I've been wanting to visit the Crowley Columns since I first saw pictures of them, so yesterday Mary, Bristle and I made the trek.
The first glimpse.
Down at the beach, amongst the pillars. Amazing!
The ice was really cool too.
Spectacular day!
Trail/direction info here
An explanation of the column formation here
Just because it's low tide doesn't mean you can't swim!
I was hoping the meager snowpack near Deadman Pass was holding up well enough to warrant a visit, so I toured up Mount Downs (near the south June Lake junction). I was pleasantly surprised to find good snow, just enough coverage, and a cool series of connected glades almost all the way to the top.
Nice views of June Lake (bottom) and Mt Wood on the lower slopes.
The slopes above June Lake are bombed to control avalanches down onto the highway.
These new skis made the long stretches of Forest Service road a pleasure.
Weather sculpted pine on an exposed ridge.
Summit sentinels
Summit views. June Mountain ski area (left), The Negatives (center), Ritter & Banner (far right).
Bald Mountain, open flats and the White Mountains (skyline).
Chicken Wing is the horn just left of center.
Things did not go smoothly to start. The "road" I chose to head south has been converted to a moto trail with steep ups and downs - not so good with the scale skis. There were no tracks so I was breaking trail and there were several melted out spots.
Once I reached Hartley Springs Campground traveling conditions improved. I broke trail for a short distance then connected with a well trodden skin track to the summit of Chicken Wing. Love the views up there.
There were an amazing number of tracks off the summit. The upper glades looked just like a ski area! I found fewer tracks, tight trees, but good skiing by adhering to the north ridge, soon landing on the Forest Service road heading north.
Fine XC style skiing in the forest here.
I was super grateful this snowmobile track otherwise I would have had to break trail for nearly two miles. It saved me a lot of time and effort.
Eventually I left the snowmo track and traversed over to the previous day's skin track up to Mount Downs.
Another summit shot south to Chicken Wing.
No tracks on the descent besides my own! Skiing in the shady north facing forest is staying good. Coverage could be better but most hazards are visible and avoidable. Starting to get slightly grabby here and there by mid day.
Great two day project! The Voile patterned skis made it all possible. No way would I want to skin those many miles of Forest Service road.
I drove up Bishop Creek to take a look at conditions up there. Low expectations were met.
Table Mountain is unskiable.
Ditto for the Tyee area.
Nothing doing up above Parchers in the Brown Lake zone either.
I did enjoy the XC skiing on the road. Was hitting asphalt with the poles here and there but the side roads were especially fun.
Today I toured in the Mammoth Lakes basin - again. Up in the Sky Meadow area - again. Visited some glades I like to frequent.
Unfortunately the last "storm" dropped only a little snow and came with a whole lot of wind, so most everything was wind affected.
The deepest trees still held good snow though.
Looks like we went from a low quantity/high quality situation to low quantity/low quality one.
Still nice to get out. Will probably focus on touring for scenery over touring for turns for now!
I like skiing in the Blue Crag area early season. There's great tree skiing, some fine alpine runs, lots of nooks and crannies, and generally good coverage.
An unusual storm visited the area Monday blessing us with nearly 36 hours of light snow with little or no wind, piling up to about 8" to 10" in the Mammoth Lakes basin and even more north.
Tuesday I took advantage of the improved conditions and toured in an area I knew would have good coverage and fun tree skiing.
The storm cleared as I reached the top of a small knob that would be high point for the day. The wintery scene was magnificent!
The skiing in the trees proved to be phenomenal!
The next day I followed my skin track up and then pushed into the terrain above treeline.
This broad, open slope looked promising but too many rocks lurked just below the surface, so I turned around here.
Tip toed down, only tapping a couple of rocks lightly, but had no interest in lapping it.
Headed east to some promising looking bowls.
Took two fantastic runs in there.
Last view before the run down to Emerald Lake.
I experienced no cracking or collapsing of the snowpack. I observed no natural avalanches. Pole probing revealed an "upside down" snowpack with very low density facets at the bottom in most locations. The thickness of the facets ranged from zero to about 20cm, however the snowpack was stable with the danger rating at low to moderate.
Yesterday I headed up bright and early for a ski tour in the Mammoth Lakes Basin. The day's forecast was for cold temps, light winds, and increasing snow showers. I was looking forward to a wintery day in the mountains.
I again grabbed my new Voile skis with scales since the approach is long and I didn't expect any steep or demanding skiing. On the way to the Coldwater Creek trailhead I decided to follow the summer trail to the historic Mammoth Consolidated Mining site which had been nicely packed by snowshoers. Good fun on the new skis, but would have been tedious with skins on.
Along the way I was afforded this great view of the Mammoth Crest from Blue Crag (left) to the TJ bowl area (right).
The mining area.
Beautiful Blue Crag
I wound my up to the little col on the skyline here.
Nice views from the col. SE towards Duck Pass (far left).
Looking NW down into the Lakes Basin with Lake Mary on the right. The skiing down the open bowls was fair on wind affected snow. The flat light and variable conditions kept me on my toes.
Here in the trees the skiing was much better. Zippin' through the forest was a total hoot!
