Swans, Clearwater Lake Super Loop

Gorge lake and the Northeast wall of Ptarmigan point.

The day after skiing on Holland I rolled out at 5 am, refreshed by a relaxed evening of camping.  With high freezing temperatures, I had grand ambitions to catch the first run of the day in good corn.  The entire 5-mile road approach was on intermittent snow, and I lost count of how many times the skis went on and off.  I think the quickest way up Ptarmigan peak is to ascend the avalanche path just North of the peak, and the bottom of the path was fairly snow free and full of little whipper willows and alder.  Fortunately everything changed once I got into the avalanche path itself and I was soon cruising up firm, fast snow.  The 3,000 foot climb to Ptarmigan peak went by quickly, and I was poised on the summit a few minutes after 9 am.  I skied the East ridge, but instead of turning North down the Lick Lake couloir, turned South and skied down to Gorge Lake.  The top half of the run did indeed have good corn snow, and the mush was manageable below freezing line.  After a quick skate across the lake. I took a good sun and food break and enjoyed the ambience of a cirque that few humans every see.

Lots of little whippers to deal with before getting to continuous snow on the climb up Ptarmigan.

On Ptarmigan.  Excited to ski!

Looking down the good ski line to Gorge lake.

My primary goal for the day was to ski off the summit of Ptarmigan point, so I made the arduous traverse around to Doctor lake, then ground up 3,000 vertical feet of Montana's finest overbaked mush snow to the summit.  It was hot, and my legs were tired, and I loved every minute of it.  Although I should return some day to ski Sunday and Matt Mountains, this was the last of the major Swans summits in the Clearwater group that I had not previously skied.  The snow was pretty over warmed on the Southeast face, which detracted from the otherwise good run. Oh well.

Mushy mush on the climb up Ptarmigan point. 

Looking back on the Ptarmigan run during my exit stage skier's right.

I exited skier's right at the bottom of the peak and made an easy climb back to the crest.  I returned to the valley via the spectacular West facing avalanche path two paths South of the main Ptarmigan point path.  It also skied well off the top, but soon deteriorated to mush.  I had to be careful to manage avalanche danger, but with care, the skiing was safe.  The lower reaches of the gully were full of debris, and I had to ski over, around and through almost a quarter mile of 10 to 30 foot high debris.  It was pretty impressive.  And challenging.  Debris skiing is tricky.  I was pleasantly surprised to ski all the way to the trail, and to find a perfect stream of clean snowmelt water to refill my water bottle and knock back the thirst from two days of warm skiing.

Looking down my exit run.

Debris.  Interesting skiing.  There was a lot more than I could capture in one photo.

I made my way around the rest of the Clearwater loop road, and it was once again on intermittent snow most of the way.  My legs were pretty shot after 8k of vertical, and 19,000 feet of climbing in two days, so I enjoyed relaxing and just enjoying the slow process of exiting.  Having mistakenly not brought approach shoes, I skipped innumerable snow patches, and eventually just clunked out the last two miles in boots to my stashed approach shoes at the highway.  It is less than a mile along the two access points on the highway, and the jog back to the car in a light rain provided a nice little cool down to the day. About 10.5 hours, car to approach shoes at the highway.

Thoughts  It was kind of fun to do an outing like this that goes all the way around the Clearwater loop. Unfortunately, the West facing avalanche paths are melting rapidly, and are more or less out of condition for the year.  On the exit, I did note a fairly striking West facing couloir system on Sunday Mountain, and a return to ski around on Sunday and Matt mountains has been added to the list...