Kendall Peak Feb 18th, 2008

So Lucas and I wanted to try the back country again, but this time we were goign to use the skis and try to get some more distance and do some climbing as well. The plan was to try to make Thompson and maybe do another peak in the Snoqualmie area (Red or Kendall?). So off we were at 6:00. Unfortunately the day did not turn out as planned and we just ended up climbing Kendall peak instead of Mt Thompson. In fact, it was one of those stupid days where in the end you are just glad that your luck was just not bad enough that you didn't lose anything and ended the day as healthy as you started. Some of this was user induced and some was just bad luck.

So we started up the basin and made good time until the climbing started. By this time I had tried to take some pics but my camera was dead and I was too lazy to get any spare batteries out. Unlike two days ago where the snow was pretty soft, there was a frozen crust with about an inch of surface hoar or fresh snow on top. This made for slippery conditions for us novices. So as we left Commonwealth Basin and started climbing the side of Kendall peak more or less following in the direction of the PCT things became difficult. Even more so, I had not stepped in correctly to the bindings and I kept stepping out of them on the steep slippery surface. With Lucas cruising ahead I kept stepping out and cursing the situation. In the end I took off the skis and booted up to a less steep area and actually passed him. I was thinking at this point we should have ditched the skis completely, but we were out there to get comfortable on them. Unfortunately there was more of the same, but undeterred I tried to skin again. At one point when I stepped out my ski started to free fall down the slope. Both of us thought the day was over, and so was the life of my ski. Booting down 100 feet I found the ski that hit a tree squarely stopping it from a 1000 foot (?) free fall. So I booted back up and we continued skinning, with me stepping out continuously. At least by now I had rigged my leashes so that I would lose my skis. But this made things difficult to put them back on after stepping out. So once when I was bending over messing with the boot all of a sudden I see my key drop from my pocket and watched my key start the free fall. GDI! The key stopped it's journey down the mountain side and after clipping in to the skis I skied down to it and gently sat down (going down hill with skins on is not an art I have perfected). So I righted myself and skinned over to the key only to find water from my bladder pouring out all over my leg. I guess when I went down the mouth piece to my bladder had come off and water was spewing all over me. So I put the end in my mouth, grabbed the key and started the futile search for the mouth piece. Luckily it was stuck in the snow (on the surface) right where I fell. So again i climbed back up to the tracks and continued skinning, stepping out, and cursing ad nauseum. Obviously with the going slower than expected, Thompson was out of the picture so we went up to a false summit on Kendall, booting the final short pitch. Here we finally got to enjoy the beautiful blueberry day and refueled and rested. Pictured is Lucas with Red Mountain in the back to the NW.


After lunch instead of climbing the summit proper (Shown with Rainier in the background) we decided to descend to the NW to scope out the terrain and other possible routes to Thompson. We got some turns in but the snow was still the rock hard crust littered with death cookies. In a very short time we had "skied" down into the basin and were slowly picking our way through the shallow forest and made it to the car all limbs intact and all gear attached to our bodies. We were both exhausted from a long tough day, with a little extra hardship. But in the end everything turned out fine and we'll obviously be smarted and better the next time we attempt something similar. It was however, a nice area to practice in with gorgeous skies all day long! So we ended up at the Rogue issaquah bantering about the idiocy of the day and the next safe practice area.

Also, in the end, I figured out the problem with the setup causing me to continually step out of the bindings and, for the love of god, i will never let it happen again.

Here is a pic from atop Kendall looking down into Commonwealth Basin (left). This would have been great to ski under the right conditions. And another (right) of Lucas booting off the false summit with his skis on his back.