Timberline Lodge is the clear inspiration for the "Oregon architecture" from out last post. Stained cedar, thickly shingled, ready to hold back 20 feet of snow or 20 feet of rain.
Perched perfectly at the timberline at 6000', this icon is just as shining as you remember it, squat and stout, separating the forest below from the wild frozen moonscape above.
Even if you don’t remember The Shining, you probably do remember The Pee-Chee.
We were clocking about 6000 vertical feet per hour today June 1—lapping the Magic Mile (1080 vertical feet) and Palmer (1526 vertical feet.) Palmer is one of our favorite lifts of all time – with its literal hinged "fortress walls" at the lower station and its literal "bat cave" top station, this lift is a dramatic, other-worldly experience.
The snow ranged from "powder" to "ice" to "corduroy" to "slush" from the Palmer top station at 8500 feet to the lodge at 6000 feet. We hit our Everest before lunch, but only because the lifts start turning at 8am (7am start time starts next week.) None of it is steep – but it is so overpoweringly authentic, you don’t really care.
Portillo is nice, but Timberline is closer.
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