Washington Ski Touring: Icicle Creek Ski Tours 

Icicle Creek Canyon has long been known for excellent rock climbing, but is also a very viable option for winter ski touring. There are a few good tours accessible on foot, but your options drastically increase if you can use a snowmobile to gain some elevation and speed what would be a long trip on unplowed roads. We have been hesitant to incorporate snowmobiles into our operation because we have noticed a significant increase in the snowmobile traffic that followed guiding at places like Washington Pass. The tours offered here focus on human powered approaches out of a philosophical hesitation to increase the impact on the few relatively uncrowded suitable venues for snowmobile assisted touring.

All of our tours begin about 10 miles up the Icicle from the intersection of Icicle Road and the Bridge Creek Road. From this point we can access tours on point 7600' (a subsidiary peak of Mt. Cashmere), and routes such as the popular Cannon Mountain couloir. Our location on the eastside of the Cascades tends to keep the freezing levels lower, and the snow a bit lighter, while the these tours are still near enough to the crest that you see substantially more snowfall than in town. It is not uncommon for storms to deposit a few inches in town and leave a foot or more on the mountains mid-way up the Icicle.

Itinerary 

Contact the office if interested in touring in the Icicle Creek area. We generally need a good snow pack for it to work out, but often find good conditions back there on days when adjacent canyons and even Stevens had poor skiing.

This program takes place on US Forest Service lands under a commercial-outfitter and guide permit. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) prohibits discrimination in all its programs & activities and is an equal opportunity provider and employer.