an upward progression

new york gully

2012-02-16T17:51:00.000-08:00

will entering the box gully

snoqualmie mountain is a special place for us who ski and climb in washington, especailly those from the seattle area. from seattle, only 3 hours of driving and hiking puts you at the top of a steep couloir or at the base of long mixed climbs. it's rare that one can be on such a high quality alpine climb so close to the bar. yesterday will, chris and i climbed new york gully in amazing conditions. the route was iced up, the sun was shining and spirits were high.

the nw side of snoqualmie from avalanche peak last march

after packing in the parking lot, we left the car at 6:40 with headlamps on and started trudging up the phantom slidepath. an hour and 20 minutes later we were standing at the notch looking down into the thunder creek drainage. another team was ahead of us so we took our time lounging in the morning sun while we geared up.

climber approaching in bottom center

early morning sun added a relaxing feel to the start

the other team took the direct start so we went up and right to the original line. sometime shortly after nine we started climbing. i hadn't been on a climb like this for a long time (too much skiing!) and lucky me, i got the first lead block. from the belay i traversed steep snow around a corner to find more steep snow. eventually i found the other team climbing up and let them pass. not wanting to belay at the same spot, i broke the first pitch into two with a terrible belay stance and scary pro. pitch two went much more smoothy with real ice and fun runnels. arriving at the belay, my block was over and i got all the runout (one solid pin and everything else was poop) loose snow traversing.

look how sweet my first pitch was!

chris and will following the first pitch

from the dead snag belay, we restacked the rope and chris led off up the box gully. 60 meters out he finds a belay and will and i follow up the corner, marveling at the ice plastered everywhere! this was hands down the most fun pitch i've climbed in the alpine. solid steep alpine ice with a few tricky bulges brought will and i up to the belay where chris led out again.

chris starting up the box gully

box gully action

looking down at will while climbing in the box

near the top of pitch three

this next pitch started with a wall of alpine ice (much steeper than it looked) that led to meandering ice in a groove up to a broad ledge below the short aid section.

"can you get a picture of my jacket?"

bottom of pitch four... steep thunker ice

thick enough for the 13cm!

will belaying chris on pitch 4

the chair peak group

myself just below the A2 section

we'll climb that roof tomorrow

with chris's work done, will took the rack and started up the aid corner. a tricky mantle move put him face to face with the corner and within reach of a fixed aider. putting in a cam and hooking the aider, will tried to french free the pitch and ended up falling onto his ice tool umbilical. frustrated but determined, he got back up there using all sorts of tom foolery and continued up the pitch to the ridgecrest.

will starting up the corner

deaner sending hard

following the corner was a lot of fun, especially the mixed ground above it that was littered with alpine ice, large rock handholds and trees!

chris climbing the A2 corner

sweet face

from the ridge, will traversed the snow slope and went up to a notch above the slot couloir. one rappel down into the slot and 100' of booting deposited us at the top of the couloir, just a 10 minute hike from the top of the mountain. a quick stop on the summit right at sunset saw us back at the car 12 hours after we started.

rainier sunset time

rainier with alpental's lights

cumbre!

beers in the bar at alpental and being pulled over for no running lights put a great end to the day.

all in all, new york gully is a high quality mixed alpine climb that deserves all the attention it has been getting lately. right now it's in fat ice conditions, go get it!

bandit peak black hole couloir

2012-02-07T22:06:00.000-08:00

glacier peak and clark mountain from deep in the black hole

click here for john scurlock's view of the entire couloir. it runs from between the two highest tiny summits down the obvious line. and here is a better view of the upper half. for a video of the trip click here.

after a "recon" trip last week, jeff and i met travis and carson at the twin lakes trailhead sometime around 1:00 am. a quick sleep in the car saw us skinning toward our destination around 5:00. having the approach dialed put us across all the river and stream crossings before the headlamps were turned off. refrozen snow conditions allowed for quick skinning and before we knew it, we were skinning under the w ridge of bandit peak toward the huge debris pile under the black hole.

early morning avy debris

before heading up the couloir, travis and carson downed a starbucks double shot and off we went. the first 800' of the couloir was booting through avy debris and alpine ice runnels before it turned to the right and became soft piles of sluff. another 800' of wind packed punchy snow brought us to the open snow slope between the two main sections of the two couloirs.

double shot

endless traverse to the couloir

avy debris for the first 800'

lunch? break

a break at the open snow slope for some food and water revealed our one route finding error. we had booted up the right side of the snow slope where the snow was deep, punchy and a little spooky. jeff punched a bootpack across the slope finding better snow on the other side. now on the left side of the slope, i started booting up toward the upper couloir.

the upper couloir

the view just before we get boxed in by the couloir walls

high east winds the past few days gave me pause as i entered the upper couloir. all the drifted snow from the east side of the mountain falls directly in the narrow slot we plan to ski. but conditions prove to be excellent, shin to thigh deep wind packed powder with no layers and an excellent bond to debris deep in the snowpack.

about 1300' of steep windy snow climbing brought us to the last bend in the couloir where the notch came into view. the last 50' to the top kicked back to just over 55 degrees and before we knew it we were down climbing or side slipping the top 30 feet.

bluebird mega couloir skiing day

i think we were actually in the sun for 5 min on the approach

steep topout

steep sideslip

dropping into the main part of the couloir i found deep wind packed snow turn after turn. sluff would run with each turn but we quickly realized it was benign and were able to link as many turns as we wanted (read as many as we could).

travis resting after linking as many turns as his body could handle

jeff slaying the upper couloir

travis's turn

carson draggin the hand...

a few turns before the binding incident

after about 500' travis and jeff skied through to the open snow slope while i waited for carson. as carson was skiing down to me he took a turn and almost fell over coming to a stop. "shit, i broke my binding!" as carson side slipped down to me thought deep snow with one ski i could tell he wasn't joking. the back half of his tele binding had snapped off (as in the metal broke) and was dangling by a mangled cable.

fatty broke his binding

quickly we realized we were over 3000' up the couloir and about seven and a half miles away from the car with a broken binding. getting out of the couloir would be easy, but 7 miles of flat skinning would be another story. it looked like carson was going to be booting and that we'd all be getting home a little later than planned.

travis and i skied out of the couloir and began to take inventory of what we could use to make a broken binding skinnable. before we knew it jeff came ripping out of the couloir with carson's broken ski on his back. a few minutes after that carson popped out of the chute sliding on his shovel. i pretty sure he got the first shovel descent of the black hole couloir.

travis just above the lower section of the couloir

breakable windcrust looks better than it skis

breakable bindings look better than they ski too

with little daylight to spare we put carson's left ski on his right foot so he could traverse as far down the valley as possible. a mile of traversing later, headlamps were on and more traversing ensued. eventually the traverse ended and the only option was skinning. we remounted the back half of carson's binding with two screws, two zip ties and a ski strap.

somehow, it worked

long story short, the binding worked for the 6 miles back to the car and we only had to stop to tighten it once. the river crossing went smoothly again and before we knew it we had skis on our shoulders and were walking on pavement back to the car.

over 16 miles, 6500' of vert, just over 16 hours and one broken ski binding. add to that skiing (or shoveling) a big line way back in there... good times.

a classic cascades spanking

2012-02-05T16:25:00.000-08:00

the cascades are amazing. they give endlessly in every season. 6.5 miles of bony skinning, creek crossings, a river crossing, slide alder and big mountains. didn't even reach the objective. no real skiing. round two very soon.

team scarpa. don't worry, i've got those boots too!

skin to the base of these mountains, take a left and skin 5.5 miles

this was a common move on this trip

slippery rocks and ski boots

will was a sissy and crossed the wide log...

if you can't find a log to cross, roll up the pants and take it

about 3 min before this picture, travis at it and fell in... haha!

blah blah blah

2012-01-11T15:23:00.000-08:00

in the past few weeks i've managed to get out a few times but nothing too exciting. with the holidays and inventory at work, i haven't had much free time to get out. i spent one day inbounds at stevens, a day at skyline ridge with heavy but boot-top powder, and a few days taking laps up at hyak on slush and bulletproof. right as the weather clears up for gear climbing, i have to go to work, which is sad. But i know that more great skiing and climbing will come around sometime so i'm trying to stay in shape for the next bout of fun. and yes, i am jealous of will who is probably walking up the road to the stuart lake trailhead as i type. a long slog or skin for some alpine mixed climbing sounds wonderful right now!

i'll add some pictures sometime... maybe.

deep! and it could have gone deeper!

drifter day

south slopes were like butter this day

photo by ryan white

kendall chutes (round two)

2011-12-23T23:06:00.000-08:00

ryan skiing below the kingpin

with semi-low expectations for skiing today, ryan and i headed for snoqualmie pass with the attitude of "it's better to ski than sit at home on my butt!" on the drive up we decided with the low avy danger today would be a great chute day, so we headed for the kendall chutes.

photo from TAY trip report here

we parked below the stump and started up through the woods in a light rain. quickly we realized we were too far right and had to battle some brush and steep and icy skinning. but no pain means no gain so we kept heads high and continued upwards in the light rain. popping out onto a logging road travel sped up and before we knew it we were traversing the ridge to the entrance of the two most popular chutes, the twins. just before arriving at the chutes, the rain turned to snow!

after a quick lunch we dropped into the skiers right chute and found hard crust up top and soft pow after the first 75'. emerging from the chute the snow looked nice and smooth but turned out to be a mixed bag of ice, cookies, breakable crust and every now and then a few pow turns. we almost gave up after the first 900' of vertical but our optimism took ahold of us and further down we went. a traverse of mixed conditions led to some pow turns followed by more pow turns followed by more pow turns! we skied about 1300' down into the drainage, until it got too bushy to continue easily.

jump turns into one of the twins

variable snow below the twins

spine shredding!

excited to find some excellent skiing, we put skin back on and started up to ski the other twin. we found an old skin track on the way up which took us on a detour up one bowl left of the twins. with no real goal for the day we decided to follow the skin track and ski a chute above it. the chute we picked looked like it wasn't filled in to the top of the ridge but it looked steep and fun so up we went. we skinning and booted up until the snow started getting thick, deep and a bit unnerving. stopping about 75" from the end of the skiable snow we got a column to slide while cutting the back. the top 12" seemed quite eager to move! thankfully there was no real propagation so on went the skis and down i went. after skiing down in a very reserved manner, ryan felt more comfortable to let it rip. sweet wind packed pow up high led to hard and crusty int he middle and hero snow down low. it turns out we skied part of "the kingpin."

the clouds broke for just a second

inverted aerials... or something like that

skinning back out of the basin we followed a VERY flat skin track for a few minutes before going strait up the the slope! the track led up the "main vein" and topped out in a perfect spot to ski back down to the car.

let's just say that the ski out consisted of powder, icy crust, breakable crust, mush and a 25 minute icy luge tack logging road ski that took us 3.2 miles away from our car. thankfully the summit ski shuttle driver was kind enough to pick us up and drive us one of those miles.

another great day in the pacific northwest

muir snowfield

2011-12-21T00:53:00.000-08:00

coming "off" a scratchy throat and achey body, i decided to take a leisurely tour with chico up the muir snowfield. this would be chico's second day on skis and first day touring.

the nisqually icefall

after driving through the rain and murky clouds, we were skinning by 10:30 broke out of the clouds with snowshoers everywhere. after giving chico a quick tutorial on how to kick turn and skin efficiently we set off toward the snowfield.

pan face was icy as every and required booting but no crampons. from panorama point we booted another quarter mile before putting the skis back on and skinning until it got too icy around 9,300'. we decided to turn around here rather than ski 800' of blue ice.

the ski down was chattery and rock hard... not the ideal conditions for your second day skiing. just above pebble creek we found a small amount of corn but the lower we got, the worse the snow got, eventually turning into breakable crust. chico was sure getting his money's worth!

second day skiing, tough variable conditions, shredding

pizza

chico's first lesson in breakable crust

above panorama point we went left and skied off mazama ridge. skiing off the ridge was the best snow of the day since it was steep and facing the sun. but as soon as we got lower the breakable crust reappeared forcing aggressive skiing. before we knew it, we were back at the parking lot packing up ready to go home.

who would like some starbucks and yummy blister?

a drive back home in the rain seemed ok after being above the clouds most of the day. a great way to spend the morning before a short closing shift at work.

chair peak lake

2011-12-15T20:24:00.000-08:00

my backyard

a mediocre forecast called for small amounts of new snow and low visibility. 2" over the melt freeze crust of the past two weeks only makes it look better... skiing it would be another story. but skiing something is better than skiing nothing so peter chapman and i decided to head out of the alpental valley with both ski and ice climbing gear ready for battle.

arriving at the upper parking lot we were greeted with about 3" of fresh over ice with lots coming from above. skinning the groomed track to it's end, we started up the traverse to source lake in the quiet air of fresh snow. the higher we got, the deeper the snow was. on the ridge between snow lake and source lake, there was a good 6" of fresh powder. skiing down to snow lake was soft and fluffy, though a bit tracked out.

the skin across the lake was epic as clouds kept creeping on and off cliffs that jut strait out of the sw end of the lake. the cliffs appeared as though they never ended, rocketing skyward. on the far end of the lake we took a quick break to eat and create a game plan.

epic

we decided to leave climbing gear at the lake, skin up to chair peak lake and hopefully get some fresh powder turns in along the way. an old skin track made getting to chair peak lake a breeze where we got great views of the "little alien" couloir (which is much too narrow to ski at the moment). stripping skins and buckling down the boots, we dove into the slope back to our gear. much to our surprise we found excellent heavy powder ranging from 8-12" and only hit the crust below a few times down low.

not bad when you expect dust on crust

peter showing us how it's done

peter slaying

skinning back across the lake and up to the bench above source lake seemed to take a long time as snow started glopping under our skins. once above source lake we stripped skins one last time and dropped in expecting the worst. chopped up but surprisingly fun skiing led back to the lake and out to the car.

peter may or may not have sunk his tips and faceplanted...

another great day in the mountains.

melakwa point

2011-12-15T19:57:00.000-08:00

travis typed up a trip report and made a sweet video here

new boots... my mustard yellow boots are obviously much cooler than travis's orange boots

with no new powder to shred in over a week, travis, carson and i took to the hills with low expectations. last spring forest mcbrian posted a trip report of skiing the west face of melakwa point. in his description were phrases such as, "light mountaineering" and, "judicious traverses in order to avoid cliffs." add to that martin volken's description as "complex, interesting and fun" and how could one go wrong? and to take it a step further, throw in new boots for both travis and i and we were guaranteed 200% fun.

the sunrise never gets old

a 5:00 start from seattle put us skinning away from the upper alpental parking lot with headlamps. quickly we were above source lake switchbacking upward toward thumb tac rock. the switchbacking skin track had been utilized (read "destroyed") by someone booting. boot holes and a week of melt freeze made skinning almost impossible but we persevered and were back to easy skinning conditions before too long.

the north slopes of chair were either rock hard or stiff wind slab; not great skiing but very efficient booting. we took a fun way up to the col between chair peak and melakwa point by climbing a steep runnel of snow over alpine ice up to the ridge.

rocket-pack!

fun runnel

the ridge to the summit forced us to use our imagination to climb. we went up and down, from one side of the ridge to the other, a cheval across a knife edge snow ridge, digging though snow to find branches to make upward movement, bushwacking though steep traverses, scrappy rock climbing and of course made no route finding decisions... let's just say that the ridge in spring is nice and snow covered making travel a lot more strait forward than it is now.

up and down, one side to the other...

yee haw!

throw that leg ever there!

ridge scramble

once at the summit, we took our time enjoying the views and eating food. after snapping a few photos, we stripped skins, buckled our boots and clicked into skis. the west face is steep and exposed skiing over cliffs. i side slipped icy snow for the first 25' before it turned into a thick but breakable crust. mashing though the crust left and right i finally found some soft consolidated powder. my first few turns felt like butter but soon i was back on hard snow when all of the sudden my right ski was no longer attached to my foot. thankfully the leash held onto the ski and somehow i didn't tumble down and off the cliff. turns out there was a bit of ice in the tech fitting on my boot.

summit with kaleetan in the background

travis and carson about 400' from the summit

more steep skiing led further down the slope left of the first set of cliffs, though a steep chute to another set of cliffs. traversing out right i skied into a steep bowl with small cliffs below hoping to find a way though. more cliffs below cliffs below cliffs and no obvious way off the face saw me booting back out of the bowl.

wrong way...

we decided to rappel from some trees near the ridge crest which worked out perfectly. one rappel deposited us onto a nice open snow slope that looked as though it would ski down to chair peak lake. wrong. the open snow slope led to more cliffs and cliffs and cliffs. looking over the ridgecrest we found a short gully leading down to corn on the melakwa basin side of the peak. before we knew it, we had made another rappel and were skiing fast corn down to melakwa lakes.

travis rappelling

a 30 min skin put us at the top of bryant col looking down on a skied out bryant couloir. chopped up semi-hard junk was the story for turn after tiring turn down bryant couloir, complete with a final billy-goating exit. 400' of surprisingly good powder led to the knee destroying luge track back to the car.

travis and carson at the choke in bryant couloir

kendall chutes

2011-12-01T13:54:00.000-08:00

another dawn patrol. travis, carson and i decided to explore the area around kendall stump. quickly the idea turned into a plan to "look" down the chutes. a 6:30 departure from the car saw us skinning up into commonwealth basin. we made it to the chutes around 9:15 and looked down a few of them.

since travis had to be at work at 1:00 we sluggishly decided not to ski the main chute (which looked to be pretty good skiing) and to go back to the car... until carson dropped in saying that if he didn't make it back to the car by 11:15 he would hitch-hike back to seattle. well, travis and i couldn't let carson have all the fun so down we went as well. the skiing was variable on the upper section, crusty in the middle and about 8" of pow on the fan below... not too shabby!

thomson from the chutes

the main chute

the right chute... sweet looking... wind slab

carson dropping in

skinning and booting back up the chute was a pain and the skiing back to the car even worse.

back up the chute... further than it looks

the best part of the trip is that we made it back in time for travis to take a "shower" before work.

more from travis here

day two at alpental

2011-11-20T18:48:00.000-08:00

kate skiing in "meadows"

travis, galyn, kate and i hit up alpental today with a more relaxing adventure. our first lap we skinned up to the top of chair two and skied down nash until it starts to flatten out. our second run, we skinned up snake dance and skied a line skiers left of of elevator shaft (i believe it is called meadows). the first run was skied out powder but the second was steep, deep, sluffy goodies.

travis and galyn skinnin just below the top of chair 2

what else is one supposed to do with a piece of ice like this... other than drink whiskey from it

great face gable

rainier from the life house at the top of chair 2

giddy for some pow

some deep on run one

getting the goods on run two

nash dawn patrol without carson

2011-11-19T12:35:00.000-08:00

sweet icicles-of-deathe above lower nash

with some insider information that uphill traffic at alpental is a go, travis and i left seattle at 6:00 am for a quick dawn patrol before work today. carson was supposed to go with us but decided that beer and not sleeping until 3:00 am was more important. a quick stop at the store for some food and gas put us at the alpental parking lot and skinning by just after 7:00.

travis skinning up

the skin up to the top of nash was fairly quick and the higher we went, the deeper the snow was. dropping into upper nash was all snow with knee deep below the entrance. we took lower nash for more knee deep goodies until it started to flatten out. another lap on lower put us back at the car just after 10:00, enough time for travis to buy his seasons pass at west. we both quickly realized that we did not fit in at the summit west scene and drove back to seattle.

the entrance to upper

800' of fall line knee deep powder

bah!

beer and a pizza while i'm writing this, then belaying for a few hours starting at 2:00. i'm pretty sure there might be enough time for a nap before work!

stevens pass fiasco

2011-11-17T23:50:00.000-08:00

6:30 am at startbucks in monroe, my phone rings... "hi david, bad news? fuck... you guys (jeff and colin), i forgot my skins back in seattle." turns out i left my skins on the back of my roommates car who drove down the road a ways eventually finding one in the middle of the road and the other attached under the car. what a way to start the day. thankfully carson and travis were meeting us up at the pass and hadn't left seattle yet.

fast forward a few hours and i find myself booting up knee deep snow with skis on my back. we have about two hours before the other guys arrive and i wasn't about to waste time sitting around. to my luck, i found a bootpack from some snowboarders leading right where we wanted to go! two laps of windblown goofy snow and my skins arrive.

jeff getting some air off rocks and bushes

now a group of five, we skin toward cowboy mountain. a tour of fairly deep powder deposits us at the top of the 7th heaven lift where we decide to continue to the top of the mountain and ski off the back. some billy-goating gets us to the top where we rip skins and started skiing.

travis sampling the goods

i lead out and pick my way through thin patches of rocks until we find a fairly open slope deep enough to ski. the first three or four turns are deep and dry sending snow in my face, but suddenly the snow turns from light powder to dense wind transport. quickly i hit the brakes but it's too late, a crack rockets out in front and behind me. quickly, i realize only the morning's new snow has slid and the slab is max 6" deep. still, i stop and watch a bunch of snow slide down the hill, over another rollover and though the trees. a quick regroup and chat and we decide that conditions are quite manageable so we continue downward.

part of the slab i triggered... it's about 6" at the thickest part

about 1000' down the slope colin caught a ski and went for a ride. as i come up he told me to grab his ski and bring it down to him. i poked at the snow until i was right next to him without finding anything. we figured it wouldn't be that hard to find the ski as the snow was soft for about a foot and much more dense below that. we dug for over two hours and found nothing. quickly we began to realize the work ahead of colin. we were about 1000' down the back side of a mountain with waist deep snow and one of us only had one ski. with snow falling hard and strong winds, we called off the search to get off the exposed slope and started up.

looks like avy debris but in reality it's from digging for the missing ski

we tried rigging a snowshoe out of a shovel, which worked fairly well on flat ground but failed on the uphill foot while side-hilling. colin eventually ended up putting his ski on his back and booting up though the deep snow. i don't think our skin track really helped him much at all even though we stomped and stomped the track down as far as we could get it.

eventually colin made it to the top of the mountain and was able to "ski" back down to the car on one ski. thankfully the snow was soft so he was able to point his ski and just go for it until he got too tired and crashed or just crashed to avoid a tree. the rest of us enjoyed blower powder in the fading light.

snoqualmie pass dusk patrol

2011-11-15T21:18:00.000-08:00

sunny!

today ellen and i spent the afternoon up at snoqualmie pass.

this was ellen's first time earning her turns and her fear of whether or not her boots would be comfortable to hike in quickly disappeared as she post-holed her way up my skin track. clear skies and 30 degree temps kept the newly deposited snow quite dry!

ellen found a "thank god" track of solid non-postholish snow

we skied two laps on boot top wind-packed powder over a solid base. rocks weren't an issue and the solid wet snow base kept pretty much everything from touching the ground.

not a bad view for an afternoon of fun

yeeeee

ellen being badass... about to tomahawk

tomorrow morning i head up to stevens pass to sample the snow 1000' higher! tomorrow is supposed to unfold with a big snowstorm so hopefully there will be lots of powder to go around!

a backpack obsession

2011-11-13T22:54:00.000-08:00

for some reason i've always been slightly obsessed with backpacks. ever since i started climbing i've scrutinized every available backpack to make sure i end up with something that is "the best." it's not like a backpack helps someone become a better or more proficient climber so this obsession is quite frivolous, if i am honest.

but hey, backpacks take the gear i need from one place to another. they keep me warm when i sleep in them to save the weight of a sleeping bag. they get caught up in chimneys and all scratched up making me feel legit. and, they become a second skin as they mold to my back over hours and hours. being a climber, i've always favored frameless backpacks from smaller companies who build alpine specific packs.

cold cold world packs were my first foray into a climbing backpack. 500d cordura meant indestructible, tool tubes were trendy, and the history of the company inspired adventure in itself! my cold cold world valdez took me to a lot of places amd even saved my life when i fell 40', first breaking my ankle, then hitting my backpack rather than my back.

next was the wild things ice sack. i got this second hand on a whim. i knew wildthings packs were coveted so i picked it up when i found a good deal. more tool tubes, deminsion poylant VX42 fabric with xpac ripstop; a five play laminate from heaven, and even more history than cold cold world.

building on the success of my first wild things pack i got ahold another one of their packs... the andinista. talk about history behind a backpack! the andinista was behind most every major alpine ascent in the 80's and 90's... hell, mark twight loved them! i slept in that pack, climbed in it, 'shwacked in it, cried in it, suffered in it, hurt in it.

i thought the andinista was the do all pack until i came across a small blossoming company which, at the time, was located in new york. cilogear intrigued me because they had a pack that compressed like an andinista but without any heavy and cumbersome zippers. i started with a 40b worksack, then got a 30l worksack, then a 60l worksack, then a 20l worksack. all of which have been on numerous adventures. these are (at the moment) by far the premiere alpine climbing backpacks and it isn't a coincident that a cilogear pack is more likely to be on ground breaking ascents these days than any other backpack.

but cilogear packs have one major weakness... ski edges cut them up, easily. being that i love skiing and ski 100+ days in a year, my cilogear packs have taken a real beating... until two days ago. two days ago i received a backpack that i would call perfect for ski alpinism. a move away from small US companies landed me a backpack by deuter (pronounced "doiter"). i never thought i would find a mass produced backpack that was exactly what i was looking for. top loading, rear panel access, reinforced ski straps, avy tool pockets integrated into the main compartment (not a separate compartment), and a whole host of normal climbing features. yeah, i wish it was made of some VX42 but the materials deuter is using are a closed second place to the dimension polyant stuff.

but the most exciting thing for me right now is that i'm going to sew my own backpack. i conveniently live with a tailor at the moment who is going to teach me everything i need to know to sew my own pack. and i have a perfect design in the back of my head. picture a wild things guide pack mating with a cilogear 30l worksack. you get the perfect shape and simplicity of the cilogear with the support and durability of materials of the guide! a tube of VX42 with no straps, just two ice tool attachments and an internal compression strap!

if you actually read this post, you receive 100 bonus points.

ruth mt. breakable crust hike

2011-11-13T22:20:00.000-08:00

being that i've only skied great powder this fall, ryan and i thought we should continue this streak and ski some more.

Ryan putting chains on his truck...

a 1:30 am arrival at the hannegan pass trailhead saw us sleeping for a few hours before skinning up the trail. thin snow with a breakable crust made skinning just possible with the occasional edge scrape on a hidden rock. the hidden rocks started to multiply and soon i was hiking with skis on my back. just before the pass we skinned up again and were able to skin all the way to the ridge leading up to ruth.

ruth in the morning light... no storm in sight!

coming around the sub-peak we could see a storm coming up the valley and before we knew it, it was snowing hard enough to create a whiteout. apparently the forecast of 0% chance of precipitation was a bit off. hiding under a patch of trees for about 30 minutes we talked continuing up onto the glacier. we decided to turn around and go home and started skinning back around the sub-peak when the whiteout started to dissipate.

a quick turn around and we were skinning back up to ruth in once again deteriorating weather. about 200' before the glacier we were in a full on whiteout again. we sat around for about 15 minutes before we got a quick break in the clouds and skied about 250' of breakable crust.

look at that visibility

and this was when we got a break in the clouds

a heinous "shortcut" showed ryan's skis who was boss with many turns full of shallow rocks. as soon as we committed to going home and started down the ridge, the skies cleared up and the sun came out. at least the breakable crust was still there!

"you are about to see ski moves you've never seen before" -ryan white

of course the sky clears up on the down

cashmere mountain

2011-11-03T21:36:00.000-07:00

the forecast called for "increasing clouds" with a 100% chance of snow by 7:00 pm. but when does weather ever keep people away from getting into the alpine?

cashmere in the morning sun

ryan and i decided on climbing cashmere mountain with the iffy forecast. not only would the mountain provide a fun day hike, but it would also provide a chance to get up close to the many couloirs that pour from its summit.

a cold early morning start forced hiking in insulated layers for over a mile! a leisurely pace and flat trail made the day feel quite relaxed, although we both wanted to get high and see something before the weather came in. after passing the last of the lakes, we cut cross country pas a sweet snaking stream and went strait for the prominent ridge bending off the w summit of cashmere.

ryan on the hike in

stuart standing above everything

a meandering stream

meandering branches

gaining some elevation

accessing the ridge was very easy and cut off at least a half mile of travel to windy pass. walking up the ridge in the morning sun allowed complete views of the enchantments with stuart dominating the skyline. rainier was visible along with the chimney rock group out by snoqualmie pass. a quick scramble across some large boulders took us to the col between the w and true summits of cashmere.

ryan hiking along the ridge up to the w summit

scrambling

moving onto the n face of the true summit we were greeted with beautiful mixed conditions. hard snow had filled in all the gullies leaving bits of rock exposed here and there. pulling his crampons out of his bag, i realized that ryan had brought the wrong crampons for his new boots. tedious crampon-less travel, for ryan, on rock hard snow forced some thinking for a better plan. since i had crampons i would lead out ahead and kick steps where i could, cutting steps with my ice axe where i couldn't.

easy mixed

with two tools, the north face would be a perfect alpine playground... snaking snow and ice gullies cut through rock bands with short mixed steps here and there! we made our way through rock bands by path of least resistance. easy mixed climbing with steep snow and alpine ice meandered up the face befre depositing us at a snort 50 degree snow ramp leading to a notch in the summit ridge

50 degree snow

a quick scramble saw us standing on the summit in no time. but what would have taken 20 minutes with crampons tool almost two hours. the summit was being pummeled by strong winds so we quickly made out way off the top and back to the n face. a snaking descent path brought us back to a long traverse completing the hard snow travel for the day.

haha

hiking back out along the broad ridge once again yielded exciting views of the surrounding peaks. we could see the front moving in over the olympics but there was barely a cloud over our heads. hiking the trail out was as tedious as trails always are, but we made it back to the car without donning headlamps.

the ridge in afternoon light

must... ski... that...

not too bad of a hike out

next time i'm going to take the short cut "goat path" approach.

october pow

2011-10-26T19:30:00.000-07:00

jeff dropping his knee in the fluff... oct 25

this october has been kind to us skiers here in the pacific northwest. so far, i have had three excellent powder skiing days and one evening of rock climbing, all in essentially windless conditions.

the first day of skiing this october was at the paradise glacier. with fresh snow and new bindings on my new skis, will and i found new snow on the road before we even reached paradise. i found my new skis awkward to ski (they kicked my ass), but nonetheless the day was beautiful and breaking trail through fresh snow was a treat.

snow on the road

the crevasse crossing

zach skiing wind affected snow like a pro

day two (oct 13) was just after mt. baker got annihilated by a fall storm. over a foot of snow every 12 hours for three days strait at the higher elevations. the 40 mph winds didn't help it stick around but still! the day after the storm stopped, the skies cleared and temps dropped. 6-8" of perfect windpacked powder waited for us as we approached the coleman glacier before the sun was up. a quick headlamp run started the day off and the rest of the day only got better. this was the best day of skiing since last november.

baker in the early morning light

it's october!

kate showing us how they do it out of state

a few days after the epic ski of baker, i joined a spur of the moment climbing trip. we climbed the ne buttress of chair peak to arrive on the summit to watch the sun go down. we all sat on the summit in windless/cloudless silence. downclimbing and rapping the gully was no, however, silent.

travis probably has his skis hidden somewhere

jeff singing the sound of music as the sun sets

carson, lisa, jeff and travis (from left to right)

And then there was yesterday. it felt like a repeat of the 13th. wake up at 3:30 am and start hiking up to heliotrope. this time the temps were even colder and the trail was frozen about 1.5 miles earlier! jeff, ryan and i met carson and lisa at the base of the coleman sometime around 5:15. we started skiing before the sun came up and stopped after the sun had gone behind heliotrope. an icy hike out was the crux of the day.

carson getting low... real low

yes, those are our tracks... all of them. yes, this is about 10 am

another perfect day of powder skiing in october in washington

121 days on skis since last november. the month isn't over yet, but i don't believe i'm getting out to go skiing before november rolls around.

paradise glacier ski

2011-09-30T23:33:00.000-07:00

today, a leisurely departure from seattle of 8:30 am saw colin and i driving south to mt. rainier to ski the paradise glacier. up until today, i had skied in every month since november 2010 except this month.

hiking up to the paradise glacier was fairly uneventful but quite pleasant. temps were fairly cool and a high cloud cover kept the sun from being too strong. a thick lenticular capped rainier and reminded colin and i of the last time we were on the mountain.

scenic trail

mastering the ski boot talus shenanigans

arriving at the base of the glacier we decided to head up a steep slope to gain the lower angle rolls above. we didn't bring ice axes or crampons as we figured the route was going to be low angle and easy. quickly, the slopes kicked back to 45 degrees and topped out around 50. thankfully i had my whippet with me but colin wasn't so lucky.

colin cresting the steeps

after a puckering 500', we skinned up the glacier crossing a great snow bridge and winded our way through some obvious and spaced out crevasses. we topped out around 9,000' and rested in a wind sheltered area for just a few minutes.

snow bridge

the ski back down was excellent. the top inch of snow had corned up and the recent rains/snow had smoothed out all the suncups. we skied back down though the crevasses and over the snow bridge to the top of the steep slope. skiing the slope was a blast as it was great to feel secure on the way down. after the steep section we traversed from one snow patch to another until we skated back to the trail.

colin ripping it up

the steeps again

as we hiked out, the sun popped though the clouds and kept us company until we got to the car. o yeah, today was a 4 volcano day! we could see adams, st. helens, hood and of course rainier.

chair peak west ridge route description

2011-09-23T22:59:00.000-07:00

pitch 1
start up to the prominent gully just left of the first big gendarme on the west ridge. climb blocky compact rock to a buldge which can be face climbed on the right. continue up the the gully passing a fun stemming corner and easier terrain. take a left when the gully splits and overcome one last bulge. you will fin two nuts pounded into a crack and a piton. belay here or continue up and right to the ridge and belay there.
200' 5.7

pitch 2
from the ridgecrest, traverse on the south side over some loose but easy terrain. continue traversing until you find an obvious chimney with a chockstone capping it. climb the chimney and pass the chockstone on the front or back. once on top of the chockstone, continue strait up the ridge by easy face climbing and a featured slab. belay at the top of the slab on a solid horn.
140' 5.7

pitch 3
from the belay horn, downclimb on the sw face about 10' and make a traverse on face holds with decent pro. aim for the splitter finger crack on the right wall of a corner. climb the corner using the crack and face holds until you can traverse a short ways to the right to gain a hand crack and blocky (loose) climbing back to the ridge crest. belay here or continue over the gendarme to a notch with small trees (rope drag).
140' 5.7+

pitch 4
simulclimb. climb right around the gendarme from the notch to loose but easy scramble terrain. stay on the ridge crest until it forces you to gain a false summit. a few loose and committing moves gain the false summit to where easy scrambling takes you to the summit.
400' mostly 4th class with some low 5th

chair peak west ridge

2011-09-23T22:42:00.000-07:00

after reading martin volken's trip report about the w ridge of chair back in late june, i knew i would end up on that route at some point. with a day off, will, colin and i set out to see if the w ridge of chair peak would hold up to the classic snoqualmie pass rock climbing (awkward and loose). my route description here

colin on the false summit of chair peak's w ridge

a semi-early start saw us marching up the snow lake trail right behind a couple guys headed toward the tooth. assuming we were going to the same place, they pushed hard to keep in front of us, haha. after climbing the talus above source lake we guessed on the easiest way up to thumb tack rock. we guessed wrong and had a good ole bushwack up to the tack. on the way i found an ice axe! popping out below chair, we made quick time gaining the base of the ne buttress and traversed below the n face. we found great alpine ice in the moat at the base of the n face, and also a 60m half rope, locking and non-locking biners, and ice screw and some tat. apparently today was the day for finding booty! traversing further, we found an old shoe and easily made it to the base of the climb.

a nice waterfall to cool the morning heat

it turned out to be a BW3

thats a lot of snow just above thumb tack rock for fall!

the ne buttress

a shoe!

will, like usual, drew the short straw and took the first lead. blocky climbing led up to a bulge with fun face climbing. above, a wet groove led upward with a few awkward steps. will found the belay talked about in martin's trip report. colin moved the belay to the ridge where we stacked the ropes and sent colin up again.

will leading pitch one

nice moves will

colin following pitch one

colin scrambled across some loose but easy terrain and into a nice chimney. passing on the outside of the chockstone, colin continued up the ridge eventually climbing a fun slab with good edges. belaying from a decent horn, he brought will and i up.

i led out above the belay, mantling up to a platform where i tried to attack the ridge directly. unprotected face climbing and a loose holds send me running back to the belay. traversing down and right i gained a corner system with a splitter crack on the right wall. working up the corner i created an enormous amount of rope drag as i exited to the right via a face traverse. above this short traverse, a handcrack and blocky/loose face climbing regained the ridge.

will led out on the final pitch which we simulclimbed to the summit around and all over many gendarmes.

will following pitch two... it's loose where he is

simulclimbing to the summit

colin stepping onto the summit

will and colin on the summit

we descended the winter rappel gully with two full 30 meter rappels and about 150' of third and fourth class downclimbing. we found the normal trail that goes from thumb tack rock back down to source lake with ease and cruised on back to the cars.

rappel number one

nice anchor... i especially liked the rock chips shoves above the horn to keep the webbing in place

all in all, the west ridge of chair peak lived up to the snoqualmie pass rock climbing legacy with lots of scrappy moves, awkward cracks and loose rock. with a bit more traffic i think a lot of the loose rock could be cleaned up and the route would be much more friendly. as it is, the west ridge is a great adventure climb with a lot of variations possible.

del campo

2011-09-12T19:33:00.000-07:00

will on the summit of del campo

one day of recovery after paisano burgundy my body was restless so sunday i went running. not quite 10 miles later i made plans with will to climb sloan the next day. a 12:30 am bedtime and a 5:00 am wakeup had me searching for any legitimate excuse to not slog up a mountain. i thought about complaining about hurting from running, but it was still too soon and i didn't feel any soreness at all.

after leaving my house and driving down the road we realized the road to get to the trailhead of sloan might be closed. backtracking back to my place, we looked it up and there was some debate to weather or not the road was actually closed. not wanting to mess around, we changed plans to climbing del campo peak.

walking though gothic basin

9:00 am we left the car at the trailhead. we walked the closed road leading toward the monte cristo site for 1 mile before turning off on our trail. three quarters of a mile on flat trail and we started steeply up. i was impressed by how efficient (read "steep") the trail was and before we knew it we were waliing through gothic basin. dropping some gear under del campo, we hiked up a small snowfield and scrambled through a choose your own adventure of 3rd class rock (4th class was available if you really wanted it). gaining a notch in the south ridge, we scrambled upward for a few hundred feet coming to the summit quite quickly. 11:35 am. it had taken us about 2.5 hours to go from the car to the summit... not bad considering we weren't trying to go fast!

moat crossing

will scrambling the ridge

summit shenanigans

we lazed around on the summit for an hour exploring it's ridges and fun slabby cracks. after we had enough torture by bug, we packed up and scrambled back down to the snowfield, slid down the snow and hiked back to our stashed gear. on the hike out we cam across a 20' wall of suncupped snice. being that will and i both had ice axes, i decided to put them to good use. 20' of alpine ice 2 in running shoes is spicy! especially when the topout is in slushy sun baked snow.

a quick hike back to the beginning of the basin deposited us next to a nice slab full of splitter cracks. we spent about an hour climbing around on these cracks, eventually succumbing to making up routes that only consisted of dynos! after out dyno appetite had been fulfilled, we hiked back to the car and drove home.

del campo and foggy lake

will he stick the topout sloper?!?!

flying for the jug flake

this was the first time in years that i had specifically gone out on a scrambling adventure. no ropes, no crampons, no helmets, nothing! it felt good to move efficiently through the mountains without anything weighing me down.

north face of burgundy via the west ridge of paisano

2011-09-11T12:41:00.000-07:00

will climbing a fun flake on the w face of burgundy

will and i left seattle around 3:45 and headed to washington pass. a few weeks ago, will chris and i attempted to climb the west ridge of paisano and rebel yell and accomplished neither. this week, it was time to knock off one or the other. we decided on climbing paisano and continuing up the north face of burgundy. the linkup is considered grade IV and it's always fun to climb something graded a higher number!

we started hiking from the car around 6:45 or 7. we made it to camp without headlamps by moonlight and ate some food and crawled into bed. waking up just as the sky was starting to get light, we packed our gear, got some water and headed up to paisano... this time aiming for the correct ridge. before we knew it, we were racking up at the base of the climb next to the correct chockstone (although much MUCH small than the chockstone on the ridge to our left, it was indeed still a chockstone).

vasiliki in the morning glow

liberty bell group

will led pitch one up a corner with one tricky move to a flat bench. i moved the belay up through 3rd class terrain and then led up through a fun 5.6 handcrack and meandering low 5th terrain to the base of the twin finger cracks. will took the crux pitch and cruised up the steep cracks and thrutched up the chimney above. following the pitch i found the upper half to be the crux, but the 20 lbs. backpack might have made that part seem harder than it was.

pitch 1 fun corner with tree aid!

twin crack crux of paisano

will in the chimney above the twin cracks

we moved the belay to the left 20' and i started up a slightly rotten corner, eventually down climbing and traversing to the right to more loose climbing. i ran the rope out through the next 5.8 section with terrible rope drap. will cruised from there to just below the summit on 5.fun climbing where i took us to the top via fun slab climbing.

goofy traverse... i should have just climbed up and not moved the belay

will on the ridge

exiting the short but fun 5.8 crack

5.fun to the top!

will at the summit of paisano

down climbing to burgundy was very easy and before we knew it, we had scrambled up some low 5th to the left side of the n face of burgundy. i took pitch one and went strait up the left side of the face for 20' until i found a great ledge system to traverse right. a vertical step of 5.8 deposited me at a nice horn with rappel tat. i led the next pitch as well which climbed directly up from the belay through fun stemming, liebacking and face climbing. i exited the second pitch wrong, avoiding the 5.fun cracks going left and chose the chimney/offwidth section straight up.

pitch 1 on the n face of burgundy

part way up pitch 2 of the n face

now that is a good move... i call it the arm breaker!

fun offwidth rather than the clean and beautiful handcracks to the side

from the large ledge, we traversed right, under the big rock and up a thin groove with easy face climbing. will ended up going left to a clean dihedral and stopping at some rappel slings. following the pitch, i untied at a broad ledge and scrambled right to see what the ridge crest looked like. making some fun low 5th moves, i found the correct clean corner way to the right.

large bench we traversed on... and highway 20 way down there

will going up a clean corner... the wrong clean corner, but a clean corner nonetheless

will in the aesthetic corner

that can't be healthy for your head will

the clean corner turned out to be quite easy and ended on the summit ridge, although a large block stood in our way. i led out form the block traversing left onto the face and was greeted with a 20' offwidth crack! maybe 5.7 climbing for two moves in the wide crack brought me to face climbing and jug hauling back to the summit ridge. an easy scramble took us to the top of burgundy!

the right clean corner!

last offwidth to the summit ridge scramble

committing to the moves

other wine spires and silverstar

will downclimbing from the summit block

summit!

rappelling was a fiasco with knots getting stock in a crack, weird rappel anchors etc. but eventually we made it back to the broad ledge where we hiked under the big rock and back to the n face. two rappels down the face and some low 5th down climbing took us out of climbing shoes and back into trail runners! two more rappels and we were back at burgundy col.

rappel one of seven

"i'm taking a picture of you walking under the rock... no way will, you're going under and rock and i'm taking a picture of you. we're going to have a picture of you walking under a rock!" apparently this is the cool thing to do

paisano

will singing?

i've found that i truly enjoy the trail from burgundy col back to the car. steep and short. without rushing, will and i were drinking sun baked hot beers at the car about 50 min after packing up camp.

n face of burgundy from burgundy col

salmonheads

2011-09-06T18:44:00.000-07:00

just when i thought that peter and i had stopped buying the same exact gear... these came to me at too good of a deal to pass up. a little heavier than i wanted but i'll suck it up for the "fun on the down" factor. and, ryan was the first one to get the salmonheads so pete and i are just posers.

husume...

prusik peak - stanley burgner

2011-09-06T18:16:00.000-07:00

peter and i both have wednesday thursday off so we make plans to climb the backbone with fin direct on dragontail peak, but thunderstorms thursday night change our objective to something a bit shorter. neither of us had climbed the south face of prusik, so it looked like we would be making the long trek back into the core enchantments!

peter digging for cookies after climbing the south face

we pick up our permits (thanks to the new online permit system) for colchuk lake early wednesday morning and spend a few hours at castle rock. we climbed the fault and catapult behind another team which took up time until around 12:00. at the stuart lake trailhead we packed our bags full of climbing and camping gear. our packs were only partially full so we brought along a cooler (with 6 beers, brats and cookies), a loaf of bread, a bag of chips and one gallon of tampica juice we bought at safeway for $1.50. with cooler and chips and bread and juice sticking out the top of our backs we started up the trail at a brisk pace (not pete's guiding pace).

peter on catapult

backpacking freak show

a few hours later we popped though the trees at the south end of colchuck lake to find no one camped at the one great spot in the boulder field. after clearing rocks from the tent's spot, i pulled out my new north face assault 2 tent and immediately set it up. with camp all set and mosquitos out we took our rock shoes and bouldered around until peter fell asleep sitting on a slab. we cooked brats in beer, ate them with bread, drank some beer then went strait to bed... sometime around 7:45!

4:45 am, the alarm goes off and peter and i try to ignore it. eventually we stumble out of the tent into the darkness and gather our climbing gear. 5:22 and we're hiking toward aasgard pass. i forgot how much of a pain aasgard is, but the views of dragontail and enchantment peak keep us busy as we point out rock climbing and winter lines. cresting aasgard pass we are greeted with a spectacular sunrise over the upper enchantments. after a quick break to eat some maltodextrin sugar junk, we start the 1000' gradual descent through the upper enchantments over to prusik. i had forgotten how beautiful the upper enchantments were without snow!

early morning light

we make great time hiking to prusik pass and scramble down to gnome tarn to get some water. at 9:00 am we are drinking water and eating breakfast at gnome tarn, taking in the views of our route... intimidating views! 9:30ish i start up the first pitch of the climb.

taking a break by gnome tarn

looking up from just left of the base of the climb

pitch one consists of either a 5.7 chimney or a 5.8 offwidth. i choose the offwidth and start up the crack quickly instantly being slowed down by 5 inches of goodness. thrutching through the wide section i'm greeted above with a perfect handcrack, which leads to another perfect hand crack! above this the climbing eases and i run it out through easy terrain to belay at the highest tree i could reach. peter follows the pitch quickly and takes the rack for the next pitch. he starts up a thin crack in a corner before traversing left on good knobs to some funky blocky/knobby/slabby climbing. he pauses for 15 minutes at one point before he moves on. after the pause, the rope pays out steadily until there is 2' left. as i follow the pitch i reach the section where he paused. there is a #1 master cam sticking strait out of a flaring shallow crack. puzzled as to why this cam was there i pull it out (by pulling down on it) and make an easy traverse left on good knobs and finish the rest of the fun pitch. turns out that peter missed the knobs and climbed up the crack, pausing a long time to contemplate the moves over his bad gear (haha!).

pete traversing on knobs at the start of our second pitch

peter took the lead for the next pitch which took us up a some fun chimney climbing and finger cracks to below "the" chockstone. squeezing behing the chockstone was easy for us as we are both infinitely small. instead of stopping just above the chockstone to belay peter thought he saw a ledge a little higher up. the ledge was not a ledge and he set up a semi-hanging belay and brought me up. since it was such an awkward place, i took the rack and started up the next pitch... the dreaded flaring slot.

o the colors... looks like pete needs to use his #3 more often

our third pitch

looking down from the base of our third pitch

lichen

there it is... the squeeze

ready for battle, i started up a nice hand crack to an awkward buldge, then strait into the belly of the beast. the flaring chimney started out fairly nice and wide with great feet and enough room to move around a bit. quickly things started closing in and becoming desperate. first, the good feet went, then it pinched down in the back and finally it just became terrible. 20 minutes of battle felt like hours but eventually i made it to a restful stance excited that i didn't fall out or yard on gear! watching pete climb the chimney was just as fun as climbing it, just a lot less tiring.

looking down the squeeze before it gets too tight

peter almost to the thick of it

too much fun

almost there... kind of...

from the top of the chimney we moved the belay across a big ledge about 50' and rested for 20 minutes to recover form the chimney. this last pitch is the technical crux of the route, although not nearly as physically taxing as the chimney. right off the belay there was an awkward stemming sequence that led to a poorly protectable low 5th for 20'. before i knew it i was in the thick of a wide crack (wide cracks were definitely a theme of the route). linking chockstone to chockstone i made m way up the pitch until i reached, according to the route description, the "bulge with two cracks." pulling over this bulge was thought provoking with a pinched off hand crack on the left and a tips crack on the right. i don't remember how i got over the bulge, but it felt real awkward and tenuous. above this bulge i was greeted with more wide crack which pinched off about 15' above. at the pinch, fun stemming on knobs led to another wide crack with a few finger pockets on the right wall. i placed gear in a pocked and looked for a way up... nothing. after resting and resting and looking and looking, i finally realized the pocket i placed my gear in was the answer to the puzzle. pulling the gear out i committed to a series of dead vertical finger crack moves 15' over my last piece. i pulled down confidently and was surprised to feel totally safe and secure. 7' higher i placed some gear at a good stance. this was definitely the crack of the route for me. above this was a beautiful left slanting, slightly more than vertical hand crack! WOOOO HOOO! cruising up the handcrack was a blast and i thought the pitch was in the bag until i reached the last move! for the last move the crack widened to about 4.5 inches. a nice ledge to the left was just out of reach to confidently move to. pulling way down on a solid jam, i reached as high as i could with a high left foot on the left ledge and found a bomber fist jam. somehow i got from the horizontal fist jam position to back upright and mantled onto the ledge... where i proceeded to let out a victory cry. what a great pitch. peter followed the pitch well and used the same "almost horizontal" technique for the last move as well. 5 hours and 15 minutes from bottom to top. not bad considering a few breaks between the last few pitches.

the last pitch. longer and steeper than it looks

looking down at peter from the summit!

look at that right arm... deep in the wideness

last tricky move

the almost horizontal hand jam thing

not quite time to relax

on the top, we lounged around and took in the views for about a half an hour before combining ropes with a team that had climbed the west ridge. two double rope rappels put us at the base of the north face from which we scrambled back to our packs on the southwest side. a nice leisurely break at gnome tarn for water and cookies allowed great views of the peak.

summit

actually, this is the true summit

some nice gentleman was kind enough to take some pictures of us

almost back to the backpacks

lentucilars being bounced off little anapurna

what a striking mountian

rest at gnome tarn

E P I C pete

last views of prusik

soon we realized it was getting later than we wanted so we hiked back to camp at a jog/hike pace, making it to aasgard pass in 50 minutes and back to camp in an hour and 40 minutes. brats were cooked as we tore down camp allowing us to fill our stomachs with meat, beer, bread, cookies and juice before the quick hike out. sometime around 9:40 we jumped into the car with a shocking amount of energy still left. i can't remember ever coming our of the stuart lake trailhead without completely collapsing at the car. all in all, the best alpine rock climb i've been on so far.

hiking in the dark... totally worth it for beer and brats and cookies and bread and chips and juice

sw rib of south early winter spire... paisano fail

2011-08-27T11:18:00.000-07:00

topo from mark allen's blog... also the topo in the beckey guide... where did we go wrong?

chris, will and i had wanted to climb rebel yell for a while and figured this past week would be a perfect time to do it. we made a plan to leave wednesday morning, climbing paisano that evening and rebel yell thursday morning. well, nothing ever goes as planned.

wednesday morning we make it out to the pass and start hiking around 12:30. after some shenanigans and a leisurely hiking pace, we drop our camping gear at the larch bench below burgundy col. another leisurely approach took us to the base of paisano's west ridge... so we thought.

beer transport, a plastic bag

but why transport when you could just drink it?

paisano and burgundy

will drew the short straw and started up the route right by a 5.8 ish lieback flake just as the topo said. arriving at a tree belay we look at the topo to make sure we are on route before will leads off through obvious 4th and low 5th class terrain (again just like the topo said). leading out again, will starts complaining of really loose rock in a chimney. peter just climbed this route the past week so i start thinking about what he said about the climb... i can't recall anything about a loose chimney, o well! chris and i climb up to will who is belaying from a small 12" chimney on the side of a wider chimney. an uncomfortable belay squeezed in the slot, while chris hung in the loose chimney allowed will to reach a descent ledge. arriving at the ledge we pull the topo out swearing we are off route. but alas, the topo says that the belay for the next pitch is a block with a .75" cam... will is at a big slung block with a .75" cam under it!

chris playing with some ropes

both the topo and pete didn't say anything about scary hanging poop rock...

by now it's getting late since we didn't start climbing until sometime after 4:30. i venture out and look for a way up to see if we even want to think about continuing. every option above is a corner with pro at chest level and then a 15" corner with nary a seem in the middle. back down it is. confusion sets in as we really start looking at the topo, trying to match up features. it's as if enough small details line up, but the big features don't.

at least the view from the bottom was good!

back at the bottom of the route we a baffled by our lack of route finding skills even with a topo. the whole way back to camp we keep looking back up at the route wondering what we did wrong. back at camp an exploration of boulders revealed some fun problems followed by a perfect camp fire to wrap up the night. rebel yell wasn't happening, all the rock stoke was gone.

the next morning we are awake at 7:00 and hiking by 8:00. 8:50 beers at the car start to bring back the climbing stoke and we start talking about what we are going to do with the day. eventually we end up deciding on the sw rib of south early winter spire with the 5.10b fingercrack variation.

dirt camp

liberty bell group from the larch bench below burgundy col

morning beer... it's already too hot and it's only 8:52

hiking by 10:00 we start up the route around 11:45. chris takes the first pitch through a fun chimney and around a cool 5.8 buldge. this first pitch is the loosest pitch on the route and it is already 3x better than anything we touched on paisano. a short scramble led us up to the base of the next pitch. the second pitch consisted of a large left tranding flake with a perfect crack. fun and slightly awkward climbing led to a final chimney before a comfy belay ledge. pitch 3 was a stellar fingercrack splitting a steep and blank wall. chris did well working his way up the crack as will and i baked in the sun. following the crack was pure joy as each finger lock was like a jug... i'd say the 10b rating is a bit stiff! above the fingercrack i led though some slabby goodness with one thought provoking move way above my last marginal piece of gear, to a comfy bench belay before the bear hug cracks. will led the next pitch and cruised up the bear hugs as if it was nothing! from the top of that pitch we simulclimbed to the summit.

chris on p1

the wide crack on p2... you can see the finger crack above and right of the obvious wide crack

chris sending

same

will with his game face

will on the bear hug pitch

chris huggin' it up

"you should take this offwidth up to the belay rather than the easy 3rd class ledge to the left!"

the start of the simulclimbing

we enjoyed the views from the top of the peak and watched two older gentlemen climb the south arete (our descent route). eventually we packed up and started scrambling down the south arete. about 30 minutes later, we were at the base of the south arete painfully making our way back to the start of the sw rib in our rock shoes.

summit!

whale's back on the south arete

time for some downclimbing!

the steep climbers trail seemed like nothing after already descending from the wine spires earlier in the morning. back on the real trail we cruised with speed an purpose... water and food! about a mile from the trailhead i realized that i left my cell phone at the base of the route. dropping my pack, i ran back up to get me phone in the blazing sun. i arrived at the base of the route (again) and found my phone at 6:36. after running back down to my pack, putting it on and running back to the trailhead, it was 7:04 when i got to the car where water was waiting for me to devour.

i dehydrated myself bad enough that i couldn't really eat food until around 1:30 in the morning. but hey, the rock climbing stoke is back! rebel yell here i come!

more craggin'...

2011-08-16T20:09:00.000-07:00

today peter and i spent some time at index. he hadn't been on some of the classics so i got to take it easy while he was my rope gun. first we jumped on tatoosh, then toxic shock, then corner flash and ended on happy puppy. being that i'm bad at fist cracks and flaring slots, i took the lead on happy puppy and had a great time with the wide cracked flaring slot!

anyway...

good thing i pay attention while i belay. pay attention to taking pictures of my shoe...

the "professional" on toxic shock

the "professional"

happy puppy. the mountainproject description says that this is a fun handcrack. bull, it starts at about 4.5 inches! who's hand is THAT big?!?

rock climbing

2011-08-10T19:01:00.000-07:00

good to finally get on the rock again... it feels like it's been a million year with the extended skiing this year! here are a few pictures from when we climbed rattletale today. i remember being pumped out of my mind the first time i lead the second pitch so this time it was great to arrive at the top of each pitch without breathing hard!

looking back

2011-07-27T19:29:00.000-07:00

it's funny to look back over the years and see how you've changed and grown as an alpinist. i've gone through and gathered a bunch of photos from climbs over the past 6 or so years. this isn't a bunch of pictures from all the climbs i've been on, just some memorable ones. as you'll see, the tooth has been an integral part of my life.

major gumby to a little less of a gumby, hopefully...

navigating a whiteout after a scramble

rampart ridge

sport climb fail. hadn't climbed in years, tried to get back on the horse with a 10.c

exit 38 substation

haha! gaiters, long undies and shorts. and look at the helmet and ice axe on the flat ground!

somewhere in the alpine lakes

first time off trail without a map, we didn't know where we were, but we kept going and got to the top

mt. margaret

scramble with dad

alta mountain

first alpine rock climb with the wac

the tooth

bouldering in indonesia... learned to like the alpine more

first trad lead... the day after thanksgiving

the tooth

in mixed conditions... we went up the wrong gully

the tooth

first winter technical climb

west ridge of lundin peak

lots of unconsolidated snow

west ridge of lundin peak

oops

west ridge of lundin peak

first bivy on top of something

the tooth

hands free is the way to go for chico

nw ridge of dorado needle

don't forget the rock shoes again... lesson learned

west ridge of mt. thomson

i'd wanted this summit for a long time

mt. shuksan

ellen's first alpine climb

se rib of mt. shuksan

crevasses?

mt. baker

first solo glacier travel and first 22 mile day due to a closed road... many more of those to come!

sahale peak

learning that fall is a great time to get out

ruth mountain

learning to love the rock climbing in boots

west ridge of lundin

no protection becomes the norm

heinous gully on mt. si's haystack

falling is not an option... one sketchy nut, cam in a flaring icy crack, and two hexes behind an expando flake, 50 meters out, 500' off the ground.

sw face of the tooth

chico climbing the pitch after i fell...

sw face of the tooth

mt. hood is a shitshow on the south side, get me out of here

mt. hood

it aint so scary

canary

first grade 4 route (i'll claim it even though it's easily a rgade 3)

dragontail peak, serpentine arete

playing with new lightweight techniques... 20 liter overnight pack

ingalls peak

chico climbing where i fell back in the winter. it was way more exposed that i remembered

sw face of the tooth

light is right. we climbed the ridge car to car in less than 11 hours.

east ridge of forbidden peak

late season fun where i met will

ruth mountian

learning that early winter = unconsolidated snow and heavy loads... boo

enchantments

steve house pose on windy summit

chair peak, ne buttress

i hate down climbing steep snow

chair peak north face

i almost died about 50' higher than this when an avalanche ripped over my head

stuart glacier couloir

gotta get back on the horse after the avalanche... the next day apparently

north ridge of baker

heinous bushwack, fun climbing. peter cruising easy snow

north face of mt. shuksan

just a damn fun climb

ne ridge of mt. triumph

i don't know why but this picture makes me happy

mt. thomson

learning to ski is crucial to a full set of alpine skills!

sw face of red mountain

full on winter conditions. snow, WIND, more wind, more wind, more snow and of course some rain.

dragontial peak triple couloirs

getting better (somewhere around 68 days of skiing for the season)

slot couloir

it's spring, time to ski and climb!

mt baker squak/easton glaciers

no fall steep terrain right off the summit

eldorado

full on mixed conditions (M5ish), not to mention tackling a route that almost killed me the last time

stuart glacier couloir

well, why not ski naked

mt. rainier emmons glacier

emmons glacier round 2

2011-07-25T15:35:00.000-07:00

no travis, that isn't a 15 year old boy or shaved legs european guy

our original plans were to ski the edumnds headwall over the the sunny warm weekend. the weather forecast was looking good except for the 11500' freezing level. being that there was a very good chance we were going to be down climbing 55 degree ice for 1500', we pulled the plug on the headwall the night before. travis and jeff wanted to ski the emmons, which i wasn't too excited about, but we made plans for it anyway. a late night phone conversation with ryan through him into the mix as a "maybe i'll meet you at camp at 1:00 am the morning of the climb." another late night phone call hooked us up with chico and owen who were planning on climbing the emmons the same day we wanted to ski it!

arriving at the ranger station just after they opened, chico and owen got the last two spots at schurman, the ranger told us we had a permit to camp at "other" and to just camp with them. the morning was already hot as we hit the trail with skis on our backs, but the mostly snow free trail to glacier basin went fast. the interglacier was a sun-cupped bitch to skin up but pride kept me going while travis and jeff booted with owen and chico.

jeff crossing the raging torrents

a plane

we arrived at camp just before 3 and lazed around for a long time waiting for the campsite next to chico and owen to clear. eventually the people packed up and left, leaving us with a perfect platform for our $3 blue tarp. sometime around 7:30ish, ryan showed up, much to travis and jeff's surprise since i never told them he might show up. he was supped to have dinner with his grandma and join us afterward (hense the 1:00 am eta) but got off the hook by eating lunch with her instead! a lazy afternoon and evening with lots of eating put us in bed around 10 with clear skies and no wind.

camp

our shelter for the night... $3 blue tarp

chico with his rad glasses

mt. tahoma's shadow with little tahoma

sometime around 1:00 am the wind picked up, not too strong, but annoying for sure. at one point the wind gusted strong enough to almost tear down our shelter which ryan was able to keep from blowing away and put back together. getting up at 4:00 am we were roped up and hiking by 5:15 am. there was a light wind and the snow had frozen making travel easy. up to 12500' the route was very strait forward. at about 12500' we went right and ran into a dead end, having to traverse left and descend about 100 hard earned feet. taking a break after the traverse we looked up to watch clouds suddenly fly over the top of the moutnain. within 2 minutes there was a large lenticular obscuring the top.

travis halfway up the corridor

woooo 12500', sunny skies, easy travel, it's in the bag!

we kept hiking upward, travis complaining about not wanting to eat gu's and being hungry, while jeff and ryan started to feel the altitude. below the bergschrund, at about 13200', the wind picked up and the visibility started going in and out. we stopped to discuss our options as faces began to get uneasy. after weighing the options, we pressed upward for about 300' before wind, intermittent whiteout and precip had us weighing the options again. so much for a sunny weather forecast.

at this point some were hungry, some were tired, some wanted the summit and some were apathetic. travis and ryan weren't into the idea of skiing the glacier in a whiteout and the snow above us wasn't going to get any softer. jeff on the other had was rearing to go fort the summit. we discussed the option of splitting up, sending travis and ryan down and jeff and i up. but in the end we decided it was better to all ski together. down it would be.

booo 13500', winds, some snow, lenticular above and dropping and hard hard hardpack above us

after about 800' of edgable semi-frozen wind affected snow things started softening up. from about 12000' back to camp, we had excellent skiing. it was funny to pass everyone glissading down the corridor. and we even passed the classic glissading-with-crampons-in-the-middle-of-the-glacier-roped-up team.

travis shredding by an icefall

travis skiing super fast to get to some food

ryan

a quick pack up at camp and we were off to ski mt. ruth rather than the interglacier. after strait-shotting terrible sun-cupps and almost dying travis was ready for anything mt. ruth could throw at him. we traversed to a shoulder on mt. ruth and had options, right or left. right went for sure but didn't look quite as cool as left. travis ended up going right and finding a great ski line, while the rest of us dropped in left hoping it would go. ryan found a sweet chute that put us right where we needed to be.

jeff skiing mt. ruth with a hurt back... at least his binding didn't come off the skis!

hiking out with skis and boots on your backpack is never fun, and it wasn't any better this time. o well. and, i'm done with this route for a while... unless someone asks me to go ski it of course.

from enumclaw we looked back and the mountain was obscured with a massive cumulonimbus cloud starting around 11000'. the cloud itself must have been 18,000'. this morning i woke up to thunder. if we would have been on the edmunds headwall, we would have left later and taken WAY longer... long enough to be a part of the huge cloud.

mt. rainier disappointment cleaver

2011-07-12T18:53:00.000-07:00

the mountain during a small break in the clouds

after climbing and skiing the emmons glacier 5 days agao, colin and i climbed the disappointment cleaver route on mt. rainier today. the weather was quite poor with strong winds, blizzard snow conditions and zero visibility. thankfully, right as we got to the crater rim, the lenticulars lifted about 1,000' giving us some visibility of the cloud sandwich we were a part of.

some hilights of of the trip would be...

the mysterious spanaway qfc bathroom... as i was going to the bathroom paper towels were coming out of the dispenser, the garbage can lid was opening and closing and the "piso mojado" sign was sliding back and forth across the room. i took care of business elsewhere.
the nice officer that didn't give colin a ticket for going 48 in a 35
endless slush on the way to muir while looking at the great view of a whiteout.
sleeping in the public shelter during very windy conditions.
eyelashes freezing together every time i would look into the wind. i could feel them break apart every time i blinked.
snot freezing as it was being blown by the wind so it would stick out horizontally until i broke it off.
not drinking or eating between the cleaver and the summit due to wind/blizzard/freezing rain conditions. this led to bonking hard on the way back down...

all in all, it was a great trip on a funny route (not direct, aesthetic or practical at all). it was really fun to get into some inclement weather and push it a bit further and harder. two rainier climbs in 5 days!

colin during that same break

who needs a tent, right?

it was a 4 volcano night... we could see adams, hood, st. helens and rainier all though the cloud sandwich

before it started blowing real hard, the camera didn't come out much after this

colin just before the summit. i got blown over right before i took this picture.

mt. rainier emmons ski

2011-07-07T00:07:00.000-07:00

view of our route from the trail

will, carson and i skied the emmons glacier on mt. rainier today, in almost perfect conditions. originally will and i had planned on rock climbing for the past two days but plans fell through due to snow covered rock and very high freezing levels. with 14,000' freezing levels, skiing rainier seemed to be the best option.

on the 4th of july, just before the fireworks, will and i finalize plans to ski rainier over the next two days. we invite carson as he's wanted to ski the emmons for a long time. with a warm forecast with almost no wind, we pack light... real light. my backpack weighed in at 23lbs, including food, water, climbing gear, stove, fuel, ice axe, crampons, skins, skis, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, shovel and other odds and ends needed to climb the mountain. for a shelter we use a small tarp that is just big enough to cover our heads.

30 liter backpacks!

we got a late start and left the trailhead around 3:30 in the afternoon. we arrived at camp schruman at 7:45 and are instantly greeted by the friendly david gottlieb. after chatting with him about the conditions up high, we settle on a late start the next morning, aiming for 7:00 am. a warm starry night was interrupted by several guided and independent partied that were appalled by our lack of tent at 1:00 am, as they roped up for their climb.

carson skinning up the interglacier

a fine evening

our bivy gear

those lights just left of center are seattle

everyone was asleep as we melted ice for water

we got out of bed around 6:45 and started melting water and lazing around camp. 8:23 am and we were walking our of camp to our route. we passed about 3 parties on their way up and many large groups on their way down around 13,500'. 1:15 pm we stood on the summit in a slight breeze and prepared for the ski down.

will and carson on the corridor around 11,000'

david gottlieb on his way down after climbing to the summit from camp in 2 hours 35 min

david shredding around 13,000'

will and carson just below the schrund

will on the summit

carson on the summit

myself on the summit

all of us!

the snow on the upper mountain was a firm styrofoam on the way up and softened just slightly for the way down. below the bergschrund we found everything between corn and slush. once out of the maze of crevasses and back on the corridor, we did a triple "BN" back to camp, arriving to laughs, clapping, and some awkward glances.

will skiing around 14,000'

good times!

corridor BN

will's corridore BN

dropping the knee, and the clothes...

our tracks

packing up quickly we skied back to the trail (carson found a pair of skis on the way) and hiked out to the car just before 7:30. a quick 28 hours round trip with 7.5 hours of sleep!

carson and his "new skis"

stuart glacier couloir

2011-06-18T21:03:00.000-07:00

carson sending hard...

the nerves started to settle in as i went to bed late, dreading the 5:00 am wakeup. last time i attempted this route, a large cornice broke and started an avalanche that ripped over me, somehow not tearing me from my thin stance. post from last year.

arriving at the stuart lake trailhead around 11:30, peter, will, chris, jeff, carson and i loaded our backpacks with both skis and mixed climbing gear. shouldering heavy packs, we plodded up the trail to our first destination, mt. stuart. our plan was to climb the stuart glacier couloir the next morning and ski the nw couloir of argonaut the following day. ambitious? yes.

heavy packs

argonaut

excellent skinning

the hike to camp at the base of the sherpa glacier is about 4.5 miles. although a short approach, we take about 4.5 hours to get to camp. once off the trail, the going is slow and the post holing through snow patches is plentiful. we skin up once we see the snow is continuous enough, but end up leaving our skis below argonaut a quarter mile later. camp is a welcome rest as and we spend the evening watching clouds blast the top of the mountain, an intimidating image to fall asleep to.

3:00 am the alarm goes off and i look out the tent to find stars, stars and more stars. a clear night means frozen snow, perfect for our route. we crampon away from camp just after 3:30 and wade upward into the morning, once foot in front of the other, endlessly. after an eternity, the stuart glacier greets us right as the sun peeks over the horizon casting a pinkish-orange glow over the snow and our faces. a solid wind picks up as we climb higher on the glacier.

cramponing up firm snow before the sun rises

the army marching upward

beautiful sunrise

roping up at the bergschrund for a short mixed step, game faces appear. it feels good to bash away rotten ice and hook the back of cracks. the sound of crampons scratching rock wakes everyone up, the climb has truly begun. because the six of us make three teams, each team gets to climb a slightly different route... the first team bashes rotten ice to reveal good ice, the second team bashes more ice chipped out by tools and crampons revealing cracks, the third team cleans even more ice; a totally different experience.

chris sending the mixed step over the shrund

once past the mixed step we start frontpointing up firm snow in the couloir. we keep the rope on to save time and keep climbing upward. i pause at my highpoint last year and remember the taste of snow packed in my mouth and jacket from the avalanche and climb on. it feels good to put scarring memories to rest. as i climb toward the constriction in the couloir and the snow turns steeper, changing slowly to ice, an ice screw comes bouncing down the rope. apparently the one ice screw peter placed was pulled out by the rope, solid! through the main ice bulge, a fun AI2 step, we plod upward up the 50 degree upper slope to the west ridge notch.

jeff arriving at the belay above the shrund

peter climbing the ice step in the couloir

looking down the ice at carson

from the notch, we discuss the rest of the route. we didn't bring a route description and here is where the route finding begins. after exploring some options, we downclimb about 200' and climb back up another gully to regain the ridge where we are supposed to traverse on the north face. easy mixed climbing leads to a fun anchor-less belay right on the ridge. here on the ridge, the wind is howling. we hold on tightly to whatever we can as to not be blown off the ridge. the traverse on the north face is shockingly exposed and feels big. after finishing the short traverse i climb upward through steep mixed terrain to find chris belaying will out to the left. i build a semi-hanging belay below chris, as he has the only ledge available, and wait to see if will is going the right way. dead end. i try traversing to the right, a notch in the ridge lays just 20' over to the side, but rime mushrooms block my way as i'm too high. i belay peter to just below me where i pass him the rack and he easily climbs to the notch from below. bingo!

chris being pelted by wind striped rime

will on the exposed n traverse... pics don't do justice for how exposed this is!

on the south side of the ridge we are greeted with a beautiful corner of rock with twin cracks. peter leads off and cruises the fun rock climbing. traversing right and out of sight above the rock corner, peter showers us with ice. after following the corner, i make the rightward traverse and am faced with a thin strip of delaminated ice. gingerly placing my picks and stepping on rippels in the ice, my crampons make the rotten ice vibrate. nice lead pete!

peter sending the twin cracks

will laughing as chris poops

leading out on top of the ridge again, i'm faced with a decision. continue up the knife edge rime balls that "somewhat" resemble the summertime rock ridge, or down-climb a 60 degree snow slope that has been baking in the sun for some time now. not wanting the second the have a 50' unprotected slush down-climb, i start up the tenuous ridge to be stopped in my tracks 20' later. climbing down the steep slope below i kick steps deep to make it easier for the rest, a tiring process that seems to take forever. below the down-climb, i traverse right and up a few tense mixed moves, but by now the scratching of my crampons on the dry rock are starting to feel natural, comfortable.

the belay above the twin cracks

spooky down-climb

i belay on a flat ledge as peter slowly down-climbs the steep unprotected snow. handing the rack off once he reaches the belay, peter leads off on the next pitch to find the summit, hopefully. traversing up and right peter explores a ledge system going up and left. a committing move turns him around and he starts down-climbing to a promising ledge below. climbing around the corner, peter yells that it might go and disappears for a few minutes. the rope starts going slack and quickly i'm taking in foot after foot of rope. no go. once again, peter leads off exploring the last option. around the corner up higher the rope keeps feeding out and out. "watch me!" calls peter as he makes some tenuous moves out of sight. then the rope goes slack again and i'm taking in the rope once again. after an hour of exploring, peter returns to the belay to rest. chris is rearing to climb so he heads off to explore the first option. just below the committing move, will points out a scary looking corner system with two cracks, slightly overhanging and says, "i remember that from a trip report!"

figuring he can aid it if need be, chris climbs toward to corner. the sun is baking the rest of us on the ledge as he sets some gear in the crack and starts up, then backs off. looking at it again, he makes another stab at the corner and comes back down once more time. fumbling with some more gear, he clips the rope and starts up. a few easy moves lead to strenuous hooks and pick cams. small ripples in the rock are the only feet. pulling up powerfully chris pulls around an awkward ice bulge and clips some tat. damn, now i have to climb that.

chris sending the crux

peter graciously offers me the lead and i start up toward the crack. at the corner i place some gear and stare up at chris and will, 15' above. water drips on my sun glasses and i stare at the icy cracks. starting up the crack i find good hand jams for the first three moves, but my crampons seemed to scratch helplessly. back down. i repeat the same thing two more times resting between each try. ready to aid through the corner i decide to take one last stab at the corner. i take off my gloves, jam three moves, wedge my right crampon in the crack and find a small ripple for my left. standing up i get a solid pick torque and pull down hard. i feel the tool bite reassuringly and lock off finding another ledge for my crampon. swinging the other tool at a halfway melted rime ball i am surprised to get a positive stick in good ice. feeling the pump begin i hesitate and contemplate committing my weight to the melted rime mushroom. more pump builds and i begin loosing it. my feet pop and all my weight falls on the rime mushroom. it holds. scrambling i find sketchy feet and pull up hard with all i have left, reaching a thank god jug... literally. depumping on the jug, i realize i am bad at depumping. pull hard, find feet, pull hard again, hook jug, feet scratch, bad technique, at the belay. i want to throw up.

looking down the crux

peter starting up the corner

accidental hidden sling hook! haha!

to save time, peter follows the pitch with carson and jeff's rope so we can fix it for them. arriving at the belay, peter is just as wasted. what a battle of a pitch! peter takes the rack and leads off up a rime tunnel. i figure the summit is just a few feet away but he rope keeps playing out and out and out. finally the rope stops about 10' from the end and i start climbing. through the rime tunnel, the rope leads me to the ridge where i climb with exposure on both sides to just below the summit. walking over to chris and will, we congratulate each other and send will and chris home as they are hiking out that night. we tell them that we'll wait for jeff and carson. an hour passes and carson comes into view. the clouds are now blowing off the ridge from the north making the route appear bigger than it really is.

rime tunnel

peter and i stand on the summit for a long time without saying much. we just look around and enjoy life. arriving at the summit, carson and jeff divulge the terror they experienced on the route. their playful attitudes masked the fear of climbing ice and mixed rock for the first time, on such a big mountain. way to go guys. but the summit is only half way.

summit!

yessss

peter on the summit

carson on the final exposed ridge to the summit

one last downclimb

jeff following the last pitch

down-climbing off the summit, carson and jeff both learn how to plunge step and walk down steep hard snow. new to down-climbing, jeff and carson gingerly make their way down the sherpa. jeff's knee hurts every time he takes a step so he turns into the slope and down-climbs on frontpoints. below the schrund, peter and i wait for carson who tells us to go down to camp while he waits for jeff. 20 minutes of walking and peter and i make our way into camp. it gets dark shortly afterward and we eat dinner watching the slope for headlamps. an hour and a half later we stare toward the sherpa glacier as we see two headlamps making their way slowly down the glacier. they disappear for a good time then finally appear again, this time going much faster... glissading! sometime around 11:30, carson and jeff come stumbling into camp. there will be no skiing tomorrow.

time to go back to camp

carson just above the schrund, jeff way up in the clouds

waking up at 8:30 the next morning, we laze around in the sun with the intentions of rushing nowhere. we pack slowly. the sun feels good on bare skin, and the thought of hiking out with skis hurts. eventually we march off toward our skis excited for beer. the skis feel heavier and the going is slow, even though it is downhill. downed trees and brush makes hiking with skis miserable but forward means closer to home so we keep hiking. just over three hours after leaving camp, we are taking out packs off at the car, being eaten by mosquitos. jeff limps off the trail 30 minutes later, barely able to walk. nothing some beer can't heal.

the route climbs up the couloir that ends right of the summit, then back and forth on the ridge to the summit

cool pants

ew.

colchuck/dragontail ski

2011-06-11T22:11:00.001-07:00

will kicking steps up aasgard

tuesday night ryan, will and i find ourselves rigging a blue tarp off the side of my car at the stuart lake trailhead. word of the road opening had us excited for the short approach to big peaks. i slept in the car while will and ryan enjoyed the dry cover of our expertly rigged shelter. 2:15 in the morning we awake to a car tearing down the road. as soon as the car sees us camped by my car, they instantly turn around and speed away... car prowlers!

morning arrives and it's still raining. by 7:45 the rain has almost completely stopped and we see fresh snow about 800' above us! a late start of around 9:30 sees us up the tail with skis and boots on our packs, even a helmet on ryan's head as he didn't have room in his backpack. the trail feel as long as it always does but before we know it we're booting though crappy snow, at least our ski boots are off our backs.

at the lake, the bootpack turns right and heads toward the normal hiking trail. we continue strait to the water where we are barely able to skin across the floating mush. on the other side of the lake we drop our overnight gear and cover it in our blue tarp, it's getting late and we want to ski colchuck in decent snow.

crappy french backpack... time for a cilogear?

will he fall in?

the skin up to the moraine goes quickly and the higher we go the nicer the snow gets. at the base of the glacier there is about 4" of fresh new snow over a supportive crust. up higher on the glacier the snow gets lighter and deeper. once at the col we take skis off and boot up the steepish slope to the summit plateau. these slopes have knee deep snow that gives us pause as we think about the descent. after skinning up the mellow summit slopes we arrive at a prominent summit. with 50' of visibility, i yell that we're there and prepare for a bit of rest. just as i'm about to sit down, i realize i'm on the false summit as the true summit pops out in a small clearing. a few minutes later we're all standing on the summit taking in the views of the whiteout!

will and ryan on the colchuck glacier

higher up on the glacier, dragontail on the right

just as we are about to ski down, the views to the west open up and stuart pops it's head out of the clouds in a dramatic display of grandeur. i love the cascades. the clearing didn't last long so we took some pictures, looked down the north face (i wanted to ski it badly but it was much too late and warm), and strapped some skis to our feet.

summit!

stuart!

wild turkey...

mediocre turns down the mellow upper slopes led to the steeper section before the glacier. the warm temp were making the deep snow quite cohesive and a little unstable. careful skiing and sluff management were essential. i got caught in the tail of my sluff at one point and it dragged me down until i landed on a rock island. the glacier below held great snow for the upper third. below that the snow became heavy and slow. ryan started a large slide that went for about 1500'. at the base of the moraine ryan and i skies a small chute which was quite enjoyable.

will shredding the steeps back to the colchuck glacier

enlarge this and find ryan... the first third of the serpentine arete route in above him...

small chute below the colchuck glacier

that evening at camp i started thinking about the car prowlers we had seen the night before. i couldn't get them out of my mind since my car was going to be sitting down there all night with lots of gear in it! after dinner i told ryan and will that i was going to sleep back at the car. i packed my bag with all my overnight gear and skinned across the lake to where i stashed me skis, hiked back to out shoes at the creek where i stashed my boots and continued the rest of the 5.5 miles to the car. that night i set my alarm for 2:00 so i could be ready with my camera. right at 2:15 i car came speeding up the road until it saw me standing outside my car with a camera in one hand and an ice tool in the other. thankfully all the work of hiking back out to the car payed off!

why did i hike back down here again?

5:15 the next morning i start hiking up the trail with a very light pack on. two hours and one minute later i'm waking ryan and will up as i start preparing water for the day. after morning routines, we start skinning up aasgard pass. the cold and clear night had frozen the snow making for excellent cramponing through the steeper sections up to aasgard pass. once at the pass we took a high traverse to gain the mellow slopes to the top of dragontail. during the traverse the sun was being reflected off the giant bowl of snow making a perfect solar over. we roasted quite well!

perfect cramponing

the forever traverse

on top of dragontail there was a slight breeze to cool us down as we took in the airy views toward colchuck lake. the strong sun was starting a textbook convection cycle. we watched the clouds billowing upward with tremendous speed. to the west there were a few ominous giants ripe for thunder and lightning.

stuart with colchuck in the foreground!

summit of dragontial

the ski off the summit was fairly uneventful as the snow was thick and heavy from warm temps. we ski cut the slope causing large wet slides and skied in the slide path for fast hardpack skiing. ryan and i took a shortcut gully back to our traverse which proved to be some of the best turns of the trip. the steep gully was short but had edgable snow! skiing the "glacier" back to aasgard was fun, although heavy, skiing. back at the pass we discussed which way would have better snow; left or right? i dropped in left and found fairly fast and carvable snow. we skied the left side of aasgard all the way back to the lake.

small gully down dragontail

will shredding aasgard

yes, his ski is under the water!

alpine bliss

back at camp, we took down the tent, packed up and started off across the lake. throughout the day, the lake had melted out quite a bit but we still felt confident it was skinnable. after skinning across the whole lake we faced our last challenge, a thin bridge of mush with water on both sides. would it hold me? would it hold ryan? would it hold will?!? i made it across without incident, even after jumping up and down on it. sure, my skis went underwater about an inch, but it wasn't like my skins weren't already wet from the sun affected snow. thankfully both will and ryan made it across without incident. before we knew it we were walking down the trail with our skis on our back.

the hike out of that place always seems longer than it actually is. but beer and oreos back at the car kept us motivated. apparently there was another mud slide that blocked the icicle right after we left that night. that was close!

mt. stuart cascadian couloir

2011-06-03T00:04:00.000-07:00

carson, jeff, ryan and i skied the cascadian this past wednesday. with a bad forecast and a truck full of gear and beer, we set out hoping for the best. let's just say there was a lot of rain, snow, sun and great skiing. i'll let the video do the talking on this one.

jeff, ryan and carson at the steepest section. ryan measured it on his inclinometer at an average 55 degrees!

on a side note, i broke my binding. :(

ski brakes

2011-05-29T19:57:00.000-07:00

i don't know why it's taken me this long these lose the 7 oz. leash system almost done.

eldorado ski descent

2011-05-25T12:56:00.000-07:00

carson, jordi and will skinning toward the east ridge of eldorado

my alarm goes off at 8:00 am monday morning, it's raining outside. i get out of bed and drag myself to the kitchen to eat some cereal, open my computer and check the weather with no hope of clear skies for the week. but wait! noaa says partly sunny up north!!!!! that night, carson, will, jordi and i sleep at the eldorado parking lot in the rain.

camp for the night... two in the car, two under the car

3:45 am the alarm goes off the it's still raining. i try to tell myself that, "it's washington and it's spring, we can get above it" as i crawl out of my sleeping bag and start putting on ski clothing. over an hour later we've dragged ourselves out of sleeping bags and are rigging up a ski carry system for will out of ski straps and velcro. just past 5 we cross the river in the rain.

it rains on us until the rain turns to snow mid way up the second boulder field (which is still completely covered with snow). by the time i've reached the meadows above the waterfall section, i'm about 15 min ahead of carson and 30 ahead of will and jordi. it's here i remember that jordi doesn't have one of his climbing wires and feel terrible for cutting the steepest possible skin track i was capable of. when will and jordi arrive above the waterfalls we rig a climbing "wire" out of a stuff sack, cord and zip-ties

in the rain, in the dark

carson showin' us how it's done

again, carson showin' us how it's done

heel wires are for losers

the snow has picked and we're starting to see some accumulation... freshies? but the heavy snowfall has also turned our visibility to zero. thank fully we have a bootpack from a few days back to follow. we stick to the bootpack and skin up to the ridge where we're supposed to drop down to get on the eldorado glacier. we've gone too high. we backtrack down the ridge, now able to see a bit better, with some fun billy-goating to reach the correct descent gully. skiing down the gully i cause most of the mush to slide, carson gets the rest to go.

skinning up to the wrong notch

will throwing his skis

jordi throwing his body rather than his skis...

carson styling the correct descent gully

skinning up the eldorado glacier is no different than walking up it... it never ends. as i reach the crest of the glacier i look up to realize we've broken out of the clouds into a cloud sandwich. there are thin high clouds above and thick rain clouds below! by the time carson, will and jordi reach the crest most of the high clouds have broken and there is more blue in the sky than white! this is what spring in washington is supposed to be like! we rest on the glacier in the sun and watch the few clouds caught up on eldorado clear themselves.

breaking out into the cloud sandwich

rest on top of the eldorado glacier... the cloud sandwich is going away!

perfect... cool gaiters man

before we know it we're skinning effortlessly up the east ridge of eldorado. the snow on the ridge isn't mush or breakable crust, just a supportive crust with wind packed powder in places! since carson hadn't ever used his crampons or ice axe before, we stopped skinning about 500' shy of the summit to crampon up. booting was much more tiring but it was good for carson to use his gear. the summit was being pummeled by moderate winds and clouds giving it the feeling of a much bigger mountain. soon we were all standing on the top enjoying the views to the north, east and south as to the west all we could see was a banner cloud building off the summit ridge.

skinning up the east ridge with forbidden in the background

2/3 the way up the east ridge

the knife edge... trough

summit! you can see the cloud building off the ridge behind me

will on the knife edge

carson using his ice axe and crampons

jordi almost to the summit

bam!

for the descent, will and jordi decided to leave their skis below the summit while carson and i decided to bring them to the top. i dropped in to the south face and ski cut the slope from the summit... solid as can be! the next few moments were perfect... steep and fully exposed fall line skiing in a few inches of wind packed powder over a firm base. the slope started at a perfect 45 degrees and rolled over to a touch over 50. eventually the fun had to stop as a traverse left was required to avoid the large cliff down to the glacier. carson was planning on booting back down the summit ridge and skiing from a less exposed area but when I yelled up how great it was he put his gear on and shredded.

fun skiing!

above the clouds

back at will and jordi's skis, we talked about our ski descent plan and ripped soft snow back down the east ridge. exiting the east ridge a bit early to hopefully ski across the glacier without having to scoot or skin we found very wet and slow snow. so much for no scooting. but the scoot across the plateau was soon over and we were looking down at 1200' of mush as wet slides were constantly ripping on the cliffs to the left of the eldorado glacier. strenuous and awkward skiing took up back to the notch we had to gain in the ridge to drop back to the boulder fields. a short boot followed by really hot turkey jerky and not enough water led us to the right drainage. we ski cut our way back down the drainage causing wet slides everywhere (so satisfying). the snow was getting heavier and heavier and just when we though it couldn't get any worse, it magically became skiable! the last two boulder fields yielded fun and playful skiing.

will getting some fun skiing in the clouds

carson ripping it in such a terrible skiing environment

jordi dropping the knee

will skiing the east ridge

time to scoot!

back at the trail we had a discussion as to what would be the best way to get our skis back down to the car. since the trail is so steep, putting them on our packs would mean hitting them on the ground a bunch. in the end, carson and i strapped them on our backs while will and jordi carried them in hand. both ways worked just fine and i really didn't think it was a problem to have them on my back.

the last log to deal with... beer.

back at the car we were greeted by beers, water and snacks. a perfect day in the cascades. a perfect first alpine trip for carson... a bit of rain, sleet, snow, wind, sun, too much sun, whiteout, perfect skiing, terrible skiing, and a steep muddy trail.

mt. baker ski (squak climb, easton ski)

2011-05-19T19:09:00.000-07:00

will on the roman wall

as i was driving home from a quick north slopes of chair tour will called and asked if i wanted to ski baker. not being one to turn down a good ski i said i'd stop by work and try to get my shift covered for the next day. with jordan willing to take my belay shift i packed up and met will up north.

driving up to the trailhead we got the car stuck in the snow and spent about 45 min digging it out. once unstuck, we decided to call it quits and park about 3.8 miles from the trailhead. packed up and ready to go, we slept in the back of my car until 3:45 am.

the skin up the road was uneventful and before we knew it we were at the trailhead. "follow the sled tracks" is what a bunch of trip reports said so we followed the snowmobile tracks strait from the trailhead. they went right when i thought they should go left but up we went. popping out of the trees we were surprised to see the squak glacier up ahead, we were about 1.5 miles east of where we had planned on going. oops! with no other choice, we started up the squak with perfect skinning conditions. turns out the squak is a remarkably straight forward climb that passes a few striking icefalls. before we knew it, we were traversing over to the summit crater.

baker from i-5

our first good view of baker... not from the vantage we were planning on, but we delt

will just arriving on the squak glacier

seracs on the squak

will skinning under sherman peak

rime formations and the steaming summit crater

at the roman wall our skins were really getting annoying. they had gotten wet in the warmer temps down low and frozen up high causing them to glop with snow. our skin tracks looked more like boot tracks! we took of our skis, donnend crampons and started booting up the sastrugi covered roman wall. after a long time we were on the summit plateau and pretty beat. i had been talking myself out of traversing the summit plateau to the true summit but couldn't resist once up there. will took a much earned rest as i skinned to the very top. here is where i ate my last gu and drank my last sip of water.

will just past the summit crater

will with colfax behind

will climbing the roman wall

a well earned rest

woo hoo!

after packing up and stripping skins, we locked in and skied off, heading strait for the easton glacier. the first few hundred feet were a slightly breakable crust with ice pellets, really fun skiing although tiring. below that, the roman wall was covered with sastrugi. it was late enough in the day (2:30) that it was fairly soft, but still, it's sastrugi. below the roman wall things got fun as corn became the norm for the next 4000'. gown at railroad grade the snow became soft and sloppy, 1000' lower mashed potatoes.

will skiing off the summit plateau

sastrugi shredding

the one part of the roman wall that wasn't covered with sastrugi

serac shredding!

last good view of the mountain

back at the trailhead, thoroughly dehydrated and hungry we were anxious to ski out the road. turns out the road is uphill both ways. much skinning and scooting led to the realization that skating was much more efficient. i was real glad to see the car... i think will was even more so.

~9000' vert over 23.5 miles.

castle rock

2011-05-19T18:05:00.000-07:00

dave the hardman with many ropes

a long time ago a climb of the tooth was planned with a few guys i work with... two who have never gone rock climbing before! when the day to climb came around so did the rain so over the pass we went. castle rock was dry so we figured it would be a good substitute for the tooth. sadly, with the rain came food poisoning for mike (one of the two newbs) so he wasn't able to join in on the fun.

carson, dan, dave, peter and i arrived at castle rock sometime around noonish and started up the first pitch of saber. at saber ledge carson and i went left and climbed canary while peter took dan and dave up the rest of saber.

after a successful climb we drank a total of 13 rainiers and one pitcher of boundary bay ipa! good times had by all.

and, good job to dave for surviving his first rock climb.

the trifecta

carson on the first pitch of saber

heel hook!

peter and "boots"

you show 'em carson... canary

peter, dave and dan at saber ledge

carson making the easy part hard

peter leading the last pitch of saber

dyno!

dan and dave climbing just below the top!

king of the world

dave looking good with lots of gear

dusk patrol

2011-05-14T16:10:00.000-07:00

last week andy, tom and i took off right after work for a quick dusk patrol. since i'd spent the past week and a half feeling sick and weak, i figured it was about time to get back on the skis and have some fun.

we skied up into commonwealth basin trying to get to the bowl just below lundin peak. about 1/3 of the way up to lundin, we got sick of the breakable crust and avy debris and skied down. refreezing mush and breakable crust were the name of the game. i double ejected and face planted into the breakable crust sending my hat flying about 30' in front of me. after getting back down into commonwealth, my headlamp went on and we made decent time back to the car.

a few days later, however, i climbed lundin and skied from just below the summit down the east ridge in perfect corn! i didn't ski from the true summit because the skinny ridge was too unnerving... 60' horizontal of booting made me feel much better!

red mountain in the last light of the day

clouds

andy getting in some good low light refreezing mush shredding

i'm sorry tom, it's the only picture i have of you

good times

snow dome dawn patrol

2011-04-24T16:08:00.000-07:00

with the sunniest day of the year forecasted, peter and i decided to get up real early and enjoy a little down patrol action. our goal was to climb up to snow dome (east peak of snoqualmie mt.), practice some crevasse rescue then ski back to the car before i had to work.

south face of red mt. in the morning sun

arriving at the trailhead we said, "nah!" to the glacier travel gear and decided to just have fun skiing. a fairly uneventful skin up commonwealth basin led to the gully beneath lundin peak. hard snow in the shade made for easy boot packing for the next 700'. once back in the sun we put skis back on and skinned over to snow dome. high on the ridge an unexpected strong wind greeted us by pelting our faces with snow chunks and particles. our time on the top was brief as we wanted to get out of the wind before we got too cold.

kicking steps up toward lundin

lundin just above peter

peter traversing toward snow dome

the ski off snow dome was fun windbuff and supportable crust. because of the wind, the snow up high didn't corn up in time, o well. on the ski back down to commonwealth i started having some ski problems. after just dropping in toward the basin, i was having a lot of fun carving turns on a smooth hard crust. picking up more and more speed, and getting more and more excited about how much fun i was having, i hit a section of slightly breakable crust. i pushed forward into my cuffs to blow through and instantly i stepped out of my right ski. the next thing i knew, i was tumbling down the slope until i came to a stop a long time later, backwards and upside down.

skiing some windbuff off snowdome

peter

after peter finished peeing all over his skis, he skied past me and found great corn just below the wind line. the rest of the ski out consisted of me popping out of my right ski and flying all over the place. i think i need to adjust my vertical release on my right ski.

10:30 am beer!

alright, i admit it, we shared it

chair peak circumnavigation

2011-04-20T19:13:00.000-07:00

yesterday i sat on the beach for hours watching convective forces at play in the clouds. i chose to take a rest day rather than skiing alone (this is not normal for me) and went to the beach to watch clouds and play with rocks and small streams leading to the sound. watching the columns of clouds raise up from nothing, dumping rain just north and in the mountains made me happy that i was sitting in the sun rather than skiing in the rain. spring convection cycles can be harsh for touring, but they sure are fun to watch!

great scott's basin from on the way to bryant col

today was different though. the forecast called for cloudy skies with no snow! how can that be since it's going to be just as warm... i'll stop asking questions before the weather changes it's mind. will and headed up to snoqualmie pass to ski the south gully of kaleetan peak and finish the chair peak circumnavigation while we were at it. arriving at the trailhead i realized i forgot my transceiver in my car back at seattle... bummer.

rather than going home we decided we would play it safe and turn around or bail if we found signs of instability and took off from the parking lot at 8. the skin up to bryant col was the part of the trip i was most concerned about. clear skies and a strong morning sun made me skin fast under the cliffs and cornices that line the path to bryant col. before we knew it we were at the col stripping skins and preparing for the ski down to melakwa lakes.

will skinning up the basin

we have to go up there?!

will on the last few switchbacks to bryant col

the ski down to the lakes was on a breakable crust that tried to prohibit fun skiing (but hey, we're on a ski tour... 90% touring, 10% skiing) so who cares! eventually we made our way down to the lakes and skinned up for the skin to melakwa pass. here is where i made history for myself. i had the most comfortable backcountry poop i have ever experienced. i'd go into details but...

breakable crust on the backside of bryant

the crust battle captured on film!

lots of breakable crust over 6" of wet snow... ugh

will almost up to melakwa pass

will is a ballerina

skinning up to the pass was tiring as the snow was a breakable crust over 6" of wet snow. thankfully the skin is mellow and we arrived at the pass to watch wet slides rip off a cliff between roosevelt and kaleetan. skiing from the pass to chair peak lake was down 8" of preserved powder which yielded perfect buttery turns, something we were not expecting on this trip.

my favorite section of skiing from the day... preserved powder

will enjoying the goods

wouldn't be a tour without a bit of herringbone

the cliffs in the back were ripping with slides quite often

skiing from chair peak lake to snow lake provided a lot of fun skiing although the lower we got, the heavier the snow became. thankfully the snow never got heavy enough to be a pain. as we were skiing down, there were wet slides ripping off cliffs around roosevelt almost every few seconds. although none of the slides were a concern from where we were, it sure is amazing to watch the power of even the smaller avalanches!

one last look at where we came from

melakwa point and the n slopes of chair

i see some lines i want to ski...

will getting to it with the n slopes of chair in the back

the skin back across the lake was an uneventful race to get out of the sun as fast as possible. on the far side of the lake, will and i took some time to rest and eat in the shade. will had never done any stability tests so we found a good slope and practiced digging some pits. on the skin out of the lake we noticed tracks coming off the ne buttress of chair peak (dan helmstadter, you beast). more smooth, although slow, turns took us back to the ski track out of the alpental valley and back to the car just before 2.

will skinning across snow lake

if you look closely you can see our tracks from earlier in the morning

thats a beast of a line!

altogether the trip took us just under 6 hours... take away an hour from our break at the end of the lake and 30 min to eat and poop at melakwa lakes and you're left with 4.5 hours! on the way up i was telling will that if he hadn't come with me i was going to try to get the circumnav done in as close to 3 hours as possible... he laughed at me. we never hurried too much throughout the day which means that a 3+ hour time is not unrealistic in any way!

what a great way to spend a half day.

more stump

2011-04-15T21:30:00.000-07:00

waking up to a sore throat and achey body, i called travis to say i wasn't going to ski today. back to sleep until i finally got up around 12:00. after dragging my butt out of bed i realized i was still not feeling 100% and quite bored. what to do? ski! skiing will cure my illness... right guys?

i was driving at 1:00 and walking away from my car, with skis over my shoulder, at 2. unlike yesterday the temp was in the mid 40's and every tree was dripping. what proceeded was a lot of skinning through knee deep wet snow, getting dripped on by trees and being bombed by just as wet snow bombs. i decided to try a new path to the top of the stump and stayed further left after starting up the hill. my plan failed as i ran into steep and cliffy terrain. dropping back down 500' i traversed right, finding a great way to access the clearcut. many many more steps through deep snow (i call them steps cause sliding my skis forward only drove them deeper into the wet mess i will call snow) and i decided to head left for the trees hoping for shallow snow. the trees were still deep but the sun hadn't affected the snow nearly as much leaving me with enjoyable knee deep trail breaking! quickly i made my way over the top of the stump and along the ridge until i found a place i wanted to drop in.

skinning through nice snow after skinning through bad snow

i supposed i should ski down here!

today i stayed off steeper terrain as the heavy snow would cause more problems if it started moving. the snow on the nw aspect was quite "enjoyable" for the first 800'. after crossing the open section down low and starting toward the bottom of commonwealth, the snow got junky again. manageable skiing led me down to the creek where i decided to skin up again and skin until i knew it was all downhill. skiing out the fun-house trail back to the car was slushy, grabby and out of control.

such fun tree skiing

carson!

i still don't feel much better. day 64 done!

day 63

2011-04-14T19:13:00.000-07:00

enjoyed some afternoon turns in thigh deep powder today. i also learned a few things.

1) after unloading pictures from my camera to the computer, turn off the camera. if not, camera will say, "switch out battery pack" when you try to use it.

2) pertex shield is an amazing shell fabric and the outdoor research helium is the best 4.6 oz of rainshell i know of.

3) a patagonia nanopuff, when soaking wet, will dry in a semi-warm car in about 25 min.

4) it is never going to stop dumping this year!

no pictures from this trip but left the house around 1:00 for a short trip to the pass. i skinned up kendall stump breaking trail the whole way though knee deep snow. one lap in the trees just skiers right of the clearcut got me excited for what was to come. buttery turns and snow flying all over my face had me skinning back up to the top of the stump as fast as i could. at the top, i followed the the ridge until i was at the treed area leading up toward the summit of kendall. once out of the trees, the snow was mid thigh deep and new cornices were forming on the summit ridge. slabby conditions and weak cornices turned me around just short of the summit. time to ski!

a quick ski though the trees brought me to an easy skin back up to the ridge closer to the stump where i once again stripped the skins and dove in. the snow on the nw slopes of the stump was as light as can be. i had to ski fast to stay in front of my sluff as every time i let it pass me it took all the good snow away. the top 12" of snow was sluffing easily on anything steeper than 35 degrees. on the lower slopes leading down to commonwealth i found a special stash of powder that was at least thigh deep. faceshots were abundant although i did have to carefully manage my sluff which meant that not too many turns could be linked before waiting for it to pass.

deep snow along the creek in the basin made slow progress to get back to the car.

i left my car around 2:00 and was driving back to seattle at 4:37... i'm tired.

great scott's basin (tooth fail)

2011-04-13T16:56:00.000-07:00

"look at how cool i am man, i mean, look how i'm standing here so sexy on some point of some ridge no one cases about, man."

yesterday jeff, colin and i set out to climb the south face of the tooth and ski off the north ridge. our plan was foolproof... no one climbs the tooth in winter, let alone on tuesdays, so we'd take our time, climb with our skis and have a great day. well, a late start saw us driving away from issaquah around 8:45 and skinning up the valley around 9:45. thankfully, the mostly cloudy forecast was staying home leaving us with not a cloud in sight.

on the way up we met some great folks from vermont and passed about 6 people. once in great scott's basin, we passed some people who warned us of serious whumphing toward pineapple pass. that group skied from a point just before the end of the basin gets steep. just as we got to their highpoint we realized there was already a group in front of us climbing up to the pass to climb the tooth, rope out and everything! we waited for them to gain the notch as continuing up the basin would only expose us to the windslab they were stomping up. while we waited we dug a quick pit to evaluate the snow. our pit yielded a layer that almost slid off our column (which was on a 15 degree slope) about 8" down. ct6 q1...yikes! while we were digging we concluded that the group ahead of us was taking far too long so we pulled the plug on the tooth and decided to ski instead.

our first run was from our safe point back down to the bottom of great scott's. 6" of nice light snow over a supportable crust provided buttery turns, although a bit slow due to a lack in slope angle. back at the bottom of the basin we decided to skin up just a bit further to see how the snow was up higher since the group ahead of us were now out of our way. upon further investigation, the higher we got, the better the stability seemed get. most of the end of the basin was a very supportable crust over consolidated snow with 4" of fresh on top. from the top of the pass we ripped our skins and skied the steeps back to the bottom. one more time up, one more time down and before we knew it we were skiing the heavy junk-snow back to the car. back at the car we ran into the couple from vermont and asked them if they wanted to drink some beer and play with transceivers, which we did for the next few hours in the sun.

not too bad for a day that was supposed to be mostly cloudy. i only got a few photos of the first run... sorry.

some pre-shred turns while we waited for a group climbing above

jeff, the asian tele master

who has zero fun, ever.

colin enjoying some goods

kendall stump dawnpatrol

2011-04-13T16:33:00.000-07:00

leaving seattle around 6:30 in the morning peter and i set out to ski something before i had to work at 2:00 pm. we had made grand plans the night before to rappel into something, but a bit too much beer and a late bedtime made me reconsider a 5:30 start. despite a small amount of time and the possibility of bad ski conditions, peter and i were both excited to see how his new prior husumes were going to perform.

we started skinning up the mountain around 7:45 encountering tree bombed, wet , yucky snow. but the areas safe from the bombs seemed as though they might actually provide fun skiing! breaking out of the trees to the clearcut, the skiing conditions drastically improved as we broke trail through rather deep snow. we arrived at our highpoint just before 10, ate a snack and ripped skins. our first few turns were a big surprise! i expected about 4" of fresh over a hard crust. instead we got deep drifted powder that, at times, was mid thigh deep! after a short but wonderful slope full of faceshots, we continued skiing down toward kendall lakes. running out of time, we skinned back up so we could ski out our line of ascent. on the way up, we skinned strait up a ski track that made about 50,000 turns. pretty funny to see a strait skin track and so many turns right next to each other! the ski down the other side started out very enjoyable, then became heavy, then grabby, then heavy-grabby-bombed goodness!

in the end peter got to test his new skis in all sorts of conditions. he likes them.

husumes!

peter thigh deep

and this was thicker and heavier than 500' higher!

ridge-tops were windy!