Trip Report
Alpine Scramble - Denny Mountain
Fun before-hours scramble.
John Leo
- Mon, May 1, 2017
- Alpine Scramble - Denny Mountain
- Denny Mountain
- Scrambling
- Successful
-
- Road suitable for all vehicles
-
Snow conditions were overall poor. Quite variable, but typically a thin layers of snow (probably from last night) over very hard snow, or soft rotten snow that you could sink a ways into. We didn't use crampons, but toward the top it got quite hard and icy--the layer of fresh snow was enough to provide traction but without it crampons would be highly recommended. Snowshoes not necessary.
Snow all the way, which is good because the brush it covers is miserable when the show melts out.
A 6am start in better than expected weather with decent views. For steeper sections with poorer snow we took turns kicking steps, but otherwise spread out more. At the top of the second lift we assessed the safest route to the summit. The best candidate at this time seemed to be to go up the lowest angle slope just above the lift, then traverse over to what would be a rock chimney but which was filled with snow. We got to the base of the chimney but there it was too steep and the snow too unconsolidated to seem safe to climb, so we turned around just short of the summit. I deemed the effort enough for credit, however.
One the way down we tried to glissade as much as possible--again the poor snow conditions didn't help and the glissades were of variable quality, but overall everyone enjoyed them. Back to the resort at 9:15am for 3:15 roundtrip. We just made the weather window as it started snowing lightly when we got to the bottom, and it rained on the drive home. The trip is listed as 6 miles but no one's GPS got close to that--mine read just under 5 miles and other people's registered even less. Overall a short fun scramble in a beautiful area, and highly recommended to do early in the morning.