Into Valhalla (or that time I went skiing in June)

Ah Memorial Day. A day associated with cookouts, beer, baseball, and for most of my life it was the "official" start to summer. Nothing like a three day weekend to welcome in the nice weather!

Well...that's not really how we do it out here. We decided to spend out long Memorial Day weekend skiing. Growing up on the East coast, ski season spanned from late December to early March if you were lucky. Out here it usually lasts until April. But skiing in June? That just sounds like pure, unadulterated crazy. Many people gave me strange looks when I told them I was going skiing for the weekend. However, this is not the kind of skiing most people think of. There would be no lifts to haul you to the top, no lodge to warm up and get a burger in, no ski patrol to get you to the bottom if you got scared, no nicely groomed trails (hell...no trails for that matter). This was ski mountaineering. You gotta earn your turns!

Our destination was the renowned High Enchantment Lakes area via Asgard Pass. The traverse of this area is rated as one of the best and most beautiful hikes/climbs in the country. It's so popular that just hiking there is heavily permitted through a lottery system, and Enchantment permits are worth gold. Lucky for us, Memorial Day falls just outside of permit season. Our plan was to climb to Colechuck lake, don skis, ski up Asgard Pass, and make camp on the high plateau. The next day we would ski up Dragontail peak, summit, ski down the peak, break camp, ski down Asgard Pass, throw the skis on our backs and pack everything back out to the cars. Definitely an ambitious plan when you factor in all of the ski equipment (we were carrying a lot of weight). Asgard Pass is no joke either, rising 2500+ vertical feet in under a mile, and would be the biggest challenge on this trip.


Day 1: The team taking a break at Colechuck Lake for a quick bite to eat.

Steve resting his feet

Chris with Asgard Pass in the background, and Dragontail on the right

Sunrise in the high Enchantment Lake Plateau

Getting ready to climb.

Dragontail from the east. We would be heading towards that col, then circling around the south side of the mountain to make it to the summit.

Starting out up Dragontail

Almost to the col.


This is Valhalla:

The landscape was breathtaking and felt somewhat alien. Definitely not what we're used to in Washington. It was so pure and pristine too...definitely a magical place.


The summit of Dragontail, the highest peak in the Enchantments. The "summit" was literally a knife edge that was just wide enough for one person, three sides dropping away into shear 2000ft cliffs straight down.

Mt. Stuart off in the distance


Now for the fun part...skiing! The snow off of Dragontail was amazing. Nice corn that was a pleasure to turn underfoot. I don't know if the amount of suffering involved to get there skewed my view, but it was some of the best snow I skied on all season (and this was in June!)
Steve shredding the gnar


Asgard pass was sketchy to ski, and I have no pictures of us doing that. First, it's steep, like really steep. Second, an avalanche had occurred in the pass while we were above, littering the pass with debris and balling a lot of the snow. This made for some interesting skiing, especially with a full pack on my back. No time for a photoshoot...

We did make it down in one piece however. This is Colechuck Peak as seen from Colechuck Lake

Looking back at Dragontail (center) and Asgard pass (left) from Colechuck Lake while taking the ski gear off for the 4 mile trek back to the trail head. Definitely a great weekend. Skiing in June isn't so bad it turns out...


Stats:
Distance: ~14 mi
Elevation Gain: ~5700 ft
Pack Weight: 67 lbf (with skis)
Max Speed: 47.8 mph (on skis of course)

GPS traces of our route. Red is Day 1, Blue is Day 2. No, my GPS wasn't freaking out. We actually skied across the lake (it was frozen for the most part).