Roadtrip 2011: Stevens Pass 2-17-11
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As much as I love the skiing in Crested Butte, sometimes you just gotta get out of town and ski some different terrain. I’ll be spending the next 2-3 weeks up here in Pemberton, BC, but I needed to make a quick stop in Leavenworth, WA to visit my friend Stone Parker along the way. Stone makes amazing rings, and since Brittany and I are in the market for a couple of rings, I crashed at his house to talk shop and get guided around his home area of Stevens Pass while I was at it. First I had to check out the faux Bavarian village of Leavenworth. Nobody told me I was going to run into “Der Radhaus”, as the local ski shop is called, but everything in this town is named in some kind of “Germerican”, as I will choose to call this relative of “Spanglish”. Sort of cool and cheesy at the same time…
In any case, the skiing at Stevens didn’t disappoint. I’d long heard great things about the mountain, and as long as it isn’t raining, as it often does here in WA, Stevens sits solidly in my top ten list for North American Ski Areas. It never hurts to have an awesome guide like Stone, either. Some sampling of the terrain:
One of Stone’s friends:
Self-portrait somewhere in the vicinity:
It was hard enough chasing Stone around without stopping to take photos, so POV will have to suffice. Most of the video was a short hike from the area, although there is plenty of in-bounds terrain that is just as good. They’re just so spoiled here that the thought of skiing something with more than one track is nearly unthinkable.
Stevens Pass 2-17-11 from 14erskiers on Vimeo.
I tried to roll out of Steven’s with plenty of time to make it through the border crossing and arrive in Pemberton at a reasonable hour. Sometimes the border is a piece of cake, sometimes it’s a pain in the butt. Sadly, on this trip I got the latter, with a full search of the truck and accusations that I was moving to Canada. I tried to tell them I would have been taking a lot more skis and my bike as well if I was, but they weren’t buying it. Meanwhile, a storm was brewing in North Vancouver that continued all the way through Whistler. A couple of one-hour delays on the highway and a crazy game of “weave through the stuck cars” eventually got me to Pemberton around 3am- a 12 hour drive that usually takes half that. I snapped one photo during a good part of the drive- I’d have to call this drive one of the worst I’ve ever done:
In the end it was worth it, and we got to ski the beer spines (names will be withheld and made-up on this trip) the next day, but more on that later…
More Road Trip 2011 Posts:
Stevens Pass
No Sleep Spines
O Face
Pemby BC
Luna Creek
Trandem Trees
Whistler/Vancouver
Down Days and thoughts on snomo skiing
Dope Creek 1
Dope Creek 2
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