Lassen / Shasta Conditions Anyone?

Well - that sucked. Don't get me wrong, we had a great time.
Probably too much of a great time...
Thankfully, it was a cool day.

Went with a friend of mine who is in horrible shape.
And a horrible skier...
We spent the night at the last switch back before the Brewer Creek TH.
Right where the road gets close to Gravel Creek.
We spent Monday night drinking too much.

Woke up at 6am - doh!
Drove up to the TH and proceeded to get our jib on - sorta...
Was hiking by 7:30. We hiked up the climbers trail at the first creek up the trail.
Took the snow drifts up and to the right.
Only got up to 10,000'.

The snow was still good down low.
The snow surface actually improved as we descended.
The last pitch was the best.
The steepness kept the snow from getting too much direct sun.
Resulting in less sun cups.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW5TSPihr20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYeFZvNsfD8

Haha! Good times!

Will have to go again to redeem myself!

thanks for the beta! Sun cups looks better than I anticipated. Surprised you went Brewer instead of Northgate. I wonder how the Chicago is holding up, and if the skiing is any decent on the shoulders around the Bolam.

We got a view of the Chicago Glacier. The bergschrund is just opening up.
With the full moon next week, I think I'll head back up.
I really like the length of the ski run coming back down from the Chicago/Hotlum area across those snow slopes.
It's a full mile of skiing back to the Brewer Creek area
in those two videos I posted, below 10,000'.

I don't like the North Gate TH 'cause the skiing ends too soon.
The best reason to hit up the North Gate TH is to ski the North Gate Chutes.
I love climbing up that stuff and skiing back down.

video from last year - climbing the North Gate Chutes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOkNL_wzuLw

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Originally Posted by SchralphMacchio

Any weekend reports?

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Yeah, Ashland was awesome!! :)

(seriously, Time Warp was the best I've ever ridden it... but I'd probably avoid that area this weekend as it's gonna be crazy with the endubro race happening)


Here are some pics of Shasta from Sunday, from the wrong side :)

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...D-IMG_8010.jpg

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...D-IMG_8012.jpg

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...D-IMG_8019.jpg

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...D-IMG_8021.jpg


Didn't end up heading out there to ride... but did get up on Hood last week. Oops sorry wrong thread :)

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u..._annotated.jpg

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...d/Hood%201.jpg

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Originally Posted by jimw

http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u...d/Hood%201.jpg

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Really cool shot!

damn you and your July turns Jdub

More on that Hood descent here. Sorry for the interruption, back to your regularly scheduled Shasta talk! :)

http://skatevideomagazine.com/viva-l...n-1-episode-1/

always fun the peeps you might run into skiing shasta/lassen on memorial day weekend or thereabouts...

Report from Sunday 7/17:
Cost of admission for skiing very high on Shasta right now.
From 13500 to 11K I'd say the skiing ranges from good to "passable" depending on aspect. Upper Wintun and Hotlum proper had decent looking snow - didn't get too good a look at upper Bolam but it looked decently skiable.
Below 11K I'd say the skiing ranges from kind of acceptable to heinously awful, leaning mostly toward more of the latter. Just a really bad suncup year for late season there.
Lots of dirt walking and portages to get to continuous snow.

Hotlum glacier still has most crevasses fully covered except for those next to icefall. We went up there actually hoping for more crevasse action but there was just so much snow this season. Upper Hotlum showing fat bergschrunds for exploration.

Lassen West Face gully still somehow looking very fat from the highway, not sure how bad of a schwack from the summit TH parking area to get over to it, and not sure how badly suncupped.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iSbWI0UpvI

Pretty suncupped and runnelled out. The snow looked smooth above 12,000'
The last steep section above the end of the snow at 8500' was still smooth.

It was fun.
I should have headed across the Chicago Glacier.
The snow looked smoother over there, above the glacier.
Just a lot of rocks of the glacier.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fwv0AQy7xU

Whatsup guys, long time lurker but I rarely post. Just curious if anyone has gotten a good look at Lassen peak recently? I was thinking about making my way up there this weekend if there are still any skiable lines left? Went up July 6th and it was still great coverage on the NE

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Originally Posted by B.Gillis

Went up July 6th and it was still great coverage on the NE

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Wow, I was there a week+ before that (6/26) and I definitely would not have called the coverage on the NE side "great", and I'm sure it's way less now than it was then. Then again, when talking about the NE side I'm usually thinking of going all the way down to the devastated area lot (car shuttle), and that definitely wouldn't have been worth it back a few weeks ago. Maybe OK if you're just dropping the upper 1k or so and climbing back out...

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Originally Posted by SchralphMacchio

Lassen West Face gully still somehow looking very fat from the highway, not sure how bad of a schwack from the summit TH parking area to get over to it, and not sure how badly suncupped.

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When we were there on 6/26 (with Storn - his bday!), we rode that west face. It had decent coverage but I wouldn't say it was in great shape. Based on the elevation and reports of mega suncups on Shasta at elevations higher than the summit of Lassen, I can't imagine it would be good now. But someone should go and report back just to be sure. :)

So I can't figure out how to post pictures into this forum, either it's not letting me or I'm just way too technologically challenged. Sorry for being a noob, but I'll post up what I got when I figure it out.

Long story short I made my way up to Lassen Peak on 7/22. Left the car at 6AM and hit the summit just after 7:10. I guess in my previous post I should have clarified that I had never been to Lassen before 7/6 so for what I saw, considering it was July, I would say coverage looked great. Growing up in Mass all we see for snow after May is dirt covered plow piles. That being said I can only imagine how amazing it must be to ski all the way from the Peak to the Devastated area parking lot.

If you're picky about your snow conditions/quality then I'd definitely say stay away from Lassen but if you're like me and you don't really care then I'd say get after it. Snow went from good up top to bad in the mid section with lots of suncups turned to suncraters but I had fun picking around and weaving through the craters. As I got closer to the bottom and the pitch began to flatten out the snow was amazing, soft and corny with a few scattered suncups/rocks poking out. I followed the Lost Creek drainage down to where the snow finally ended and hiked out northeast from there, meeting up with 89 at the Hat Creek parking lot. I know it's frowned upon to go off trail but I found someone's tracks from sometime previously and followed those out pretty much the whole way. I guess it's not the first time someone has broken the "don't go off trail" rule but oh well.

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Good to go now ..

In order, view of the peak, top third, middle third, and bottom third followed by a gopro selfie for mom.

That's a great way to beat the heat.

Anyone think there's anything worth skiing at Shasta? Really want to get an August day in but don't wanna make the journey for crater sized sun cups

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Originally Posted by B.Gillis

Anyone think there's anything worth skiing at Shasta? Really want to get an August day in but don't wanna make the journey for crater sized sun cups

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HB was skiable last week...but you'd be on dirt for about 4 miles. The HW is probably do-able too. But, once again...many dirts.

Just depends how bad you want it and how much time you have.

Wonder how this AR event at the end of this week will affect Lassen/Shasta?

I bet Shasta gets crushed above 9k. Helen Lake forecast looks gooooooodddddddd http://shastaavalanche.org/weather/f...rent-helenlake

As of 10/9:
http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...2da2e5bc0b.jpg

Holy shit, the 7-day QPF for the entire coast from Eureka to Vancouver is insane.

Yabba dabba doobie it's on. Up to 81 inches predicted for Helen (10,400) through Sat night.

ThursdaySnow. High near 36. Windy, with a southwest wind 55 to 65 mph increasing to 70 to 80 mph. Winds could gust as high as 115 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 1 to 3 inches possible.
Thursday NightSnow. The snow could be heavy at times. Low around 23. Windy, with a southwest wind 75 to 85 mph increasing to 90 to 100 mph. Winds could gust as high as 115 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 16 to 22 inches possible.
FridaySnow before noon, then snow showers after noon. The snow could be heavy at times. High near 23. Windy, with a southwest wind 60 to 70 mph decreasing to 44 to 54 mph in the afternoon. Winds could gust as high as 105 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 8 to 12 inches possible.
Friday NightSnow showers before midnight, then snow after midnight. Low around 23. Windy, with a southwest wind 55 to 60 mph decreasing to 47 to 52 mph after midnight. Winds could gust as high as 90 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New snow accumulation of 4 to 8 inches possible.
SaturdaySnow. The snow could be heavy at times. High near 29. Windy. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 10 to 14 inches possible.
Saturday NightSnow. The snow could be heavy at times. Low around 23. Windy. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 16 to 22 inches possible.
SundaySnow showers. Cloudy, with a high near 24. Windy.
Sunday NightSnow showers. Cloudy, with a low around 20. Windy.
MondaySnow showers likely. Cloudy, with a high near 21. Windy.
Monday NightSnow likely. Cloudy, with a low around 21. Windy.
TuesdayA chance of snow showers. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 31. Windy.

That. is. beautiful. Shasta Lake should be getting a topper from this as well. Tempted to make a Shasta mission next Tuesday or Wednesday to get a taste of winter.

Wow those are some big numbers! And they get bigger and bigger as you go up in elevation too!

I'm tempted to try to make a trip next weekend. My limited knowledge of Shasta is that most of the higher elevation terrain is steep and rocky when not covered in snow. Is there anything worth skiing there (or at Lassen) that wouldn't absolutely destroy me and my skis after a big dump over no base?

Any field/photo/webcam updates? Looks like this part of the state got smashed.

I've been looking at the lassen webcams all weekend and all day today but the clouds haven't scattered from the peak yet. As for shasta I have no idea ... I did some instagram creeping and found this from Lassen today at 6700 https://www.instagram.com/p/BLrXNhuB...-by=ross.girl_

I'm tempted to head up on Wednesday since it can't be any worse than the shit I skied on Lassen Peak in july

Nice. If they've plowed the road through the park there will be feet upon feet of snow up there. Or they'll just shut the road...

When I checked earlier it said the road was temporarily closed so I'm hoping they open it up tomorrow but we'll see

Looks like the road is still temporarily closed. Send us some stoke if you get out there B. Gillis!

OHHHH YEAH Check out the Shasta Cam !! Woot Woot

https://www.snowcrest.net/camera/highres.php

The cam looks good; the newly-updated http://shastaavalanche.org page not so much:

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We have just received up to a foot of new snow (10/17/16) on the mountain in the recent days. This doesn't mean climbing or skiing conditions are good, but the mountain is looking quite nice with her wintery coat...not to mention getting all the powder hounds stoked for winter!

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I guess they don't specifically say skiing is BAD, but I'm not squaring the "up to a foot of new snow" with the huge forecasts (at least at elevation), unless it all blew away. Probably thin down low though.

I bet mountain biking conditions are gonna be all-time this weekend though. :)

Someone should go and report back!

Shasta is fully pasted and fully on. https://www.snowcrest.net/camera/

Man...I'm really starting to feel an awful fever...and I'm weak and coughing hack hack hack. Probably should just stay home from work tomorrow....

Driving by on I5. Looking sexy

http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...9ec3bb32ed.jpg
http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/2016...af84a84764.jpg

http://shastaguides.com/blog/

5-7' at Helen Lake and snow cover looking good even down at 8000ft. Looks like I'm going to have to head to Shasta this weekend!

Yup, was pretty good on 10.18 and today should be fun too and then maybe a corn cycle for the weekend.
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^ Nice, man!

Fkna. Amazed none of my pnw brethren made the 12hr drive. Looks totally worth it to me

Nice handle lee
Good stuff

And so the jones begins......

Skiing right to the car at bunny
Corn cycling already and mostly smooth. Ne side looks sick from 89. Someone go check it out n report if road is in good shape after storm.
Good seein ya j!