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Trip: A week at Fairy Meadow (Bill Putnam hut) - Pythias, Damon, Enterprise, My Little Pony, Pioneer (ski peak) Trip Date: 04/18/2018 Trip Report: Last year a bunch of my friends and I won the lottery! Well, more accurately, Bingen won the lottery and invited us to share in his prize- a week at the Bill Putnam hut up at Fairy Meadow. Wisely, he convinced to us to spring for a cook for the week, a luxury on top of the helicopter ride for us and our gear to the hut. And what a week it was. Storm, sun, wind, and fantastic food- It was my first taste of the more refined side of backcountry skiing. We had the whole hut for our party (20, including Patti the Mo's Mountain Cuisine cook). Each day the weather gods were consulted and plans hatched for whatever objectives seemed reasonable give the avy conditions and visibility. Some days this meant tree skiing below the hut. Others were spent chasing 10,000'+ summits ringing the valley dominated by the Granite glacier. Views down the spine of the Adamants are quite impressive, along with far away views of Sir Sanford (highest of the Selkirks) and Sir Donald (Sentinel of Roger's Pass). The hut is carefully situated at 6,800' meaning that a huge variety of ski terrain of all complexities is right outside your door. Steep chutes, mellow glaciers, treed glades and everything in between are comfortably within reach in a moderate day. We were moderately successful with weather, having one bluebird, three OK, and two storm days, managing to ski or boot up Pythias, Damon, Sentinel, Pioneer (ski peak), Enterprise, and My Little Pony (glaciated bump above the Unicol). All fairly easy, but each with it's own uniquely spectacular view. You're only limited by the conditions and your imagination at Fairy Meadow....Just don't be late for appetizers at 4pm! View across the Gothics Gl.: Skiing late season powder below Friendship col: Go big or go home: Heckling people on the "practice slope" right above the hut: Sauna Fairy, she points the way to cleansing warmth: Hut diversions (High Country Christmas is now at the hut for your reading enjoyment): Sentinel keeps watch over a trio battling high winds near the hut: Cycle Peak across from the hut: Granite Gl. Icefall: Skinning up to the Granite: on the Granite below Unicol: S Summit of My Little Pony: View of storm clearing on Austerity and Ironman: Shoulder of Colossal above the Unicol: Skiing the very mellow Granite Gl.: Skinning over to another part of the Granite under Pioneer Peak and the Stickle: The Stickle! Heading to Friendship Col on our best day of the week: Almost at the col, Gog and Magog above the skinning skiers: Friendship col: The Black Friars from Pioneer ski peak: Ridiculous peaks all around: Mount Columbia (?) in the distance: Adamant and Austerity: Our tracks on Pioneer: Adamant North Face: On the summit ridge of Sentinel. We fixed a line in case the slope slid: On the Gothics Gl: Skinning over to Enterprise under the watchful eye of Adamant: Just below the summit of Enterprise: We tried a different way back to the hut, coining the term "Adventure Suck Tour". It worked to cross the lower Granite this season with a 4m snowpack, but don't count on it every year: Bye bye Fairy Meadow, until next time: Gear Notes: Harness, rope, ski crampons, axe, whippet, rando ropes, avy gear. Plenty of beer/whiskey. Hire Mo's Mountain Cuisine for your cooking needs! Approach Notes: Alpine Helicopters out of Golden

Trip: Eldorado Peak - East Ridge Trip Date: 04/22/2018 Trip Report: It's a bit late but me and Fred skied Eldorado on Sunday 4-22-18. We did a TH bivy in the car Saturday night (after helping dig a guy out of the snow 100' from the parking lot). There was a tiny bit of snow lingering in the shade at the lot, but none in the woods. The log crossing wasn't nearly as bad as I had heard (though the water was low). Pretty typical Cascade stuff: We were off at 0600 carrying skis wearing ski boots for about 2100', man is it nice to start under sunny skies and not with headlamps. At the start of the boulder field there was enough snow to skin but not by all that much. The snow was pretty variable, wind affected, but it went pretty fast. We crossed into the Roush Creek drainage at 6200' after a brief attempt to do so at 6500' (there is a cliff there). The drop down was only about 70' of easy plunge stepping until we put skis back on. Skinning to our lunch spot at 7500' went smoothly from there. Skinning the boulder field: Shitty views towards Cascade Pass: Crossing the creek divide, this was 6500', too high: Lunch spot: I think it was around noon when we took a long break to melt snow and have lunch at the plateau. Sun-screened up we headed up again. On the ridge the snow was firm and wind affected, it didn't warm up at all despite the hot sun and pretty warm air. We skinned to within about 150' of the summit where we switched to booting with crampons and axes. The ridge was a piece of cake, wind packed snow made for bomber steps and solid cramponing. After obligatory ridge photos we took some time to identify peaks and enjoy the clear spring views, planning future trips, then back to the skis. Looking east toward Forbidden, Goode, etc. Summit ridge: I had thought that the snow on the ridge would be a horrid ski but it was more powdery than anticipated and was actually lots of fun. We shot as far across the snowfield as we could, then shuffled and boot packed a little over the hump. The ski down from about 7000' was horrid sticky sludge, but views and silence were pretty amazing. We spoke to another group that was headed for the NW Couloir at the divide ridge. How did it go? From there more horridly awesome sludge down to the boulder field where the steeper angle made for suuuuper sketchy traversing causing the entire slope to slough off as wet slides. Way dangerous, though its probably all sloughed off to firmer stuff now. From there we hiked out for a round trip of 9.2 miles, 7100' in 12 hours. Gear Notes: Axe, crampons, helmet, ski touring gear. Didn't take a rope, glad of it. Approach Notes: Hiked about 2100' in ski boots from the TH.

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