Ski tour to Camp Muir on 5.21.25.

ROAD: The road to Paradise is paved and suitable for all vehicles and is generally open 24/7. We arrived after a storm cycle moved through, and the last half mile to Paradise and the parking lot itself were quite icy, so just beware of freezing levels! This all melted out by the time we left, of course (31 degrees in the morning when we parked, 50 degrees when we left).

PANORAMA POINT/CAMP MUIR: The route out of Paradise was entirely snow-covered. The NPS has flagged the way leading towards Panorama Point, and there was a compact boot-path/skin track all the way towards the Panorama Face making for easy travel. Conditions were firm with a little dusting of fresh snow.

The Panorama Face was very solid in the morning. I had neglected to bring crampons, but managed to make it work in ski boots since some folks had already kicked in some steps. However, some form of pointy traction would have made life easier.

I switched back to skinning after the Pan Face and it was generally smooth, albeit slow sailing with a few icy spots (I did take a slip on a particularly slick sidehill...). There was one section that was melting out and getting a bit rocky, but we could still skin through it, and we managed to avoid the area by staying skier's right on the way down. One million steps later, we made it to Camp Muir.

There were a handful of supply chopper drops at Muir today! I wasn't at Muir when they landed/took off, but I imagine it would be very loud and windy.

Left Muir at 1 pm. The ski down was fairly pleasant - not the foot of fresh pow we had dreamt of, but more wind-packed. We had generally nice soft turns with a few icy spots here and there up higher to keep us on our toes. Conditions started getting a bit sticky above Pan Point and definitely mushy and grabbier below!

WANT MORE PHOTOS? Follow along on Instagram @thenomadicartist

The gate to Longmire on the road opens at 9AM. By 10AM the parking lot was well populated by skiers and snowshoers. Microspikes were good for the initial sections, but later portions were better with snowshoes. The trail was well marked by postholes and ski tracks. Entire hike was in snow, initially harder pack which developed some slush by evening, and later powder. Views from Panorama Point were exceptional.

We did not hike all the way up to Panorama Point because of the snow and white out condition. Lots of fresh snow, we really enjoyed snowshoeing. Trees were beautiful. Gates opened at 10am, parking lot was not full when we left around 1.30pm. We did not a view of its majesty but still a great day in the national park. Even driving from Longmire to Paradise was a true winter wonderland.

Weather was great, exactly as forecasted.  Clear skies all day, in the low 20s and quite windy in certain spots.  I was able to clearly see down to Hood, which seems rare for me, usually too much haze or clouds or whatever.  But not today, it was lovely.

Snowshoes were not really needed, lots of people just microspiking all the way up to Pan Point.  I had my snowshoes and I'd rather carry them on my feet, then my pack, so I wore them pretty much the whole time, but things were packed down enough that they weren't doing much.

Once on top of Pan Point, that's where it got super windy and was blasting pretty good, a couple folks turned around before the top because of the wind.  I kept heading up to McClure rock and it actually mellowed out a bit once you got near there.  I turned around at McClure worried about catching the outbound gate in time, but still had more than enough time when I got down.  So I wished I had gone further -- at least to Sugarloaf, which wouldn't have been much more.

Glissading down Pan Face was sort of futile.  Way too slick for my tastes, plus trying not to smash into the tons of people, meant, I would slide for about 5 feet, then self arrest.  I kinda gave up and just slid on my side, sort of half self arresting the rest of the way.  I'm sure folks were thinking "That's not how you do it."  Ha ha.

All in all, great trip.  The nordic patrol folks were all out and I had a great time talking with them.  Thanks for all you do to help keep us safe!

My only minor gripe of the day, is when people stop in the middle of the boot pack/main trail to take breaks or layer adjustments or whatever and make us all walk around them in the loose or angled snow.  If you're gonna stop, it's polite to move off the main trail :-)  That seemed super common today, whole families basically just standing there in the middle of the trail.

We had a wonderful day snowshoeing to Panorama Point today. The weather was so good, and there was even a line at the entrance before 10AM. Looks like there hasn’t been much new snow recently, roads were mostly bare, just some sections with thin ice covered. Snow on the trail was also so compact. We used snowshoes all the time but many people just used spikes or nothing. Snow softened a little bit in the afternoon, and maybe because of the heavier weight on shoes coming down, it felt more like snowshoeing.

We went up from the Edith Creek Basin, and came down from skyline trail. Again, all paths were quite clear today so path finding was no issue. The route descriptions on WTA is very accurate nevertheless, you will come to a flat area before take a left turn uphill, which is also kind of a viewpoint to the paradise valley.

Adams, Hood, and St Helens could been seen clearly today. Adams and Helens could been seen even halfway, which made me wonder if I could ever see them in summer around similar elevations. I wonder if the it was the deep snow so we were much higher than what we can be in summer.