cooldickdudeHi all,
I'm hoping to do some touring when I'm in Oregon from may - late august. What are some spots in the PNW you would recommend for someone new to touring? Hopefully I'll be using daymakers paired with my Kartel 108s. Super hyped!
Seeing as that during that time of year, you're mostly relegated to a lot of north facing, steep, frozen slopes high up on the volcanos, that sounds like way too wide and heavy of a ski to do late spring/summertime backcountry skiing on... snowpack gets mighty thin even on a big year in most places.
Also, daymakers are going to suuck trying to get grip on firmed up spring/summer snowpacks, with frozen suncrust and cupping all over.
Skins in that time of year usually don't fully do justice due to the inability to make purchase on what are very much likely to be steep, crusty slopes.. I recommend investing in a set of boot crampons and a pack that you can slap your skis onto Aframe style.
The north side of the north sister is a good option once Mckenzie highway opens up to grant you access.. on a big year, South Sister is always a good option as well. Middle sister is a bitch to get to either way.
Diamond Peak, Mt. Washington, and Mt. Jefferson are all total slogs to get to at any time of year so i wouldn't recommend that for a newbie..
Maybe Mt. Bailey? or perhaps Mt. Scott on the crater lake rim? But neither of those seem to hold snow for too long once the early summer months strike..
Mt McLoughlin and Pelican Butte are good, but Southern Oregon is generally a huge question mark when it comes to snow depth. Though this season seems to be going pretty well there.
Mt. Adams is a good option, but again, can be a bit of a slog just to get to where you can start skinning up.
Shasta if you want to drive south for a bit is an excellent choice for skiing in summer months. I've skied it in June and July and it was magical. I'd assume Rainier would be similar at a lot of aspects.
and then you can always just drive down to California and ski the eastern sierra nevadas, which are due to be going off through at least Mid-July at this rate... but you're absolutely going to need a lighter weight, and more mountaineering type setup to ski most of the stuff on the east side, effectively...
