Pumphouse 042112

A breezy but warm spring day provided us with rare gelato snow conditions from first run to last.

Joel prepares for the first run.

As usual, we met at 7:30 at Woolly Mammoth HH. Cathy, Phil, Joel, and Rob met Cheryl and me on a warm spring morning. We divvied up the people and gear between two cars, cruised up to Downieville, then on to the Pumphouse trailhead. We were surprised to find a couple inches of snow at the parking area, probably from a small storm on Thursday. After stepping into boots and unloading skis and poles and skinning up, we dashed across US 40 and clambered up the dirt embankment to the snow. 


Old tracks led us up the usual route by the gravel pit. We dodged the old collapse pits along the trail on a well-consolidated base with a couple inches of powder in places. We didn't expect powder on the open ridge as we saw the wind moving the powder off the high peaks on the way in.

Powder is on the move on the ridge.

As we cleared the trees and headed up the gentle nose of the ridge, we noted that the recent storm had smoothed over the rough snow surface, and the sun had already prepped the snow so it was soft enough to ski on our first run at 9:30. Usually we have to make one or two crust runs before the snow is ready, but today was prime skiing from start to end.


At the top, we saw several people had climbed the peak 12424t and were skiing the 40° slopes into the Pumphouse bowl. We stayed on lower ground.

Click the photo to zoom in and see the tracks
off the peak to the climbers left of the cornices.

Cathy and Phil get ready to make a run.

Joel is standing around waiting to make his run.

Phil and Rob de-skin for the run.

Here I demo the perfect tele-wedge technique.  Arghhh!

Before we knew it, we had done 4 runs with only a couple bites of lunch, and it was time to go to make sure the snow supported us on the way out. Pleas for compassion had us wait a couple minutes longer for the slow eaters who were expecting a formal lunch period. We headed down through the trees, dodging exposed ground and logs, and made it safely to the gravel pit, then to the pumphouse itself, and the car.


Stats: 4 runs / 4 hours / 1900' elevation gain.