Looking back through some old photos, I came across some pictures from a day trip with a good friend to the Zigzag snowfield on Mt Hood on Memorial Day in 2002…..
Andrew and I had made the journey from Corvallis north to Mt Hood for some spring time riding, and spent some time in the morning spinning laps on the Palmer Snowfield. As the day progressed, we decided to head out of bounds and check out the conditions on the Zig Zag snowfield. Traversing out from the top of the lift, we encountered good conditons. Here’s a shot of the Zigzag canyon…
Andrew ventured out further than I did since he was on skis and was able to traverse higher without losing as much elevation. We saw one guy who said we’d be screwed with where we were at if we didn’t have skins. Evidently he hadn’t heard of hiking? Anyway, here’s a shot of Andrew with the Mississippi Cliffs in the background…
One of the first things I noticed was a rather large kicker someone had built directly over the steep entry to the Zigzag canyon. Hitting that would have probably resulted in a 100 foot flight and then landing on a steep transition. I imagine the person who built it must have had some skills. Nevertheless, we dropped into the canyon and enjoyed the excellent corn snow on the steep slopes.
We rode down through the canyon and were able to traverse our way out to the flatter snow slopes below and eventually connect back to the Magic Mile inside the ski area. Given how good the snow was, we headed back up and made a few more laps out to the Zigzag from the Palmer making for a really enjoyable day. As the day wore on, the snow became mushy and it was time to head back to the car. Overall, the day was really fun, and one I doubt I’ll ever forget.
