Thompson Pass - Stairway Chutes

DATEs HIKED: 4/11/25

TOTAL MILEAGE: 5 MILES

TOTAL ELEVATION GAIN: 3,600’

Our overall gloomy weather with brief windows in Thompson Pass continued on Friday, and our group decided to take advantage of it and head out on another bigger tour. This time we had our sights set on Stairway Chutes. Just 2,000' from Highway 4 lies a cirque encased in couloirs and chutes. To the east is the imposing Mt. Dimond, with steep couloirs pouring off its flanks and to the west is the area known as the Stairway Chutes. Much of the rock near Thompson Pass is tilted on an edge, creating stacked lines of perfect chutes of differing difficulties. Some are narrower, some are shorter, some are wider, some are STEEP. It's a choose your own adventure type of spot. You simply look up and choose a chute to ski, then boot up it and ski down. It doesn't get much more simple than that. And the fact that this area only took us 1.5 hours to reach from the road is incredible, it's an alpine playground!

A few days prior we had already done a recon mission and made it to the base of the chutes during a weather clearing, but we didn't have enough of a window to climb and ski a chute, so we decided to come back if another opportunity presented itself and it appeared that the morning of Friday would be that opportunity. Clear skies were forecasted for the morning and we were a little worried the east facing chutes would warm quickly and shed, so we aimed to start skiing down the chutes around 11AM, which meant an early start on Friday. We packed and loaded up the cars on Thursday night and ended up leaving around 6:30AM on Friday, which by Thompson Pass standards feels nearly like an alpine start.

As we drove through the pass we were treated to some of the clearest skies we had seen all trip, the mountains were glowing in the morning sun and I was happy we left early, both so we could see the sunrise and so we could get a head start on our ascent.

We were the first car to pull up to the parking area, which wasn't surprising given how early we left, and started getting ready. Since we had already toured this route a few days prior the ascent was quick. We took a slightly different, more gradual but easier route up, with the trail broken by Sander, naturally.

The surrounding views were beautiful but we didn't stop much on the ascent, wanting to get to the base of the chutes in good time. We had budgeted 2 hours to climb the 2,300' to their base, but actually made it up in 1.5 hours. Mt. Dimond was a stunning sight to behold in the morning glow. The sun had just crept over Dimond's north ridge and was softly filtering light onto the Small Glacier below.

We assessed the chutes to our right. The first chute had obviously been skied the day prior, it had a solid bootpack up (good) but it was also very tracked out (bad). The second chute was maybe not classified as a chute at all since it didn't top out on a ridge. It hadn’t been skied, but it also looked a little shorter than what we were hoping to ski. The third chute looked Golidlocks-right. It had been skied recently but the tracks looked mostly filled in, it wound 1,300' all the way to the ridge and topped out, it didn't get too narrow, and according to the topo map, it was a sustained 35-45 degrees with just a few hundred feet of 45-50 degree. It looked juuust right.

Dan zoomed ahead, eager to get going. There was an established skin track from previous skiers that zigzagged its way up the chute. (Skinning up a couloir is something we learned recently is VERY frowned upon by Thompson Pass skiers. Next time, we will boot right from the base of the chute!) The views as we gained elevation were very cool. It was my first time ascending a chute this way (as opposed to dropping into one inbounds at a ski resort), and I loved the changing of perspectives as we got higher.

After a few kickturns up, the skin track got extremely steep and the kickturns were slick and rough. Steep slick skintracks are one of my backcountry nemeses, so I opted to start booting up earlier than the rest of the group. Sander also joined me in the early booting and we began wallowing in the snow. Each step I sank up to my knee or higher in the snow, taking a massive amount of effort for minimal gain. Before this trip I had waffled back and forth on if I wanted to buy ascent plates specifically for booting up a chute, but ultimately I decided I didn't want to spend that much money on something I would use once. As I swam my way uphill I regretted that choice. Those $150 plates would have made the ascent so much better!

Somehow we still managed to make progress and slowly the top started to feel closer than the bottom. Dark clouds parked themselves on top of Dimond and light snow began to fall, this was not quite forecasted. As we neared the top the wind began to rip over the ridge, scouring the snow away from our chute and onto the slopes beyond. This meant bootpacking was easier as the snow wasn't as deep, but we also encountered a rocky traverse at the very top that nearly broke me. And I don't meant that in an exaggerated way. The final traverse was on loose rocks that were floating on the snow, not held in place by any means. As I made my way the last 30', the rocks beneath my feet began to slide, I desperately grasped at the other rocks around me, trying to find any that held their place and just when I thought I might be in for a ride, t I grabbed onto a rock that was solid. I was so close to all of the guys who had already made it, they stared at me as I crawled the remaining feet to the top. It was not the scene I had imagined in my head when I imagined skiing this line. I had mentally prepared myself for steep booting, steep skiing, slough management, but I had not mentally prepared myself for a loose rocky traverse and it left me shaken, before the skiing part even started.

The top was also buffeted with frigid winds. There would be no long break at the top or enjoying the views. We transitioned to ski mode, layered up, and got ready to ski. Given how long the chute was and how few "safe" spots it had to stop, we decided that each of us would ski the entirely of the chute one by one so two people would never be in the chute at the same time.

Dan skied the chute first, he had set most of the bootpack on the way up and we wanted to give him those first tracks. A few minutes later he reached the bottom and radioed up, "it's really good, have fun!" I ended up going second. I was still filled with adrenaline from my sketchy traverse and I was nervous to ski the entirely of the chute in one go, but I also was eager to get back to the bottom, to more relative safety.

I was unsure how the chute would ski so my first few turns were extra cautious as I got my bearings, but Dan was right, the snow was good! I started to speed up and focused on fluidly linking my turns down the slope. While I was anxious at the beginning of the line, it didn't take long for the nerves to turn to excitement. I was skiing my first big chute! It turns out 1,300' is a long way to ski in one steep go, and by the bottom portion my legs were burning. I wanted so badly to not have to stop completely, but I did slow a few times to try and catch my breath once I made it out of the steepest and most narrow section. From there it was an easy and fun ski the last few hundred feet to Dan, waiting at the bottom.

Finally, I was at the bottom, exhausted, legs shaking, but so happy for being able to check this line off! We radioed up for the next skier to come down, and Adam, Sander, and Alex all skied the chute one by one.

From there, all we needed to do was ski back to the car. The clouds were coming in and it was tough navigating in the flat light, but we slowly picked our way back down the slopes, Alex ended up running straight into a wall of snow Wile-E-Coyote style, but more or less we all made it back to the car unscathed. Once again it seemed like we timed the tour nearly perfectly!

Skiing Cracked Ice in primo conditions had already made this trip feel worth it for me, but skiing Stairway Chutes was the cherry on top!