty good. A few more shots off
of Where's Waldo and we headed down to the car around 2 to get our
Outtabounds Skis for a little back country excursion. We headed
back to the back side, even the groomers feeling a little odd on
our patterned skis - they make a whirring noise as the patterns
glide over the snow and they're much slower and lighter. We headed
down through the trees next to Destiny, but with the light gear
it was pretty tough in the chewed up left over powder. Since the
lifties we had talked to didn't encourage our idea of skiing
down through the trees to the cross country trails on the back
side, we decided we should just head for it early so the ski
patrol wouldn't be looking for us. We headed off into the trees
off Where's Waldo, following the ridge line down and across,
climbing back up to the top of West Peak - West Peak is about
6600 feet, a little less than Peak 2 (which has the lift). The
view on top was spectacular so we hung out for a while and had
a snack and enjoyed the view. We planned on heading down the
North or Northwest side to hit the resort's cross country trails
which run behind the ski area. The top part was pretty wind
packed so we both struggled with our turns with our light gear.
A little ways down we hit some real nice pow, so the rest of the
run was all in excellent snow in the trees. Probably about 800
feet or so of vertical before we hit the cross country trail at
the base. It was a pretty long, but easy ski back - probably
about a 4 mile or so trail - some downhill, lots of flat with
some uphill at the end to take us up to the midway point on the
front side where we skied down the icy runs to the parking lot,
arriving at a little after 5:30. Head back to the cabin for
dinner and beer, and head out for another easy tour along the
railroad tracks, again seeing 2 trains go by. Another excellent
day at Willamette Pass marred only by Jay's binding failure and
my fall in the parking lot at Odell Lake where my Uggs - with
the near zero traction soles, the last pair I will ever buy a
fter having worn them for 20+ years - slipped and I landed hard
on my back, breaking my new Sony Digicam which happened to be
in my jacket pocket. Lucky I didn't break something else. A
long post for an eventful day, it may be a bit before I get my
website (www(dot)telemurray(dot)info) updated as I need to get
the pictures off Sony's proprietary chip.
02/22/08 Still no fresh snow, but a couple more inches from yesterday's
snow fall, conditions looked to be the same as the day before.
We headed straight to the backside and hit the trees off of
Escalator, finding some very nice powder stashes. We then
headed up to hit the glades off the top, Jay heading down the
main run, Northern Exposure, and I headed over to drop in off
the steeper gladed areas. We then did some runs over off June's
run, Jay hitting the fringes and me dropping down through some
steep, tight trees at the top, finding a bit more powder on this
aspect, mixed in with the icy, crusty stuff. After hitting a
really steep, tight shot, we then hit some turns in the sun
off a ridgeline lower down when my binding popped off. The
cable had worked it's way loose, luckily on an easier slope
and not on the more technical steeps just a few minutes prior.
I think I'll shop around for some new bindings after the season
is over, this has happened before. We decided we'd shoot some
more video on my cheap Intel camera - we took a couple short
ones coming down June's run, then I asked Jay to shoot me
coming down the steep upper glade again. The only line with
good visibility was the one he shot me on the previous day, so
I headed down, checking my speed with each turn and dropping
straight down to hit the tight gap between the trees. I made
it down the top, really steep section OK and started really
ripping it as I skiied by Jay and then lost it, going down
hard and sliding about 40 feet down the hill, scattering poles
and hat on my way down - right under the lift, probably the
best entertainment of the day. The tele ski patrol guy was
riding up and commented - "it looks like you blew a heel out".
Everyone's a comedian (being a free heel skier :-)). I've got
a nice bruise on my elbow and a sore shoulder to show for it.
As we headed back up the lift I regained feeling in my fingers
so we hit a couple more steep runs before heading down for
lunch and beer. It had started to snow again, lightly at first,
but fairly steadily later. After lunch we decided to ride up
the shorter Twilight Lift to save walking before mounting our
skis and had a really nice run down through some wide open
trees which hadn't been skied at all (all the tree skiers
are on the back side). We also hit one of the black diamonds
on the front side - High Lead, looking for an open ungroomed
run. What we found was steep, icy, crusty bumps, so we mostly
skied along the fringes to find some smoother turns. Back to
the back side, starting with the trees next to Escalator,
still some very nice shots up high, but snowboard scraped
down lower. Some more runs here, finding the few remaning
untracked areas. The trees off Where's Waldo, the ridge
between the lift and Down Under, the trees off of Escalator
and of course the glades off the top. I had thought that we
would just mellow out in the afternoon as we were pretty
tired, but I seemed to get a second wind and hit successively
steeper shots off the glades at the top, feeling really good
about skiing down this area - which I was too chicken to ski
in cut up deep powder a couple of years ago. Today we were
skiing it in really tough conditions - a thin layer of powder
on icy crust. My last run was the steepest of the day, I
think I found the steepest line there, a couple of the turns
feeling like I was dropping straight down - basically just
checking my speed with my edges, but still linking the turns.
At this point Jay was tiring rapidly, so at 3:25, we could
have got one more on the back side, but instead headed back
over to the front for our last run. We took a couple more
vids heading down the steep upper parts of the front side
and cruised on out. Again, Wllamette Pass delivers the
goods. If anyone wants to know why we ski here rather than
Mt. Bachelor - I have 2 words - "cheaper" and "steeper".
There isn't anything on Bachelor as steep as the glades on
the backside or the top of the front side. Another awesome
trip to the gem of the Central Oregon Cascades. The first
time we've been here and not found deep powder stashes, but
the skiing was still fantastic and we skied harder runs
than we've ever skied. Willamette Pass rocks!
TeleMurray
02/21/08 The first full day at our favorite Oregon ski area. We didn't
get the hoped for fresh snow, so we headed over to the backside
expecting to spend the day on the groomed runs. we were
pleasantly surprised to find a couple of inches on top of
Escalator, one of the shorter black diamonds on the back side.
Quite nice, but lower down it was groomed and the groomed was
very hard. Next run we hit Northern Exposure, right under the
lift, probably the steepest of the back side runs. A mix of icy
crust and powder on a steep run. We tried the glades next to
June's run, found breakable crust and a little bit more powder,
very steep, but pretty nice. That was when we started seeing
skiable lines in the trees, so we headed in. An interesting
mix of crust, powder and icy crud. very challenging, but quite
skiable as long as you kept the speed down - trees are unforgiving.
We skied down the trees through the steep upper portions and
hit the fringes on the more mellow lower part of the runs. We
finally checked out the trees out of bounds off of Where's Waldo,
one of our faves. We found very nice wind blown powder when we
left the trail, some tight trees to get through and some pretty
decent powdery, crusty tree skiing on the steep upper portion.
Very nice snow in the more open glades down below and chopped
up ice down lower. Very nice overall. It started to snow about
noon, so we took a couple more runs off Where's Waldo and then
headed over to the front side to head down for lunch. We headed
into the glades between Good Time Charlie and Eagle's Flight,
finding more carvable crust. The big danger was the bumps and
the ruts from previous tracks. I hit a scraped spot (snowboard
sliding sideways) and landed hard on my butt, digging in my
skis to keep from hitting the trees just below me. The trees
got thicker and the snow worse as we descended. After lunch
we headed back to the back side to find more hidden powder
stashes (we hoped). This time we took a few runs down the
glades skiier's left of the lift, the steepest that the Pass
has to offer, as steep as RTS on the front side, which is
listed at 52 degrees. Jay took a nice video of my coming
down through the steepest part and continuing down. We shot
a few others, which turned out pretty good. I'll have to look
for somewhere to post them now that I have DSL at home. we
decided to check out the trees out of bounds on the other side.
We saw a couple skiers, asked them if there were any powder
stashes - "no way" they responded. They were right, marginal
conditions all the way down, challenging and entertaining. We
hit the trees over by Where's Waldo, found some more decent
shots, hit the knob just below the cliff band and played in
and out of the trees on either side of the steeper runs. All
in all a very challenging and, despite the marginal conditions,
fun day on the slopes of Willamette Pass. Lots of snow, about
8 feet on the front side and 12 feet on the backside. After
dinner we headed out for a short tour along the railroad
tracks, hoping a train would pass. A pleasant tour, no train,
but nice weather under a full moon.
TeleMurray
Back to Report List | |
