[TR] Big Chiwaukum - NW Face Couloir 4/1/2013

[Dannible]

Trip: Big Chiwaukum - NW Face Couloir

 

Date: 4/1/2013

 

Trip Report:

Winter happened. It came and went in a haze of wind blasted chairlift rides, legs pushing uphill, skins being torn off and stuck back on minutes later, ridges, summits, lift lines, laughs and hoots, wet boots, sore thighs that resist getting up every morning, late nights working out in the cold and sometimes the driving snow, knowing that tomorrow would be a long day but also a good day, the best kind of day. There were periods of time when every evening I would claim that tomorrow I would rest, but every morning wake up early knowing that there is still untracked snow, just a little further out than where it was the day before. In those few periods of time when there was truly no good snow that could be reached in the time that I had to find it, I would get on the chairlift where I earn most of my living during the winter and take a short ride up to where I could watch the last light of the day highlight the sheer, black northwest facing wall of Big Chiwaukum rising above everything else with its two perfect white stripes, and know again that there is still powder out there. It’s been the same way every winter for a while now.

 

 

With spring in full effect and nothing but sun in the forecast my roommate and old friend Phil and I started skinning up the north side of Arrowhead, just east of Stevens Pass on Sunday afternoon. Heavy packs, the blazing sun, and the rushed feeling that came with a late start made the skin to the top of the ridge between Arrowhead and Jim Hill seem to drag on way too long. From the ridge top Big Chiwaukum looked far away, and the sun looked very low in the sky. We snapped a few pictures and dropped in, committing ourselves to the White Pine valley.

 

Having skinned up White Pine Creek from the normal summer trailhead to ski a random couloir on an unnamed peak a month or so before, we decided to avoid that approach in the future only because it’s boring. We thought this up-and-over Arrowhead thing would be much more interesting, and oh boy, were we right. Wet slides, trees that were way too tight, dead ending between gullies, skiing over dirt, and scary bridges over streams got us to the valley floor, where we went back and forth and down and around to find a reasonable log to get us across the creek just upstream from the junction of Wildhorse and White Pine Creeks.

 

 

We broke out the map and compass to get our bearings before dark, and set off up the Wildhorse valley. We contoured up the hillside trying to guess how far we’d gone to identify terrain features that I had seen on Google Earth and from the ridge top earlier in the day to help us find the basin below Big Chiwaukum in the dark. We would adjust our course based on these landmarks. This is called dead reckoning. Of course, this kind of navigation is subject to a lot of human error, and if you get too excited and over-confident you might find yourself overestimating how fast you can skin late at night with a heavy pack, and you might find that your mind can trick you into believing that the terrain before your eyes matches the terrain features that you see on the map…

 

We broke out into the open just when I thought that we would, and a big dark peak loomed in the distance just where I figured Snowgrass, the peak west of Big Chiwaukum would be. I confirmed this on the map: yes, that must be Snowgrass.

 

Feeling good about things we set about melting lots of snow, eating a big Easter dinner, and washing it all down with a particularly Rich and Rare brand of whiskey. Phil was snoring the moment his sleeping bag was zipped up, and I checked the map one last time before zipping mine, just to be sure. Yes, of course that is Snowgrass over there.

 

I think the conversation the next morning went something like this:

 

Me: “Man, Snowgrass is so far away. I’m glad we don’t have to go over there.”

 

Phil, still groggy with sleep: “Yeah. So Big Chiwaukum is closer? Where is it?”

 

Me, thinking out loud: “What is that big rocky peak way out in the distance? It couldn’t be…”

 

Both of us at once: “Ohhhhhhhhh, shiiiiiit.”

 

Sure enough, we’d gone up the wrong wooded rib in the dark, and had several ridges in between us and Big Chiwaukum. The peak before us was not Snowgrass, but Pt. 7535. This was starting to look like a long day.

 

Pt. 7535 on the left, Big C on the right.

 

As it turned out, we weren't too horribly far off. We just had to drop a few hundred feet, make a level traverse for an hour, and we were where we wanted to be. We found a place to camp that night, dumped our gear, and started up towards the face.

 

The northwest face has two very nice fall line couloirs on it, the one on the left is steeper, wider, and a bit shorter, around 800 or 900 feet, and the one on the right just seems a little more prominent, being about 1,100 or 1,200 feet. We had hoped to ski both of them using the same boot pack on the second lap, but the couloir on the left had already slid, and our route finding error had eaten some time, so we headed up to the one on the right. I defiantly recommend giving yourself enough time to ski both of them if you put in the work to get there.

 

We skinned up and started boot packing about a hundred feet below the entrance. I had noticed a cornice off to the right up high, and small chunks of ice trickled by as the sun melted the rime coating the wall high on the left side of the couloir. I didn’t want to be in this thing as the sun worked its way around, so we stayed close to the more protected right wall, and traded off kicking steps every time the leader began to slow. We made good time, and once up top all but the rime covered upper 100 or so feet of the couloir was still cold in the shade, so we decided to let the ice soften up while we took a short run down the gentle south slope, and watched crazy ice feathers get blown hundreds of feet in the air, shimmering in the sun.

 

 

 

By the time we dropped in the rime was sideslipable, the ice was edgeable, and once we got a bit lower we made turns down something kind of like pow. Once on the apron below the couloir we fired off 1000 feet of high speed turns in what felt like seconds. Good stuff. I brushed off Phil’s suggestion of another lap because I didn’t like the idea of being in there under the sun.

 

 

 

We got camp organized, ate, drank some snow margaritas, and started skinning up towards Deadhorse Pass to get a few more turns. Then, from about 500 feet above camp we watched soberly as a massive slide came ripping out of the mouth of the couloir we’d skied hours earlier. Surely the cornice hanging above the right side must have gone when the sun worked its way around, bringing everything soft down with it. Having, as a result of ignorance, seen many sun-caused avalanches up close, some on terrain that I’d only crossed over minutes before, I didn’t think too much about this one. It wasn’t guaranteed to happen, but I knew it could once things warmed up. For Phil though, new to this game as he is, this was a pretty shocking lesson in why speed is safety in the mountains, and why you must pay attention to what is above you and where the sun is. The mountains are strict, drunken teachers who will beat their lessons into you and hold a pair of scissors to your throat while screaming into your ear to get their point across. You don’t forget these lessons and you do your best to follow the rules, and even so they will sometimes throw a chair at you for no reason at all.

 

We sit next to the fire and sip on fruity Gatorade-margs late into the night. We wake at 3am to unforecasted rain, and move to be under the protection of the trees. Morning comes grey and damp. I’m reminded of Alaskan glacier life as we sip coffee and watch the mountains shed. Our plan was to cross Deadhorse Pass and do a tour over to lake Ethel and exit via The Swath, but that all seems crazy now. We drop into the valley floor and the only tracks that we cross on our way to the road belong to a cougar, some bears, and us, from weeks before. What a wild place to have only 15 miles from home.

 

 

Gear Notes:

Bring whatever you want to carry.

 

Approach Notes:

Drop into the White Pine from the ridge west of Arrowhead, cross river, head up the Whitehorse Valley, find big Chiwaukum.

[JoshK]

Very nice trip, and a great looking couloir! Glad you guys decided against the second lap.

 

Id love to get in some skiing in the Chiwaukum area. How late do you think will be too late this year? Have things begun to melt quick east of the crest, or is the snowpack looking good?

[Jimmy J]

Classic, and well done.

[Dannible]

Id love to get in some skiing in the Chiwaukum area. How late do you think will be too late this year? Have things begun to melt quick east of the crest, or is the snowpack looking good?

 

I'd call it pretty close to done this year. There will be corn up high, but valley bottoms and slopes that get a lot of sun are melting quick. I'm sure the Stuart range is good still.

[lunger]

enjoyed reading your tr! "interesting" approach, classic, done that.

 

have wanted to return to the steeper aspects in that area since an early (10+ years ago) descent of Big C's western (?) aspect, back when i skied w/ broken bindings (tele)--one of these years soon for sure, thanks for the reminder.

[SeanO]

Cool trip and a well-written TR!

[danhelmstadter]

Sweet, kick ass writeup Dan!

[powdrx]

Awesome TR Dan. I caught glimpses of those couloirs a couple times this winter and plotted to get out there. Thanks for the beta and the stoke!!

Aaron

 

[sparverius]

Very nice Dan