Timberline, OR - September 3rd 2006

I haven't ski in the last two days... what a different temps wise.

Quick summary:

Aug 29 - 48F at 7am and very windy. Bright and sunny until the clouds moved in at around noon. Surfaces softened up at around 10am.

Aug 30 - 33F at 7am. Lifts aren't running. Rain and snow. There was about a one inch accumulation on our rental car at Timberline Lodge. It never warmed up.

Aug 31 - 40F at 7am. Packed powder (okay, it's a slight exaggeration), but it wasn't the hard icy surfaces of the previous ski day. Everything softened up at around 9am. My daughter joined me at 10am for turns until closing. No wind and temps increase fast. Nice sunny day. It was getting pretty sticking at around noon.

Two days off to the coast.

Sept 3 - 61F at 8am. Summer is back, no hard surfaces to be found at 8am. A few Rock Islands are popping out toward the bottom of the Palmer Snowfield. I am toasted.

Sept 4 - Last day of the 2005-06.

Now I have to drive back to Portland and we'll do this again tomorrow. Getting back East on Wednesday.

Despite the September 15 storm it appears that Palmer (photo from Oct. 7) is close to starting from scratch again for the new season.

Where is the snow?

Frankly, I do not know what it looks like in Oct. .... but this is sad.

A southside snow field. Not good.

ChrisC":2p67mllv said:

Where is the snow?

Frankly, I do not know what it looks like in Oct.

Click to expand...

Looks like there definately less snow than when I was there on September 4th. The bottom of the lift wasn't the problem, but the area around the mid was fairly bare. You can see that it probably got worst from looking that the bottom of the snowfield.

Patrick":156czn6y said:

Sept 3 - 61F at 8am. Summer is back, no hard surfaces to be found at 8am. A few Rock Islands are popping out toward the bottom of the Palmer Snowfield. I am toasted.

Sept 4 - Last day of the 2005-06.

Click to expand...

Same as the previous, so here are the pictures.

What percentage of Palmer's vertical was snowfield vs. white ribbon at that time of year? Second to last pic is bottom of Palmer, right? With Magic Mile chair overhead and its unloading station just out of the picture to the upper right?

My impression is that quite a bit more variety was there during Frank's trip a month earlier.

The Palmer Lift is about 1500 vert (7000 to 8500 according trail map).

I would estimate the midstation is at about 7500 - 7600 giving the snowfield almost 1000.

The snowfield is definitely the steepest and most interesting part of the mountain. Maybe similar in pitch to the Chair 3/FaceLift (?) at Mammoth. Possibly less so. It's not a steep place. More like high intermediate than low expert pitch in my opinion. Like the Summit Lift at Bachelor -- maybe a more apt comparison.

ChrisC":132jpjfw said:

The Palmer Lift is about 1500 vert (7000 to 8500 according trail map).

I would estimate the midstation is at about 7500 - 7600 giving the snowfield almost 1000.

Click to expand...

I checked back at the data from my watch.

Here is what I found:

Palmer top-half: 713 vertical ft (snowfield and steeper part)
Palmer bottom-half: 726 vft (snowfield tongue(?) in gully - flatter)
Ski run pass Palmer during the last week of the season: 792vft
Hike from end of snow to bottom of Magic Mile: 162vft

ChrisC":132jpjfw said:

The snowfield is definitely the steepest and most interesting part of the mountain. Maybe similar in pitch to the Chair 3/FaceLift (?) at Mammoth. Possibly less so. It's not a steep place. More like high intermediate than low expert pitch in my opinion.

Click to expand...

I totally agree with Chris,I even think that Chair 3 is probably slightly steeper at it's steepest place than Palmer. Pitch grade from Palmer snowfield is very constant. As I mentioned in one of my report, Morgane was laughing when I told her that was a black run...she answered back that it's should be a green one. Mind you, she's was only 8 and has a hard time noticing how steep runs are.

Tony Crocker":132jpjfw said:

Second to last pic is bottom of Palmer, right? With Magic Mile chair overhead and its unloading station just out of the picture to the upper right?

My impression is that quite a bit more variety was there during Frank's trip a month earlier.

Click to expand...

No, picture #3 is the Palmer midstation. The picture that you posted is the bottom of the Palmer lift.

Rock island look bigger than they were (the one with midstation). It's was the worst area on the snowfield, it's was really the last few turns on skier's right that add rock islanmd issue. 95% of the rest of the snowfield was more or less intact.

Tony Crocker":132jpjfw said:

My impression is that quite a bit more variety was there during Frank's trip a month earlier.

Click to expand...

It was my understanding that not much of the coverage changed in one month, however I'm sure that the rocks were probably not popping out at the bottom of the snowfield (mid). That only really started in the last week of August. Frank could probably answer this more than I can, but it was my understanding that he had a skier right option on the left side of the lift. The bottom of the run was skiable and wide open, however it was sheltered from view and I couldn't see where it started. There might have been only a small walk required at the top to make to the snow and ski all the way down to the bottom of the Palmer lift.