Kirkwood Slackcountry 03/24/19

The route:

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We started off the day with a couple warm-up groomers off Cornice Express, then headed over to the backside. From the top of sunrise, we threw on our skins and made our way to Melissa Coray peak.

Summit of Melissa Coray peak

It took us a bit to find a spot to drop down into the backside, as the cornices were quite large, and we ended up skiing down a path which appeared to have slid a couple days back. The snow was very firm here, with a bit of surface melt, which quickly turned into deep snow with a dense wet surface once we ventured off the avy path. Certainly not the best skiing... but we skied all the way out to Fourth of July Lake.

Not so great skiing on the east facing bowl off Melissa Coray

More wet snow!

Fourth of July Lake

From here we skinned to the summit of Peak 9607. The top portion of the ascent was extremely wind affected, and I was very glad to have brought the ski crampons.

Skinning back up, looking towards Round Top + The Sisters

View into the Summit City Creek basin

 The skiing off the top of Peak 9607 was amazing... deep and dry(ish)!

Look at those turns!

We again climbed back up much the same way, but turned towards Peak 9795 at the saddle.

Rime ice trees on the climb up

We descended California Chute from the summit. Snow was good, but was starting to get a bit sun affected.

View from Peak 9795 towards Kirkwood

Sally Alley exit of California Chute

We made it back to Kirkwood in time to catch Caples Crest to avoid that one last skin :)

alistair