South Goff Ridge

Recovered from the jetlag of our India trip, after some morning Friday meetings, I took a long lunch and headed back up to Antilon Lake, eager to complete the short tour I had bailed out on a week earlier. Skinning up Grade Creek Road, I followed my exit track as it left the road near Site B, and contoured around the mountain, overlapping with my existing skin track on the way up, but then veering off so as not to get pulled into the thicket of pine trees below Johnson Creek Forest Service Road.

Following my exit track up towards Antilon Creek Forest Service Road

I followed my exit track up onto the road and proceeded along earlier my skin track, stopping along the way to snap photos of the lake. I was feeling much better this time around, and excited to get some halfway decent skiing in so close to home.

Obligatory photo of Lake Chelan

I went a little ways past where I had turned around last week, and then began yoyoing up the slope. It has a pretty good pitch to it, not particularly steep but enough to make it a fun ski. And the snow continued to look good, with a thick layer of faceted snow along this slope. Once near the ridge, there was some wind effect on certain aspects, but it was more scoured than a wind slab. Near the top I dug a pit and found distinct two ice layers below the recycled powder, but they looked pretty solid and I hadn't noticed any instability on the way up.

Wind effected snow near the top

It was a bit windy at the top, so after a quick break to hydrate and munch on some food, I ripped the skins and started skiing down, taking my time until the snow became consistent. It certainly wasn't a deep powder day, but there was enough old powder that it skied well, and coverage was good enough on this northern aspect that I wasn't dodging bitterbush and sagebrush every other turn. There are a couple of open swathes on this slope, and while short, it's a pretty fun ski, at least for what's available in the area.

Looking down the slope

My turns

I stopped at the road, even though there was about a hundred feet more of skiing. I had to get back to work, and since I wasn't going to lap it, I didn't want to have to throw my skins back on. I was able to ski out down the road and then veer off to ski the lower slope back to Grade Creek, which just like last week actually skied pretty well. I'm surprised the snow held here, as it is lower elevation and a more western than northern aspect. The snow depth is lower here, and you have to be careful where you ski, but it wasn't too bad.

Turns on lower slope

I skated out on Grade Creek Road, hopped in my car and was back to my house to finish up work in the afternoon. This ski tour isn't anything to write home about, but given it's less than 15 minutes from my house, and was holding pretty good snow weeks after the last storm, it's definitely one I will be doing again, especially when time is tight.