Expedition Consulting

This was my first time going up Whiteface on skis via the toll road and the late season conditions were almost perfect for the trip.

I took my Mountain Approach skis for this one, Fischer S-Bound 112s with Silvretta 500LSV bindings setup and they were actually overkill for this route as normal Nordic skis would have done the job just fine; the road is fairly low-angle almost the entire way up and keeping the AT boots at home would have meant a significantly lighter setup. I also ran into several others, most of whom had Nordic or Nordic-BC setups and that’s how I’ll do it next time. It’s a good training route and is usually the first skiable route in the Adirondacks.

The one place that there were minor issues (this was my first time up Whiteface) was from the Castle up to the summit the walkways were basically pure ice and I neglected to bring either crampons or micro spikes (which I have since added to my gear selection) which made that section a little more frustrating that it needed to be.