January 26 2013 - Stevens - Smithbrook Traverse

Stevens -> Smithbrook traverse

After some scrambling to align schedules, I drove up to Stevens Pass with Nicole and our friend Kate. I was not in the mood for riding lifts, so I took off up Heather ridge with the idea of running laps on the new snow that had fallen since the last high pressure crust. Upon gaining the ridge and skinning up and past Skyline Lake, the snow seemed very stable and I entertained the idea of dropping off the backside and seeing how progress went to link up a traverse to Smithbrook. I moved efficiently, having left the camera in the car. Bluebird skies and views to the east were easily passed by, whereas this would normally make me pause for at least 15 minutes.

The snow on the first climb got progressivley deeper, and at the top was a solid 6" that promised to hide my skis from the cookies lurking underneath. Instead of farming this slope, however, I scratched my way down the backside traveling down the drainage towards the main Nason Creek drainage. Considering it was now only 10AM, I regretted not at least climbing up to Tye Peak and then skiing the NW face down to the headwaters of Nason Creek.

I came across a number of parties at this point who had come up Nason Creek from the highway, so I slid in behind the skin track and headed up towards Valhalla. I caught up to the large crew putting in the skintrack a few hundred feet up from the creek and took over for about a thousand feet up to the lake. The biggest error I made during the trip was keeping my elevation and traversing above the lake instead of dropping down the ~150' to the lake and then climbing directly up to the col. Instead I nervously edged my way along, shamelessly using veggie belays to gain the col.

Taking a break at the col I polished off my water, threw down my second sandwich and began to check out the map to best use my elevation to get all the way out Smithbrook. Being only 1:30 I was not worried about timing, but I was fairly worked so wanted to avoid putting on skins again - yet Smith Brook proved much flatter than I had remembered, and sections of the road had skins going on and off.

Next time in better snow conditions I hope to tag Tye Peak and Lichtenberg Mtn along the way. Perhaps a good spring run could be a Smithbrook -> Stevens traverse to get corn on Lichtenberg.