Stowe 11/20

[JD]

Breakable crust formed after 4-5 fresh inches. Kind of a good thing. Base is getting fairly consolidated. Skinned up the LT from the notch and there is 12+" of dense snow. 20" down chin clip with a light crust on top of creamy snow that skiied pretty well. First day on plastic tele boots. Glad I had the extra power.

 

[Marc]

Wow, so you can skin the LT from the notch? I hiked that in the summer and parts of it seemed pretty steep for skinning. How far up do you skin? Can you skin up to where you cut off it? Do you use ski crampons?

 

[JD]

You can skin from the notch to the chin on the LT with no crampons. I would rate it double black diamond skinning, with triple black being the most extreme in the east. This level of skinning requires climbing spruce trees out of traps with skis ON. Nice way up though, and doable with good cover.

 

[Marc]

Cool, thanks for the info. After hiking it in the summer, sounds like something I'd like to try, and it is a scenic trail. Must be nice in the winter. It sounds likely I'd have to doff the skis for some of it, but then again, Austin has provided me ample opportunity to experience some "extreme" skinning in the past.

 

[JD]

Actually i wanted to correct myself. To get to the chin I would bust off the LT onto chin clip at the traverse and head up past the gondi house. You can skin the whole way that way. You can go up the LT past Taft Lodge and up the north ridge. The last 50 feet is a walk and crampons would be helpful.

 

[Marc]

Actually i wanted to correct myself. To get to the chin I would bust off the LT onto chin clip at the traverse and head up past the gondi house. You can skin the whole way that way. You can go up the LT past Taft Lodge and up the north ridge. The last 50 feet is a walk and crampons would be helpful.

Yes, I figured that's more or less what you meant. There's a part of the LT that involves some scrambling to get over the last bit up to the Chin.