[pct-l] Unofficial Snow Report.

[Ronald Moak <ronm@fallingwater.com>]

Boy you leave home for a few days R&R and get home to some 400 new
mails. Intermixed are enough disturbing ones to make me want to turn
right around and head back out.

Anyway in my wandering around Oregon this past weekend I did a little
unofficial snow survey of the Oregon Cascades. In my various wanderings,
I ended up crossing the PCT on the pass near Diamond Lake a few miles
north of Crater Lake. I crossed it yesterday during a brief pause
between to storms. The first on dump 1 to 2 feet of fresh snow this last
weekend. Another storm hit today. Still parts of the drive over the pass
were in near whiteout conditions. Visibility was done to about a 100
feet.

With snow banks along the side of the highway towering 10 plus feet, it
was difficult to tell much of the time where the road surface ended and
the bank began. Fortunately driving into a snow bank is not as costly as
plowing into a tree. An at least there's no way to run off the road. 

I don't know how deep the snow was at the pass. Suffice it to say it's
deep and getting deeper. 

Since I was so close, I decided to take a spin down to Crater Lake. It's
been many years since I've seen the great lake in winter. Highway 62
that runs through a corner of the park and provides the only winter
access was barely open. Snow build up had restricted it to a little
wider that 1 and a half lanes wide. Pass someone meant that each person
had to drive into the snow bank that builds up at the edge of the road
between passes of the snow blower. 

Fortunately I only passed two vehicles in the 40 plus mile round trip up
to the Visitor Center. It's kind of like driving in the middle of a
bobsled run. Definitely a great winter experience. The final 3 miles of
road from the Visitor Center to the rim went not plowed. I don't know if
they plow it anymore in the winter.

Driving around the Visitor Center was a kick. All of the buildings were
buried under 10 to 15 feet of snow. They looked a lot like little hobbit
houses buried in the snow. The snow blowers had dug a maze of roads
through the parking lot. Feels a bit like being a rat in a maze. Now
where the hell am I?

On the lower portion of the highway 62, a dozen or more trees had blown
across the road in the storm. By the time I went through the were cut up
enough to weave through to continue driving.  I can only guess what it
must be like up on the ridges where the PCT runs. 

Once I've finished reading all my mails I'll try to dig up the official
snow stats for the area. Suffice it to say there's a bunch. 

In the 270 mile drive home today, there was for the most part constantly
raining and snowing. And that was in the valley's. Up in the mountains,
it's probably another foot or two of snow.

Unless we get an unusually warm and wet Spring, I'd expect there'd still
be a lot of snow when the thru-hikers come through. Especially on North
slopes and sheltered areas.

Good Luck
Fallingwater

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