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| Greg skins the upper slopes of Kendall Peak |
Greg and I had not been in the Kendall Peaks area this year. With some mixed precipitation the day before, I had hopes of a little fresh up high. We had some nice pockets of soft snow, as we toured up into the commonwealth basin. Unfortunately, as we ascended through the trees, we could see that the skiing would not be much fun. The snow was somewhat soft, and decent for breaking trail, but it had refrozen enough from the prior day's warming event, that it was not ideal for turns. We told ourselves that once we broke out of the trees, things would improve. Not so much. Between old tracks and a firmish crust, not good. We stopped short of the Kendall peaks ridgeline, perhaps shy 100 feet. Conditions would have been good to top out, but with the prospect of no good skiing, we were not motivated to go higher. We traversed East and crossed the ridge into the Kendall Lakes Basin. Ski turns were on a firm supportive crust. We managed a few decent turns then hacked our way through the trees onto Kendall Lake. We went with my favorite emergency exit, for when the skiing just sucks, and skied the Kendall Lake approach road all the way out to the Hyak exit and called for a shuttle. All in all, it was a good day. Not stellar ski turns, but good views and we covered a wide variety of terrain.
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| Getting higher. Hyak in the distance. |
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| Not powder |
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| Kendall Lake |
