Green Mountain, Darrington Ranger District: November 7th Surprise

The goal: search for snow, possibly get some ski turns. 

The outcome: Success! 
Getting there: a rough, slow drive

1. The Suiattle River Road = OK! The Suiattle River Road is in good condition and except for a couple of fallen trees jutting into the road and the occasional stray tree branch, it's a pretty straightforward drive that most cars could handle with care. 10 miles of pavement, then about 9 more miles of gravel to the turn-off for the Green Mountain trailhead. It's not the fastest drive though since the road is somewhat windy and narrow. 
2. FR 2680 - the 6 miles of road leading to the trailhead = ROUGH! HIGH CLEARANCE VEHICLE REQUIRED! Steep, bumpy, eroded, rocky, rutted covered with debris/leaves/some snow and ice, fallen trees - this road was slow going even in our Land Rover truck which is jacked up for extra clearance, has AWD, and has rugged suspension and off-road-specific tires. The only other vehicles that we saw at the trailhead were a Jeep Wrangler and a Toyota truck. Do not even think about driving your Prius on this one! :) We had to get out of the truck and drag a tree and branches off the road at one point. Thanks to a good Samaritan or the USFS, 2 large trees that had fallen across the road had been cut with a chainsaw, clearing the way. If there's another storm that blows down more trees and/or leaves more snow & ice on this road it might become impassable unless you've got a very well-prepped vehicle, a shovel, a winch and a chainsaw!

On the Trail: It's Winter Up There! 

 We started at 9:30am. It was snowing and the temperature was about 25 degrees F. Light dusting of snow from the start on the trail. Within a mile, there was consistent snow and ice. We were breaking trail and so it wasn't that slippery for us. At about 4900'/2.3 miles in, after crossing one of the initial broad avalanche slopes and seeing that the snow was becoming deeper, we switched to our ski gear. We broke trail for our entire journey. We skinned the trail with a small detour at the pond area (so don't follow our tracks there). The snow was deep and the conditions were wintry! Pond was mostly iced over. This area was tricky though with some liquid water flowing and multiple obstacles (logs, boulders) hidden underneath the snow. We reached the base of the slopes leading up to the fire lookout. There was deep fluffy powder here. Unfortunately for us skiers, the slopes below the fire lookout had a firm crust from sun/rain/wind that we keep punching through, which made for less than great skiing. We stopped maybe 500 vertical feet short of the fire lookout as climbing up there only to have to ski down more awful crusty snow wasn't that appealing. A determined and energetic party of snowshoers would have been able to hike up to the fire lookout if they were so were inclined. 

AVALANCHE HAZARD 

Since the trail crosses 2 very large and broad avalanche slopes (which currently don't have enough snow on them to have an avalanche)... then in the final ascent to the fire lookout goes through more avalanche terrain... you would face serious avalanche risk in winter here. Plus of course you might not even be able to drive up to this trailhead in wintertime! Please be careful and cautious.  

 

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