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| The Porphyry Peak Lookout |
The wind has been blowing non-stop and I thought our good snow would have been wind-crusted and melted, and so I stayed home until Sunday, Jan. 5.
I ventured out tentatively on that day to see what the wind had wrought, finding incredibly terrific and deep snow in the Little Belts in the Kings Hill Area.
I hate to keep repeating trips, but for the third time this winter I went did the 747 Loop that goes to the top of Porphyry Peak (first peak of the year!) It is a 5.6 miles loop that gains and loses more than 1,000 feet in elevation. Without rushing, I did the loop in under 2 and a half hours.
There had been a small dump on Saturday, depositing about 3-4 inches on a two-foot base.
The wind had also blown soft snow over our tracks of two weeks ago.
The snow was like velvet and the turns couldn't have come any easier.
On the back side of the mountain where 747 meets a roomed snowmobile trail/road, snowmobiles had put down tracks in the center, leaving a wide strip of powder on either side.
Sometimes this two-mile stretch on the road to the O'Brien Creek trail is a sheet of ice and fast an and somewhat dangerous.
Sunday, anyone could have made turns.
While the wind was blowing on top ,the vast majority of the loop was sheltered. Although the sun shown brightly, it was bitterly cold. The temperature in the sunlight at my car at Kings Hill Pass was only 21 degrees.
I took the long route, avoiding the Golden Goose run on the Showdown Hill, going up the trail to the north to the top.
Like me, other people were avoiding the wind and stayed away from the hill, so there were very few people on the ski runs.
After the trip I hopped in my new car to test it out on the icy road to White Sulphur Springs, where I did my first soak of the new year.
With a backcountry ski and a hot springs soak I felt positively European!
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