I generally enjoy ski mountaineering with summit objectives more than ski touring, but the Mesachie Tour looked like a nice way to get up high with great views and experience a new area along Highway 20. Our group of four met up at about mile 148.5 near the end of the tour, dropped a car, drove to Easy Pass, and started skinning at 8:45am.
While there was continuous snow at the trailhead, we quickly had to transition over patches, a bridge, and a series of other obstacles. It was slow going and not so easy on the way up to Easy Pass. After putting skis on our backs for a ways, we finally started skinning near the end of the switchbacks near 4,000 feet, pulling some PNW moves over some dry patches before it finally got easier. The rest of the climb to Easy Pass was straightforward, though it was already hot on our perfect blue-bird day and we were getting increasingly nervous about wet slides on the high traverse.
From the pass, we switchbacked North up to 7,000 feet and then started traversing. It was slippery enough with high enough consequence that we eventually put skis on our backs and booted along. This turned out to be reasonably efficient since there were a number of sections with bare rock, there was a booter in place, and we also hit a place where we needed to climb up steeper section. Farther along the traverse at about 7,400 feet where the runout became less consequential, we switched back to skinning, reaching the col above the Mesachie Glacier in about 5 hours from the car.
It felt like a beach here with no wind and a strong sun. The views of Black Peak, Goode, and Logan were awesome. I was especially intrigued by the sprawling Douglas Glacier on Logan. We ate a leisurely lunch here and then dropped in next to a cornice onto the super fun slopes of the Mesachie Glacier. What a cool cirque framed by Mesachie, Katsuk, Kimtah, and Cosho Peaks.
The ski was super fun all the way down to 5,650 feet where we transitioned and started up toward Mesachie Pass. The views back toward Mesachie as we climbed to point 6,730 were awesome—it felt much more remote and grand than any of us had expected. We transitioned at about 7 hours and 20 minutes from the car, skiing a relatively steep chute briefly before getting on much lower-angle terrain. We stayed on what seemed to be the easiest slopes of the descent and were able to ski down to about 4,000 feet with some shenanigans, including one point where we had to climb back up a stream gully that turned into an exposed waterfall.
We’d carried trail runners, given how light the coverage seemed to be where we’d parked, and walked our way down to the creek at 3,400 feet. It took a bit of looking to find a suitable log to cross, and we did some “Four Seasons Total Landscaping” on it, removing some limbs to make it easier to get across with skis on our backs. It felt great to be past the final objective with lots of daylight left and we triumphantly walked a short ways down the highway to our car for a little over 10 hours on the day. High price of admission and exit, but worth it!