Contrary to the title of the blog (kc-climbs), I am putting more than just climbs. I am putting weekend hobbies ... Climbs, hikes, Fun brew news, and other exciting or not so exciting excursions. I'm trying to organize trip reports, recipes, etc. on the right. Please leave comments as I love reading them!
If at first, if at second, if at third .... try try again. So my previous umpteen attempts at Shuksan have been weathered out. I've gotten up to the sulphide 3 times and have had to turn around in misery because of weather twice ... and the third time, well, you can read about it here. We wont mention the even less successful trips. So with the summer winding down after all of the other trips, I convinced Keith and Alison to make a go of it - both of them newbies to alpine stuff, but both wanted see what all the fuss was about. We decided to go Fri/Sat to eliminate possible highways up on the sulphide and summit pyramid even though weather was a tad suboptimal. Also decided on the sulphide because of group experience and my familiarity with the route.
We got a latish start as Alison had to work in the AM and took off from the trailhead (2800') at about 3. We made it to 6750' or so at the foot of the sulphide at sundown. It was the first reasonable place to camp, although we'd soon find out that on rock fingers about 10 minutes away down 400 ft there is camping with toilets. ... but what's the fun of that, I mean, no blue bags. We dug two platforms and got stuff ready for the morning and got some shut eye.
4 O'clock came early, we rose and were on our way due N to the summit pyramid. Breaks in the clouds gave us glimpses in the dark sky, but we wouldn't be in the clear until 8,000 ft or so. Slow snow slog on the well graded glacier. At one point we were in the clouds and I beared a little too far E and we went right past the summit pyramid into a meandering maze of giant crevasses. I really just wanted to give the two newbies some excitement and up close encounters with the fun creatures and immunize them a little bit. We went back NW and got back on track to the summit pyramid. Pictured is Keith and Alison back on track above the clouds, with gorgeous Baker behind. ... and Baker was the only view we had this trip.
Up the summit pyramid, again, we didn't find the "class three" gully quickly and ad libbed. K is pictured wondering what the path of least resistance up and to the typical route is . Protecting a few moves in hiking boots we made it to the summit by a less than standard rout. Lunch on top and a more direct route down went more uneventfully. K and A back at camp with the summit in the background. Back at the car at sundown for the long way home. Only regrets is the huried nature of the trip - sorry Keith!
Stuart is the second highest non-volcanic peak. This pic is from Stuart Pass (Camps) and shows the West Ridge. July 4 weekend 4 of us tried to do the W ridge of Stuart. Weather was iffy and we ended up climbing into pea soup. When it started drizzling and the rock was getting slick, we decided to turn back. On the plus side, Sunday was a beautiful day in Highlight basin. Why the weather gods didn't move that up a day for us, I don't know.
Fast forward to the next long weekend - labor day weekend. Lucas and I set off to do the W ridge and see if we couldn't tame the beast. Weather was slightly better than the July 4th weekend but pea soup came and went and we really didn't get any warmth from the sun, leaving the rock frigid, at least to the wusses that were climbing this specific time. We camped at Stuart Pass as before and woke at 4. I was pissed because I wanted to sleep in, and there is no way that a few thousand feet should take us that long especially since we had gotten 1,000 feet within the destination before. But 4 it was and we were on our way. We decided to take our camp up and over to save us a little time on the way, even if it made climbing a tad more difficult. Up the west ridge, we passed all of the bivvy sites we were familiar with. We recognized the place that we turned around before and thought we were in good time as it was about 8 or 9 AM. Route finding became difficult and we kept finding signs of bivvy sites, all the way up and over the summit. It wasn't until afterwards that we read on someone's post that "90% of first attempts of the W ridge end up needing bivvys." That explains the plethora of them scattered throughout the rock face.
Well, here we went up, down, over here and over there, trying to stay on the W ridge and follow the "described" route, but that was futile. After 3 or 4 hours we had made it 500 feet and didn't feel any higher. We just decided don rock shoes and belays and climb with some experimentation with route finding and we went in the 'direction' of the perceived route descriptions. Following signs of human tracks, we thought we were on a route that would 'go.' At this point I can only (possibly) retrace our steps and can't begin to explain the route. Lucas took the final lead and by 5 pm (I think?) he was belaying me up to the summit. What a fine feeling that was, in the waning beautiful afternoon skies.
A quick lunch and we headed dow to the Cascadian Couloir. This was not an easy route down without being familiar with it. Whatever path we took 'went,' even if a little unclear as to whether it was going to or not. Light was waning and we were not yet at trail. 5 minutes after donning the headlamps we found a nice little maintained trail, which made things mindless until back at the trailhead. However, a trip wouldn't be complete without me bonking on the way back up to the pass. But alas, just past 11 pm we were back at trailhead. At 1:45 we took our shot of whiskey at home to celebrate the accomplishment and the long day.
... and as everything says, good route finding on this route leads to better (or at least faster) success. Lucas pictured on the summit and a self portrait of the two of us on the summit. Not really many other pics taken.
After getting back to camp we waited out a storm, which gave us some awesome down time to reminisce and talk about the area, since we were leaving first thing in the morning. It didn’t hurt having the sun shine through; illuminating the cirque unlike any other day we were there. We ate dinner killed a few more mosquitoes and went to be, totally giddy from the weeks events. We woke up early, said some goodbyes to another couple and high tailed it out of there. The hike out went pretty quickly although I was hating my backpack compared to my climbing pack by the end of it.
We cruised out of there and decided to make a go for Mizzoula that day. We made a huge mistake, not stopping close by for some food. Just be warned that if you are driving through the middle of Idaho on a Sunday afternoon (and maybe any other day of the week), make sure yo start with a full tank of gas and some good, quality food…. Especially if you’ve just come out from a 5 day camping trip!
Well, we made it to Mizzoula, hung with Lucas’ parents, saw some friends, did the brewery tour, and finally returned to Seattle to prepare for the next extravaganza.
Having a full day of rest we decided on a nice scramble in Overhanging Tower (OT) and then an attempt at Sharks Nose. We hiked up to Wolf’s Head, OT col went around to the N and then West of OT for a very nice, easy ascent. Shown is OT from Shark's nose with some mocking clouds just over top. The trippiest part was being on the summit and knowing that you were on a … well … overhanging piece of rock with nothing below what you are standing on, easily seen from the pic. We got some nice picks of wolf’s head, reminisced about that awesome climb and the bivvy, and had a nice break. Shown is a summit shot with Bollinger behind Lucas and me.
We then went back down the West side and made our way around to the col between OT and Shark’s Nose (shown right). We dropped the packs and started up the route that was loosely described by Kelsey’s guide. There was a description of a cave mid route, but damned if we never saw a cave. But as the climb went, we were 1 or two pitches behind another group. I led the first pitch up the middle class four gully. Lucas took the second lead which was some nice, but easy lower class five. I continued and, in retrospect, hit the crux of the route. While en route, I learned that the group ahead of us thought they were off route, it was getting significantly harder, and was bailing on account of weather rolling in. From there I belayed Lucas up to where I was at, conveniently next to a rap station. We assessed the situation and decided to bail because of weather and not wanting to get over our heads on another route as Kelsey wrote that “a few old pitons can entice a wary climber off route and onto a much more difficult 5.10 version.” In retrospect, we were probably on route, right next to the supposed cave and probably could have finished, but so be it. We ended up retracing our steps, caught up to the previous group and had a nice hike back with them. A noteworthy eerie experience we had on the way back was a nice snowfield we had crossed 8 hours earlier had turned into a giant tangled mess of avalanche debris.
We awoke Thursday to beautiful skies and set out to try the E ridge of wolf's head. This is indeed one of the 100 classic climbs of the world (I believe). The guidebook says that it's easy and straight forward if you don't mind walking on a two foot wide sidewalk with 1000 feet drops to either side. If not, and you try to protect it, it's a long day. We planned to jump off that ridge when we got there. ... But first was the approach.
We started off hiking close to the base of Pingora and beyond. We found a ramp that led up to the ridge ... class three, or maybe four, or maybe five? Things looked wet and we saw a pair of climbers possibly struggling up another route. We decided to pick a route that looked easier. Soon thereafter the other group caught up to us and our routes merged. Things would have been fine and dandy but the rock was dirty and wet, with increasing exposure. We finally decided to grab the rope and I led in my boots up the slipperiest/steepest parts. Afterward lucas said “You’re insane.” “Why?” Because you just led that in boots! Wtf, we should have put on rock shoes.” The rest of the approach was straight forward and soon we were descending the ridge to where the real fun started.
Lucas started leading up the ramp which was exactly as advertised: a steep “sidewalk” with drops on both sides. Due to the exposure we decided to protect the class four pitches – which indeed was a recipe for a very long day. Lucas led most of the ramp - he is pictured on the first lead with the other partners in the crack just above him - and we took a short break to study the route descriptions that we had. On the ridge there are 5 towers, the last of which is the true summit. Pictured is me approaching the first tower on a nice shelf. The best description was a drawing from Steph’s trip report. You have to go in front of, behind, and through different towers, but the key is figuring out which tower is which up close. Most of these pitches are mostly rising and descending exposed traverses. Not knowing if we had gone around the first tower yet, I found a crack that led on the backside to a blind corner. When I got to the corner and looked around there was absolutely nothing and I almost crapped my pants – but at least we knew where the route needed to go. I back climbed, cleaning my pro on the way and led down to what we figured now was the first tower and traversed in front of it (in front = cirque lake side). Lucas led the next pitch which included a fun move up a boulder wedged between the two towers and then traversing between tower 1 and 2 through the “squeeze box.” I heard some moaning and bitching but couldn’t see the route, or Lucas. I followed with the pack and realized what the bitch and moan was about. Even with my small frame, it was a tight squeeze through the squeeze box –go figure. Add in the pack on my back and I thought I was going to get stuck and/or have to ditch the pack behind. Not fun when you are slightly claustrophobic like me – but I still made it. So I took the next lead which steph calls the piton pitch. I think this should be a hand traverse but I led it as a foot traverse using the piton as aid and leaving the pitch very much run out. I guess I wasn’t comfortable with the exposure and I was just trying to get through. After this pitch I realized that 1) we had to power through it and get over the summit because there was no turning back, and 2) daylight was waning and we couldn’t lollygag and worry about the exposure. So in other words, just deal with it. The human mind works in a weird way and after that I was totally comfortable with the exposure and route. Details here get a little fuzzy, but I think that I led most of the rest of the climb to save time. We traversed the smallish third tower via a hand crack, passed between the third and fourth tower to the front, and trended down via a hand and foot traverse to the base of the fifth tower – the summit block. These last two pitches were very fun now that I had “coped” with the situation. The rock was nice and the cracks were perfect sizes. After this last traverse two more pitches up class four-ish rock led to the summit. ….right at sundown.
We spent the obligatory 5 minutes at the summit for 1 or 2 pics and tried to figure a plan now that we were without light. Shown is a self portrait on the summit along with the summit sunset. We couldn’t stay the night on the summit so we rapped once to a ledge. I found another rap station so I egged lucas on and we rapped one more time to another nice ledge. It looked like we would have to up climb a sketchy little section to get back to the front for the next rap. Continuing down the backside has also been described but we didn’t know to where and couldn’t find a rap sling. So we decided to stay put on the comfy ledge and spend the night. We cleared out some room on the ledge, put everything we could under us, grabbed the space blanket from the first aid kit. We “slept” under the space blanket using the ropes to wait it down and for added warmth. Not the most pleasant night but what were we gonna do?
The next morning in the light we climbed up to the rap sling and finished rapping down a snowy gully. This was miserable with rocks falling all over the place, ropes getting hung on rocks and such. But we finally arrived at the base of the gully to pack up the rope and hike to camp. In retrospect, it would have been worth finding the other rap slings – or setting our own since we ended up doing that in the gully - descending to Overhanging tower:wolf’s head col, and going from there.
We arrived in camp at about 10:00 and said hello to the other climbers (who got back to camp at 1:00 themselves) that knew we were up there. We crashed in the tent to take a nap and then decided this would be a rest day.
This was by far my favorite climb of the trip. I could have done without the unplanned bivvy, but the combination of the approach (actually I could have done without that too), the interesting rock and route, the relatively easy climbing with the immense exposure, was great. Maybe that is why it has such a great reputation – and it didn’t disappoint.
We decided to do Pingora our first full day in the cirque - arguably the quintessential summit in the area. We went for the S buttress. We got up early not knowing what our speed would be nor whether T-storms would approach. We only met two other groups on the mountain - one passing us on an adjacent route, and one climbing late in the day. To the right, Lucas is "excited" to be at the base of the climb. So from there, L and I traded leading pitches and it turned out to be very pleasant and fun climb, even if it was a bit slow. On the left, me leading one of the pitches.
Upon summiting, the weather was getting a little dicey and kind of weirded us out. We quickly took our camaras out to snap a few summit pics, but they started humming (like snow on your television) - I am guessing from all of the electricity in the air???? So we scurried off the summit to to avoid the putative lightning and stared rapelling. After two rapels the sun came out and we basked in the warmth on a little ledge and had some lunch...
This pic from the summit shows tomorrow's objective - Wolf's Head, and the E ridge route (knife ridge) that we will take.
So the day after Kari's wedding Lucas flew into Denver to meet me. We had Indian food with my fam, said goodbyes to the fam, went shopping, and got everything packed for an early start. Packing was no small feat - four kegs, 200 plus pounds of grain, climbing gear, and everything else in a golf. About 8 or 9 hours driving time and we were at the trailhead. On the way we stopped at Bitter Creek Brewery in downtown Rock Springs, WY for some good beer and food. We decided to have them cook up an extra deli sandwhich and some fries for that evening. We arrived at the TH at about 5 or so and decided that it would be adventageos to hike in as far as possible. Set up camp half way to big sandy lake and found a decent camp spot. French fries on a camping trip was a welcomed first - a new tradition might have been born. Pictured is me and my absurly huge backpack entering the wilderness area.
In the morning we continued up to Big Sandy Lake and up to Jackass pass. We deviated and went over the climbers pass that saved sufficient elevation gain/loss and distance. As we approached we could see Pingora, but the views from the pass were incredible. Pictured just below is the cirque how we entered. Pingora just left of center with the rest of the cirque around. We hiked in, dropped out packs and found the spot that we'd call home for the next few nights. We even had refrigeration right next to us, although by the end of the trip the refrigerating snow was down to a patch or two.
So while we set up camp, we discovered what would be the most annoying thing for the trip. The mosquitos. We doused ourselves with three different types of carcinogenic goop, but still the mosquitos swarmed us. We considered it to be some motivation to get our asses in gear and get out climbing. Weather was wonderful so we decided to get out and hike but not try anything technical. We ran away from the mosquitos towards Skunk's nob which turned out to be our first "summit. " I have to quote the guide book describing this a popular summit because "any kid can walk up it." We rested, were eaten by mosquitos, and continued. Below is a pic from the knoll of Pingora ... and me, in the bottom left.
We climbed up to Texas Pass and then up Camel's Hump, pictured below right. We meant to do an easy scramble but we started up some very low class five stuff from Texas pass, but soon figured a way out and into class 3/4. A pleasant scramble up to a slightly more prestigious summit. We chilled at the summit for a bit, took a few pics (shown on the left) and headed back to camp. We were soon met by the mosquitoes and retreated back into the tent for refuge.
OK, this is the start to the crazy part of my summer. Crazy in a good way, but crazy nonetheless. I had been gunning to drive to my sister's in Boulder CO and bring beer for her wedding. I had spent many of the previous weekends brewing four batches to hand deliver for her wedding. Well, it was only fitting that on the 12th of July, Mark and Alison (friends from my homebrew club) were having a homebrew meeting at their place. They have a place in the country that has always sounded spectacular, but i have always found an excuse not to go. Well, I went up there and had a grand old time and brought the wedding saison for taste. It received high marks (A good omen I must say) and 6 months later I would taste the exact same recipe from a fellow homebrewer because he wanted to brew it. It was a great start to the more than a month that i would be off work and "on vacation".
Packed the car up Sunday, trying not to forget anything I might need for the ensuing adventures and took off at about 7 pm (!!!) on the way to Boulder county. Slept in E WA and was on the road again before 5am, arriving in Yellowstone by evening. Saw the geysers etc. and I talked to a dude about day hike suggestions. Hearing that Yellowstone at this time of year can have "crowd issues" I told him I wanted to get away from people and wanted to do something 'strenuous.' At 5 the following morning I started out on the hike. If what I was doing was strenuous, I hate to see the average day hiker in Yellowstone! It was a nice, "relaxing" hike - I thin kI climbed a total of 300 feet. The fun part was that I got lost. Evidently, the strenuous part was to send me on an abandoned trail 3 miles in that was "obvious." Well, not so much, so I hiked the normal trail for many miles and the backtracked to find the vacant path to the little quaint lake. All in all a nice hike, nice exercise - I think it ended up being 12 or 14 miles - on the road to Longmont. Pictured is the major trail I took, early enough to avoid any crowds. ... Oh and very few rests because of the mosquitos. Damn they were bad. Since I got hiking early, I got out early and headed to the Grand Tetons and quickly decided that this was more my speed. I found a free camp and figured out a day hike for Tuesday. Not a bad free camp with the mountains in the background and right on the Snake River (pic on right).
4 AM I was out of camp driving to the hike with oats in hand. Hiked (actually more like trail ran) up to the base of the Grand Teton, salivating the whole way because I just wanted to climb it. The grand teton appears to rise up from nowhere and they we just screaming to be climbed.... maybe next trip down there with lucas. Alas the hike up to Amphitheatre was gorgeous in everyway. Pics of me at the lake and some flowers on the climb. I had some second breakfast there, hiked randomly for a bit at the end of the trail and then decided that making such good time I could make it to Longmont in the evening.... and so I did. As I was hiking down it was like a pilgrimage going up ! I said high to the first people I passed but I soon became horse. The amuzing part was that I met some pretty fit dudes with ENORMOUS packs. I asked them if they were climbing... "yes." What? ... "The Grand Teton, duh." So I wished them luck and proceeded on my way with a funny feeling of stupidity for an unknown reason. After passing the rest of the ant-line up realizing that the discourteous, inexperienced folks were likely guided, in part, by the dudes I wished luck to. Well, good luck climbing this mountain for the 259th time ... you'll need it! Well, at least I was heading down, and them up.... By 10 AM I was heading out of the Grand Tetons, following the WIND RIVER (!!!), destination Longmont.
Panorama from Colchuck lake. Aasgard pass : Dragontail Peak (8840') : Colchuck glacier : Colchuck Peak (8705'). (Editor's note: wow, colchuck looks dwarfed compared to dragontail at this angle.) Lucas and I had some celebrating to do. After long weeks for both of us, we had a few highlights. I finished teaching my first class (Admittedly it was team taught with my boss but she gave me flexibility in organization and doing most of the teaching; we'll have to wait to see what the students thought) and Lucas had his last few lab meeting before he moves on to bigger (and better?) things. For weather concerns, we picked something pretty far east and agreed on Colchuck Peak. It's a pretty massive mountain and I've always been intrigued by Mark's "3000' glissade" stories. What better than doing the 3000' on skis. The plan was to make camp Fri afternoon, ski Saturday (Colchuck and others things?), maybe get a run in on Sunday, Ski out to the car Sun late morning, weather permitting of course. After my last class on Friday AM, I came home and packed everything into the car. After his lab meeting Lucas packed his crap as fast as possible and we were on our way, although not as early as ideal. Leaving the car at about 7:00 we had to boot up the road (no access because of snow) about 1 mile to the TH and then another mile or two because the snow was only patchy. We finally started skinning and made decent time until it got dark and we lost the skin tracks we were following. We mustered on and soon (i.e. 10:30) were at Colchuck lake for camp.
It was one before we got to sleep so we had a casual morning and headed up the Colchuck glacier. Clouds came and went, but by the time we made it atop the glacier, we were greeted with biting winds and it soon became socked in. We booted to the summit (left photo) and then returned to our skis. We got to ski 2500' from there - strait back to camp on soft and heavy snow, which made for good skiing (Lucas eating it up on the right). With the weather deteriorating, we aborted the plan for additional runs and an extra night at camp. We had a couple celebratory PBRs for the summit, our time out, and our nice run, and then headed out.
The ski/boot out was the worst part. All gear was soaked (i.e. lots of extra weight) and we had full packs. Trying to navigate through the terrain was a lesson in survival skiing. I finally gave up about .75 miles from the TH and put the skis on my back.
Sunday was the day to go out. Not only was it supposed to have the best weather for the weekend there was an omen. On Saturday, I went to buy ski poles at a great local shop up the street, but it was closed. there was a sign (scribbles on paper is a better way to describe it) that said that they were closed due to "unavoidable circumstances." Below that it read: "You should be out skiing anyway." Together I understood that to mean, "go away stupid! Take advantage of the snow, we are!" Good advice. My 'bent in all direction poles' still remain basket-less. c'est la vie. So we were off to ski on Sunday. I just went along with whatever lucas wanted to do since I didn't think that I could convince him to seriously attempt Shuksan in these conditions. So off to Crystal we were.
4 am alarm (aka, cussing after a night of drinking). 5 am departure. 7 am skiing at the deserted Crystal ski area. It was warm and the snow already soft and wet. We skinned up and had a second breakfast on a table outside of the lodge on top of the mountain. We made an upward traverse of the headwall under the high campbell chair and gained the ridge. Past the throne (1) we ended up on top of Silver King (2), which would be our high point for the tour (Right, me pic'd on the throne with silver king in background). We rested with an early first lunch and prepped for our first decent. We headed away from the ski area down into the crystal lake basin. The snow was soft and wet, after all, it is the spring. The decent was great, with soft snow through some nice, open glades.
At the bottom of the descent (3) we had a brief second lunch and schemed our plan. Unfortunately, neither of us had been to the area. I wanted to get around to the opposite side of crystal peak to try to find better conditions. We found a ledge system to try to go around, and the ledge system quickly cliffed out. We retreated as fast as we could. Our second illadvised plan involved taking a crazy line to try to gain the next ridge en route to Crystal Peak and we eventually arrived at the ridge (red dot). There was definitely a better way (purple dot), but that would have involved backtracking! After getting on the ridge and being able to breathe again we made the easy ascent up to Crystal peak (4; site of panorama). The clouds were thinning and Rainier was coming out. The day was getting better.
From here, we followed the ridge to two peaks (5, unnamed?; 6, Chinook; both pic'd on right, above from our decent into the basin). We backtracked a tad on the ridge, continued, and met up with other skin tracks that made the much more logical line to the ridge. After an 'easy' boot up class three rock (not as easy in AT/ski boots) to the true summit of the unnamed peak, we just followed the ridgeline to chinook peak (Lucas pic'd in bad lighting with Rainier). Our route was 'doable', but traversing to the SE face around the rock outcropping would have allowed a straight shot up a snowfield. We rested atop chinook peak a long while since we were done climbing and the weather/scenery was spectacular. Both of us waterless, we melted some snow in the sunshine. We wanted ski the wall to crystal lake but couldn't find a way. So we we skied down NE to hit skin tracks on the backside of the ridge, which led us to sourdough pass (7) and back out to the ski area (8). A final decent down silver basin and we were back at the car. Per the broken altimeter: 5000' gain, unknown mileage. Great skiing, great day.
A short synopsis of the skiing in the past 3 months. I've skied a total of two day in this millennium before this year and it shows. But it's an awesome time out in the back country.
Ian had the weekend off to go celebrate his birthday and wanted to do something "big." We decided to attempt Shuksan via the White Salmon glacier. Late Friday afternoon Lucas and I loaded up the car and headed to Ian's. We made our introductions (I hadn't met Ian), loaded the car and were on our way. We arrived at the Mt Baker parking lot after they had closed the gate so we were resigned to the upper lot and it was there that we set up camp .... in the lot. After a 10 course meal, some beers, a birthday shot of whiskey, and a b-day piece of cake, we headed off for some shut eye. We woke up to the sounds of the cats taking off onto the ski hill and then dinked around packing up camp, giving way to a late start.
We took off from the upper lot, why we didn't just drive to the lower lot and park outside the gate, I don't know. Headed over to the white salmon glacier with a view of the objective in front of us. We started climbing (red) up the white salmon. We actually followed some skin tracks up a knoll to gain the white salmon a bit higher. In hind sight we should have gotten on the glacier below, more or less the same was we actually came down (green). After a rest on top of the knoll, we continuesd up and were almost immediately hit by the sun (there wasn't a cloud in the sky!). With conditions changing and a turnaround deadline looming, we made it up to the top of a little feature, had some lunch and started the descent before the sun baked the snow some more.
The skiing on the first part was just pure heaven. The snow was wind loaded 'powder,' up to a few feet deep. The pic (right) shows a group of 5 just to the right of our lunch spot with our tracks in the powder descending to the left. Just pure enjoyment. At the bottom of the glacier, the snow turned into avy debis that was covered by easily broken crusty crap. After struggling through this terrain we ended on the bottom of nice sun-softened snow, great spring skiing.
Even with the short-ish day it was beautiful terrain and skiing. I hadn't expected to summit with the unknown conditions, route, and our timing, but it was my 4th time on the mountain, all of which ended with a 'premature' turnaround. Hopefully in the next few weeks (or months?) I'll have a post with a picture taken from the summit! ... but what a beautiful day and incredible skiing!
Finally got back into the snow on the 5th. Lucas and I were going to do a longer overnighter .... something like an overnighter on Shuksan, but instead we hung out late Friday drinking beer and discussing life issues. After long weeks for both of us we decided to sleep in and go from there. So I woke up late, cooked a decent breakfast, and had a lazy morning. Finally we decided to go for a close overnighter and after packing and getting organized we were at the alpental parking lot at the bright and early time of 1:00 pm. We planned to go to someplace around snow lake for our little overnight excursion. took the normal route - climb up to ridge, ski down to snow lake. Very nice! It had recently snowed and there was 4 inches of powder. We crossed snow lake and climbed to gem lake and decided to camp there. We climbed to a knoll to make sure we were out of any avy danger (it was supposed to snow some more). Of course this was annoying because the few times we left we skied down 50 feet on our skins and when we returned to camp we had to redon the skins and climb about 50 feet. We decided it was a fine trade off to make sure we wouldn't be buried by snow in the middle of the night.
Since neither one of us have built a snow cave we decided that it would be advantageous to try to make one, for future reference if we ever get into dire straights. 3 hours later, we were soaked and exhausted, but had a roomie cave with a slanted floor and a door that was a little too high. We called it good, and set out to get one short run in since we really hadn't done any skiing. We climbed to another knoll, that we named 7 o'clock knoll (it was 7:00 when we started climbing with light fading fast; chair peak pictured from the knoll in the fading light). Spectacular powder and a great run. Back at camp we had some dinner, whiskey, and called it a night... a very cold night since the cave was a tad spacious and the door let in a lot of cold air.
The next day we climbed Wright mountain. Pictured below is lucas arriving at the summit with the cave on the knoll just out of the picture to the right. We skied down into the drainage NW towards wildcat lake. With the extra 3-6 inches of snow while we slept, it was again superb. It was a great run (pretty long for the area) we had lunch on a nice opening, after which started up back to the ridge where we had lunch on our previous excursion out to this area. We climbed 7:00 knoll again because it was so much fun the previous evening and was right on our way back to camp. By this time there was a lot of accumulation and we were causing a lot of slabs to slide which sketched us out a tad. We packed up camp and cautiously descended to snow lake and then out to alpental. All in all, a successful outing with a few great runs, a first attempt at a snow cave, and a relaxed schedule.
So Saturday was a friend's b-day. The plan was to go to Hyak and have a decent nordic ski. We headed up with a late start and got some exercise in. It was a pretty chill day with beatiful skies. after some skiing around, we headed out to the yurt and arrived at about 3 in the afternoon. Soon people just started showing up with things big foot had stashed away for us. Part of the group and the "stash" pictured. Weather was warm, baking the snow and as we headed back it was already getting severely crusted over. It was a great day and a low key x-country ski - hopefully the birthday boy thought so too! I think that I totally suck at x-country skiing because I was exhausted on the ride back to Seattle in the evening, even moreso than climbing with a pack on. Back in Seattle the group met at a local brewpub and then Leny's, a local dive, to celebrate in another style.
So after 3 hours of sleep owing to daylight savings time, I was getting ready for a short bc excursion with Lucas. We were on our way early enough and were going skinning away from the alpental lot (actually me skinning and L taking his snowboard for a walk). We just decided to climb up the ridge to snow lake and go from there - needed to be a short day. It was great weather, but the snow left something to be desired. Hard crust early on. On the way to snow basin I got a quick shot of Chair peak and you can see the NE buttress route - 'hourglass' of snow heading straight up to the summit and the SE gully, the skinny snow filled gully just to the left of the large summit block, both of which we did last winter. After hitting the ridge, we headed into the snow lake basin and skied across the lake. On the left you can see L pushing taking his little pet for a walk across Snow lake. We then decided to climb the ridge on the other side because it looked "easy enough" and fun to ski. It was. We climbed up to the ridge and had a nice lunch on the ridgeline (Lucas pictured) and just skied back to lake (down to the right from pic). If we had to do it again we would have climbed closer to the peak behind L. It looked like a better climb and even better descent. Regardless, this was the best snow we found since I imagine it was protected from the sun and wasn't pure crust or pure sludge. afterwards we just retraced our steps and by the time we were skiing to source lake the sun had cooked the snow so we were skiing through the typical NW concrete. Back to the car by 1:45, early enough to dehydrate some more at rogue and then play soccer. With a lack of "drama" the past few times out, hopefully we've graduated so I can bring you some bigger and better TRs.... per my altimeter 2900' gain, 2850' loss, a good half day.
So Lucas and I decided a short, fun outing was best because of his need to defend .... well.... next Thursday! Well, we decided on skiing McClellan Butte. 5:00 came and I was rip roaring ... we needed an early start to get back for "work." So we parked just off the interstate and headed out. We had a "description" of what we wanted to do but the gist was: 1) drive I90. 2) get off at McClennan Butte exit. 3) Park at trail head. 4) climb with the NW shoulder as your destination. 5) ski down. 6) drink beer back close to Seattle. Well, I made (6) up, but it seemed fitting. At the trailhead, disoriented, we met some guys that pointed us in the right direction and in turn we gave them some tracks to get through the mid part of the mountain (they were post holing with boots the whole way) So we headed up, me skinning on the skis (pic left) and lucas on snowshoes packing in his snowboard (bindings still in the shop; pic right). I didn't envy him. Per our descriptive guide, we accidentally started climbing a little too early. To our defense we wanted to try to hit the summit, whereas the NW route cliffs out 300 feet below the summit. mushy, wet condition turned into some newly felled powder on top of a crusty base. This soon turned into 6 inches and then 18 inches of powder! We got about 800 feet from the summit and things got pretty steep and sketchy for me and my skins. We tried to stay in the glades and boot it but with no pro and turnaround time coming we decided to dig a platform in the steep slope for a late lunch and turnaround (Pic from platform on left). While we wanted the summit, it was just time to hit the slopes that we had climbed. There was no sense tempting fate with the powder that lay below us. After lunch Lucas started down on his snowboard ... it sounded like he was relieved to have it of his back. The first few pitches were tough, being steep and "warm ups" for both of us. but below them was pure powder. We had about 1500 feet of knee (+) deep powder to ski before hitting the wet slush through which we would have to navigate. All the way down both lucas and I were giddy giddy giddy. Even though we were cursing the hike up and what lay in front of us (in terms of the crap out), we both agreed that the fresh, untouched powder was worth it and so much more. Cursing the wet snow and wet snow bombs, we eventually made it back to the car exhausted... but loving every second of it. We twisted each other's arms to end up at Rogue Issaquah. We had a beer and were so hungary added some appetizers. 2 beers later we were cruising back to seattle .... lucas to work (L, how much did you accomplish?) and me to grab my stuff for a top division soccer game. It's a good thing I saved all that energy, yeah.... Thinking back on it, that was the best snow of the year, maybe ever. It was only one trip down but it was worth the energy. On the way back I almost drove off I90 looking at our lines ... and scheming on all the other possible lines out there.........
een attempts at Shuksan have been weathered out. I've gotten up to the sulphide 3 times and have had to turn around in misery because of weather twice ... and the third time, well, you can read about it here. We wont mention the even less successful trips. So with the summer winding down after all of the other trips, I convinced Keith and Alison to make a go of it - both of them newbies to alpine stuff, but both wanted see what all the fuss was about. We decided to go Fri/Sat to eliminate possible highways up on the sulphide and summit pyramid even though weather was a tad suboptimal. Also decided on the sulphide because of group experience and my familiarity with the route.
at the foot of the sulphide at sundown. It was the first reasonable place to camp, although we'd soon find out that on rock fingers about 10 minutes away down 400 ft there is camping with toilets. ... but what's the fun of that, I mean, no blue bags. We dug two platforms and got stuff ready for the morning and got some shut eye.
r. At one point we were in the clouds and I beared a little too far E and we went right past the summit pyramid into a meandering maze of giant crevasses. I really just wanted to give the two newbies some excitement and up close encounters with the fun creatures and immunize them a little bit. We went back NW and got back on track to the summit pyramid. Pictured is Keith and Alison back on track above the clouds, with gorgeous Baker behind. ... and Baker was the only view we had this trip.
