Moscow Mountain Powder

      I headed up to Moscow Mountain on Saturday. When I got to the parking lot it was full of cars. The bottom gates are closed but the road is plowed as far as the Hatter Creek Road/Tamarack Rd. intersection. After a mile long warm up hike I was able to start skinning up the road. A few of the side gates are nearly covered with snow. The Stotel site was reading like 17 inches of snow but it was quite a bit deeper farther north of the Snotel site. Usually the track leads up to East Moscow Mountain but instead the all went out towards the Cedars. I headed up to East Moscow Mountain. A few guys with snowboard were out doing laps with a snowmobile and I was actually pretty glad to see them flattening out the irregularities in the roads surface.  After a break in the sun it was time to get going.
 

View looking east from Moscow Mountain

It was cool to see the Seven Devils after all these weeks of haze. You've might have to click the photo to enlarge it and then look really close!


Seven Devils in the distance!

Also, its going to be a little while before you can ski off the rocks straight to the trailhead.

Still a little boney

After heading back to the main road I decided to try a run down through the trees. The skiing was actually really fun. The snow was fully supportive and actually powder even though it had not snowed for a few days. All I had to do was avoid the obstacles.

It was way better than it looks here!

After a quick skin back up to the road and a chat about how great the snow was with the snowmobilers/snowboarder and a hiker with his kids  I headed down again. This run was really good. I found that the stump free zones weren't hiding hidden stumps and opened up the skis a little. 

Shortly after some hoots and hollers!

A cool down and and beautiful hike down to the parking lot. A successful reconnaissance trip in the bag.

Be sure to read the latest advisory from the Idaho Panhandle Avalanche Center and remember you can submit condition reports or quest trip report to palousebackcountry@gmail.com and I will gladly publish them on this blog.

Thanks for reading and if you get out this week be safe and have fun!