Spent a pleasant day at the Pass today with my wife Deb and Karsten Heuer.
Clear skies, light wind and a high of -13 observed.
We skied the N face of Mt Green with a detour and short but excellent pitch (no
wind effect) on the Bonnie Moraines enroute to gain the couloir up to the
summit ridge. Some surface hoar developing in this area, small, up to 2mm
observed at treeline.
It would be wise to bring lightweight boot crampons and perhaps ice axe for the
final rockband before the col. It's dodgy for about 10m without.
The summit ridge travels well on hard facetted snow. The descent down the north
side -- looks like a previous party dug through the cornice on the west side.
We descended the NE ridge directly from the summit dropping about 75m before
cutting left. The skiing here wasn't great and there's some dicey steep
sidestepping through a rockband covered in facets to the glorious slopes below
but it worked. Ski quality from there was generally excellent with some wind
press especially at the top.
Travel was quick on existing tracks (thanks to whomever cut the excellent
uptrack up to the col) and trailbreaking was light to moderate with less than
boot top penetration.
Tom Wolfe
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Tom Wolfe
Mountain Guide ACMG/IFMGA
cell: 403-861-1079 home: 403-678-4997
sent via Blackberry
_______________________________________________
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