Lassen / Shasta Conditions Anyone?

A couple friends and I skied the hotlum wintun route yesterday. Parking is still a little ways out (the trailhead proper is covered in two to three feet of snow still!) but the skiing is prime.

We parked at about 6300’ (could’ve gotten a little bit closer actually) and put skins on at 6900’, which was around an hour’s walk for us. The suncups on the flats are a bit larger than I expected, worse than when I last skied the HW in early July 2017. Not too bad yet though.

I stopped at 11,500’ and took a long siesta before skiing perfect corn at 10am. (The spring of feeling tired and out of shape continues.) Friends skied from the summit and 13,200’ respectively —both at noon — and said the snow was perfect from the very top and still good down lower. Great skiing for the three of us at our respective times down to about 9000’, at which point it was unpleasantly sticky and a matter of making hop turns through slushy suncups to get to our shoes. Tiring but fine. I think we were one of just three parties trying to summit on that side that day, though a bunch more people walked in to camp later that afternoon.

I’d definitely recommend skiing it now and not waiting for the trailhead to open. The extra walk is minimal effort.

For reference, highs and lows at the summit were forecast around 32 and winds were minimal. Highs felt like low 70s at the car and maybe high 40s at 3am.

We’re hoping to head back to the north side in mid-July if the skiing still sounds half decent at that point.

Oh, we also discovered that the mt Shasta market does Santa Maria-style barbecue Fridays and Saturdays with tri-tip, steaks, chickens and ribs. Delicious and inexpensive! The locals don’t seem overly enthused by a couple dirty guys woofing down grilled meat in the market’s parking lot though :)

There’s also a great taco truck in Corning on the way up the 5, so the eating portion of the trip far exceeded expectations. Wish I could’ve stayed longer than 24 hours.

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Originally Posted by emcee

anybody been to lassen lately? how's the cupping look?

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My daughter and I skied Lassen yesterday. Some texture on the lower angle flats area but fairy minimal and soft/easy to push around. The face itself was absolutely glorious rip roaring corn from the summit all the way to the flats. About 30-40 mins to snow. Let me know if you find my shoe up there. Biner clip fail!

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Gimpy - correct. Angels wings(my memory sux now :). Yeah, i see your point about doing a route that usually doesn't come into shape. this is one of the years to do it. let us know how it goes.
B. Gillis - cool TR and pics!

Jorion - Thanks for the Hotlum/wintoon Beta! yeah, we were there yesterday as well and did stuff from the south side. it only froze from about 9500 and above and starting to get suncups below 9000 or so. We had great corn at 9~am from 12.7 on an easterly (2-3 inches of corn, would have been bad had we skiied it at 10 or later), then great corn (1 inch really smooth) from 11 down to 9500 or so on a more W aspect. Total mush below that. Still pretty much ski/skin to bunny with a tiny bit of on/off. such warm temps, a pretty early start is key...

AKBruin - bummer that we didn't catch up for a beer. Same to you JimW (hope ya have a great day today).
Chill - great shot on Lassen w/shasta in the back (classic!). I'm envious of you/AK taking the kids out to the backcountry on fathers's day. Hopefully in a couple of years i'll have mine doing the same :)

Sweet, Chill Winston!

Mr. Hankey, sorry I missed you in the parking lot. I would have really enjoyed a beer. Also, I hope you do a TR on your impressive fix of Markham's binding!

Anyhow, as alluded above, I took my 12-year-old to Shasta this weekend. Here are my crappy iPhone photos.
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We parked about a quarter mile downhill from the trailhead because we wanted more vert (and because the parking lot was a junkshow).
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To my her credit, she did the whole thing in alpine boots and frame bindings because her feet are too small for tech boots.
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Thankfully, some cloud cover rolled in Saturday afternoon but never actually produced any rain or lightning on the mountain. Before that, it was pretty sweaty.
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Here's my super secret camp spot on the mountain. Don't tell anybody!
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I kept hearing mountaineers and skiers talking about ridiculously early starts. Against my better judgment, I decided to be conservative and leave camp at 5:30 a.m. with the goal of summitting around 11 a.m. In retrospect, we could have gotten another hour of sleep and had more than enough time.
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Taking ample breaks, we made it to the summit around 10 a.m. though. We chilled above Misery Hill for an hour so waiting for the snow to soften below red banks.
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We dropped just after 11, but I think noon would have been a better drop time.
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Still, below Red Banks, the snow was pretty good.
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This panel was particularly nice, delivering about 1,500' of near perfect corn. After packing up, we descended from Helen Lake around 12-ish. The snow below was heavy but fun until it was just heavy and wet.
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Sooooo rad dad+++

Leemurian or anyone have Diller road access beta please?


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Originally Posted by gimpy

Leemurian or anyone have Diller road access beta please?

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Gimpy, I believe JimW was planning on doing Diller today, you could PM him. Else I'm sure he's watchin' the thread... Jim?

AKBruin, super awesome kid stoke. 12! Can't believe a kid her age can climb that thing, let alone ski it... gotta get my own kids into shape :)

^^^ Will PM you more info later, but I think we got to about 6600 ft on the “road”. Above that there are trees down, and the manzanita is so thick it prolly wouldn’t be worth it. Speaking of which the road is more overgrown lower down than I remember. Bring a truck you don’t mind getting scratched up. Continuous snow at ~7300. I think it was about 30 minutes or so of hiking from the car before we started skinning. Good quality snow in there, minimal suncupping. Goes down lower than usual for this time of year. Entrance is still filled in.

Cool Jim. hope to see pics soon :)

Here's some pics from sunday 6/16. probably too many pics, but I got lazy and couldn't decide (sorry, f*cking burst mode takes too many pics to go through on my phone)....
Pano off of Sergents Ridge ~12.7k. (Casaval ridge on the other side, Trinity Chutes, gulch crowd, red banks, Miseryhill, Summit, Thumb rock..):
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Looking down from upper Sargents, “Thumbs down chutes":
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good corn (2-3 inches, not too deep at ~9:15 ish. would have been bad news if we hit it at 10am):
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Markham:
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Mrs. Jack Burton:
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mid chute:
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Left side chute, right before his binding broke(fully). Made a sound like "wiley coyote hitting the ground" followed by "my binding completely broke". more on that later...
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right side goes too, Mrs. JB:
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short climb back to lower Sargent's ridge... hundreds of people in the gulch, but this side of the mtn is a lonely place. not a single other track...
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M's Dynafit heel piece broke completely. Leaving him with no heel lock. Nothing Mrs. MacGyver and some Voile straps couldn't fix...
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We waited until ~11 ish to ski this more westerly (SW) face off of Sargents. Super smooth and great corn down to about 9500 or so. fix worked:
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looking back at lower sergeants ridge/shastarama point... this is the old ski bowl where the ski resort used to have lifts before an avy took them out and made them re-locate:
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the ski out around Green Butte was a bit mushy. The road was skiable to about ~1/4mile from bunny. not bad at all for this time of year... not sure if I'm gonna hit H/W this coming weekend or not. but if not it was a great season!
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sooooo......yer saying get my buddy to drive? hah!! thanx jw. we hope to b gunning for the tina north panel with diller in n out

fucking dynafit radical heelpieces. ive broken 3 of em in last 2 years. they will warranty replace them for free but major bummer when it happens. would really suck if it happened at a really dangery place.

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Originally Posted by gimpy

sooooo......yer saying get my buddy to drive? hah!! thanx jw. we hope to b gunning for the tina north panel with diller in n out

fucking dynafit radical heelpieces. ive broken 3 of em in last 2 years. they will warranty replace them for free but major bummer when it happens. would really suck if it happened at a really dangery place.

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That's why i went away from dynafit bindings, breakage and pre releases.

Salomon MTN is bomber, light and in hard carved groomer turns, no pre releases, where with ft12s i had a hematoma on my hip for 8 weeks.



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Great photos, Mr. Hankey! Looks like you scored.

I've broken two Plum toe pieces and two Dynafit heels. My frankensetup for the last few years on my main skis has thus been a Dynafit toe and Plum Guide heel. It's worked well for me. The Solomon tech bindings look pretty nifty though.

AKbruin, so impressed! You got a great kid, nice work.

gimpy, not gonna lie, the Diller road is a bitch. My move is to run my DRZ up to the trailhead. The sound of manzo ripping along the sides of your rig not comforting...better if your buddies...

still amazing conditions on nearly all aspects, pretty awesome season!

Daughter is something else AKbruin!

Terrific pics, everyone...

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Originally Posted by gimpy

sooooo......yer saying get my buddy to drive? hah!! thanx jw. we hope to b gunning for the tina north panel with diller in n out

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I'd rethink objectives...at least maybe a slightly different line than that all alluring north panel that we dropped. Snow sucked. We came to our sense while descending and stopped a little less than half way down. Plenty soft but not in a good way. Super bumpy and skied like shit. A bummer considering how long I've daydreamed about it. Angel Wings, while dirty, might have been better. That north panel might be better way over skiers left but I have no idea. I'm sure if jimw saw this he already pm'd you.

Fyi, once you see the first log just back up 200 feet and there's a good obvious spot to park in the trees.

Well shit, since I'm here:
Jimw in the human in 3 of 4 pics.
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So i got at bunny flat to find a spot to sleep in the car and... Can this be? Jim w in the parking lot.

Last time i saw him was on kettle peak, which we did together with Abe.

But he saved my day by filling my water bottle.

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Great time out there mr. hankey! Thanks for the idea on the straps for binding!

Great to see you guys AKbruin! Your daughter is killing it!

Tried to log on to change my weird numbered name but got throne a 500 general server error.

Got up on the east side of Shasta yesterday. I drove up the 97 thinking I was going to the Inconstance TH, but the snow looked pretty high up. So I kept driving on Military Pass Rd., past the turnoff to North Gate.
Drove around to Brewer Creek Rd. Got up to about 6700' and took road 42N67 towards the Gravel Creek TH. Snow patches on the road soon got deep, so I turned around and parked right at Gravel Creek.

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Woke up a bit late and headed up Gravel Creek. Got to the base of the Chicago Glacier. The snow was a bit mushy below 10,000' when I dropped in around 10:30, but was firmer when I went around the corner to more north facing.
The traffic on the 5 driving south was horrendous. Second time now getting caught in the long lines. 1 hour+ of stop and go getting through all the road construction!

Got a little trigger happy with the pics.
Video and pics are linked below in my signature.

thanx brooks!
plan b in action

Anyone ski down there this past weekend? Thoughts on whether or not it would be worth the drive from the Seattle area to ski this Friday/Saturday?

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Originally Posted by glademaster

Anyone ski down there this past weekend? Thoughts on whether or not it would be worth the drive from the Seattle area to ski this Friday/Saturday?

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Hit Shasta on Saturday, nice hard freeze and absolutely stellar corn the whole way down. Minimal sun cups, only on the flats on the way out. Did Avy gulch with the masses, and dropped in on the trinity chutes.

Lassen on Sunday, did the car shuttle. Ditto on the conditions, primo corn.

Dropped in at 11:30 both days and it was perfect. Not sure on weather, but this weekend it was cooler and the hard freezes helped.

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Originally Posted by glademaster

Anyone ski down there this past weekend? Thoughts on whether or not it would be worth the drive from the Seattle area to ski this Friday/Saturday?

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A friend skied Hotlum/Wintun yesterday and said the first 5k was perfect corn. I haven't skied there, but he started at 4AM and said it was 7 hrs to the top, so skiing around 11AM?.

Heading up there today. How far up is the vehicle high point @ Brewer Creek?

I would have guessed the upper mountain would have been rock hard all weekend given the forecast of wind and low temps. Maybe NOAA forecasts are total shit. The next few days show highs in the teens with winds from 55-75mph. I might shoot for a hot tuna to finish off the season later this week when winds die down.

After my wind pounding a few weeks ago I’ve been wind shy. Ran down to Lassen today to get south of the winds and it was a good time. Cheated and hiked up the summer trail then skied down towards the devastated area before hitching a ride back up to the peak lot. Snow line was at 7200, not a bad little descent. Dropped at 11:30 and was a bit sticky. Seemed like a weak refreeze last night though.

Back up in Shasta now. Debating what to do next while downing a burger at Floyd’s Frosty in McCloud. West face vs the hot tuna. Definitely like that name lol

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Just got back from Shasta. Pics and videos are up.
Hiked up from the swimming hole on Gravel Creek @ 6900'. Just before the Brewer Creek TH.
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30 min. to skinnable snow in Gravel Creek.
Booted up for two hours, then went to skins up to 10,880' along the Hotlum Glacier.
40° just before sunrise at the truck - el. 6900'.
36° at 10,000' @ 10am.
Winds were gusty to 40mph @ 10,000'.

Watch out for cows on the way to Brewer Creek
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Anyone lose a ski on Shasta this season? Describe it and I’ll help you out

Shasta, 6/29/19. Travel was from Brewers Ck., ~120 vt. ft below the trailhead and one switchback from the trail head. After luxuriating at the top, dropped a spicy line at 3:30 p.m., skier's right of the summit to the main Wintun snowfield above the glacier proper and to the skier's right of Ship Rock. Although neither windy nor shrouded in clouds, it was still very firm with a weird frozen crust that had a 5cm fin-like symmetrical structure that varied from catch-able to breakable for the first 1K feet. Sure the Inuit must have a term for it, but we'll go with sketch. The next 5K vertical got progressively softer and was $$$, with an easy cross-over from lower on the Wintun snowfield back to Hotlum snowfield at about 10,000 ft. The last 1K vertical from treeline to the road was major sun-cupped, but no complaints as it was a first for me to be able to keep the skis on all the way back to the road.

Does anyone know if sleeping overnight in the Lassen TH Parking lot is permitted? Never been up there before and the whole national park thing makes me think it might be an issue.
Thanks!

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Originally Posted by davjr96

Does anyone know if sleeping overnight in the Lassen TH Parking lot is permitted? Never been up there before and the whole national park thing makes me think it might be an issue.
Thanks!

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Just sleep outside the park and make the paved 15 min drive in the morning.

Camping in the parking lot at Lassen is a rite of passage for any backcountry skier.
Heated bathrooms and snow camping - you can't go wrong.
https://www.flickr.com/search/?user_...sen&view_all=1

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Originally Posted by davjr96

Does anyone know if sleeping overnight in the Lassen TH Parking lot is permitted? Never been up there before and the whole national park thing makes me think it might be an issue.
Thanks!

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Parking in any Lassen VNP lot overnight is permitted. You will have to pay the usual entrance fee, but a fair amount of people do it. Don't sleep in the Sulphur Works lot as you will get a splitting headache from the sulphur.

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Originally Posted by B.Gillis

To end my trip I wanted to try the Hotlum Wintun ridge. Made my way over to the end of the road on Saturday and set off Sunday morning. I had planned on starting really early, maybe 3:00ish but ended up talking to a guy who had summited that day and he said a 5:00 start would be fine. I consider myself a morning person but I’ve had a hard time waking up on time lately. Caught an amazing sunrise and I hit the trail at 6:06.

I shot straight up the drainage I was parked infront of and hit the true trailhead in 15 minutes, 1/3 of a mile hike from the car. Soon thereafter I hit snow, 7.5k feet, and was pleased to find a great lower elevation refreeze. Suncups were major so I kept the sneakers on and felt like I pretty much flew to 9k getting there around 7:40.

Snow was softening slightly so I switched to ski boots and started to boot pack. From here on up the snow was textured but not what I would call suncups. Boot pack was nice and easy with just enough toe dig to avoid cramps. Switched to skinning at 10k and made it to 11.3k before I opted for the crampons and switched back to booting.

I hit the lunch rock crossover just after 12:20 and took a nice break. Made some friends and enjoyed the views before discussing 4th of July plans. The longer I sat the more I started to catch the lazy bug and decided to get going sometime after 1:00.

The final push honestly felt like the easiest part of the hike as far as set footing goes. Followed a great boot pack all the way to the top. Got there around 2:40. Great hike, great views and met some great people at the top. No wind at all, the most pleasant summit experience I’ve had yet. I waited for some of the guys I met to make their way up and then dropped with them at 3:30. From what I could tell we were the last group to leave the summit. Didn’t see anyone down below heading up still.

As Dark Energy mentioned earlier the first 1.2k was real sketchy. I was very happy to have some folks around me, just to play it safe. Some sort of odd hollow refrozen chunder that was not something I ever hope to encounter again. After that it was totally different. Had some great turns high on the Wintun while admiring the opening crevasses below. I made the crossover around 12k and enjoyed the rest of the late day sun baked snow. Not too soft, perfect ripping surface down to 8.5k. The suncups and runnels below that were some of the gnarliest I’ve skied. Not overly fun for tired legs but hopping the runnels was entertaining.

Back in Reno now and I’m already planning to get back out in two or three weeks. I’m itching for some glacier exploration. Just need to find a partner for that.

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You weren't able to park at the TH, correct? I was thinking about heading up for the HW route, but am hoping for some road beta.

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Originally Posted by SierraSnowSurfer

You weren't able to park at the TH, correct? I was thinking about heading up for the HW route, but am hoping for some road beta.

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Correct, that being said I didn’t push it as far as I could’ve. Some folks took on the big snow bank and got up just below the final turn to the trailhead. I have to imagine by this weekend everyone will be able to make it within a quarter mile of the TH if not closer.

Hit the SE face of Lassen on July 4th. Got some follow-up beta of pretty much identical conditions as of 7/7.

I wouldn't bother unless you're already in the area or a turns-all-year type. Not unrideable, but not worth the effort IMO. Sun cups and runnels. About 2k vert back to the parking lot, upper third wasn't bad, middle third was hit-or-miss with some nice turns, and bottom third was pretty rough. Pretty much continuous coverage back to the car, but had to unstrap my board a few times due to dirt patches at the bottom. If I was on skis, I think I could have gotten back to the car without booting on a few lower traverses.

No touring. Hiked all the way up just short of the peak from the parking lot with my splitboard + boots a-carried on pack. Did it in trail runners and felt fine with good footwear and poles.

I've spent better part of the past couple months at sea level so the hike was rough for me (really, really glad I didn't* try pushing it in the Eastern Sierras this weekend, would not have survived at 11k+).

I wouldn't bother unless you're up in the area already. I had my backpacking gear on me, so immediately transitioned onto summer trails. It was perfect half-day as a bonus to a summer backpacking-focused trip, but would not have gone out of my way just for the snow.

Anyone have an educated guess at what aspect is currently holding the least textured snow (on Shasta)? I would imagine there has to be a few thousand feet of decent skiing out there?

Was out there last Sunday 7/7. I couldn't believe how much the snow had deteriorated since my previous trip a few weeks before; on that trip we rode the west face and were able to ride to within like 50 feet of the parking lot, with maybe a couple short 100 ft unstrap/walk sections. It was awesome smooth corn pretty much the whole way. Now it's totally dry at the parking lot, and the suncups are pretty big in the lower elevation snow.

Anyway one of the main reasons I went back was because on the previous trip I discovered there was an awesome pond skim forming at the top of the west face. Gotta be one of the highest pond skims around at ~13.2k. So I had delusions of a Shasta Trifecta - pond skim that thing, shred the west face, then get someone to drive my van back to town while I mountain bike the Entertainer back to town.

Well, it was a nice thought. :)

I figured with it being the weekend of the 4th that it was gonna be a zoo up there. For whatever reason it wasn't too bad. Maybe most people had already left? Maybe it was my sub-alpine start at 6:30 AM? Dunno. But it was nice to not be around the hordes. It was dry hiking almost all the way from the lot to horse camp, with the snow level right about at the shelter. Here's what it looked like from the window in the shelter:

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Saw maybe 4 people milling around there, then didn't see a single person for the next several hours. Not one person descending the west face. WTF? Climbed up via hidden valley and directly up the west face. Here's the view from hidden valley. Suncups smoothed out around 10k. Snow was good above that.

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Bummer #1 was that naturally the clouds decided to come in right before I topped out on the west face. One minute I was seeing this:

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Then it was this:

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I could tell things were swirling around and eventually there would be a window so I continued to the top of the west face. Whereupon I was greeted with Bummer #2 - the pond was half frozen, and/or slush. Not ideal pond skimming conditions! Bummer to climb 6.5k to find that out. :) It really is a perfect setup with a great run-in. Probably 60-ish feet across long-ways.

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Got a window and dropped in on one of the short chute-like entrances to riders right. Pretty good snow. Cool cloud formations and lighting from storms off in the distance.

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Around 10k I climbed up onto the ridge. About this time I saw the first people I had seen in hours. I heard some voices from down around hidden valley, and sure enough zooming in with the camera it looked like a bunch of people camped over there. Wonder where they were all day.

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I dropped the other side of the ridge down towards horse camp and the main avy gulch route, where the snow kinda sucked. At least it was soft.

On the exit there was still a tongue of snow that could be sorta ridden for a while, cutting out about half the dry hiking from horse camp. As much as I hate to admit it, I guess Schraph was right about this:

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Originally Posted by SchralphMacchio

The good news is that the massive Avy Gulch slide from Feb will keep the ski exit from CG or AG properly filled and skiable almost all the way to the TH pretty late into the season, I would estimate you’ll be able to ski to the car through 4th of July and just a short walk through late July based on the slide debris having run so far past Sierra Horse Camp.

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By this time a lot of that tongue was melting out so some of the broken tree debris were showing up. Pretty impressive.

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Photo later around sunset showing most of the west face route:

https://i168.photobucket.com/albums/...0-IMG_5371.jpg

By the time I got out I was no longer motivated to bike. So the trifecta turned out to be a mono-fecta. Next year! :)

Nice jimw! West face was the main route I was thinking about. That pond skim looks like a lot of fun.

Got some great turns in LNP yesterday. Some crust and roller balls on solar aspects.

Picture: N. side of Brokeoff.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...f6cc178ec6.jpg

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Last min decision to drive north tonight and ski Mt Shasta Ski Park area Sunday on way to Bend, maybe explore the sidecountry there a bit. I gather Red Butte is pretty accessible? My Shasta experiences have always been June ski tour to summit, nothing in this S zone.