Eastern Sierra BC 2022-23

Went up this last weekend for the Gathering of Old Timers. We were looking at a line outside of Lone Pine that needs a lot of snow. It was filled in.....with Chunder from all the natural releases. Disappointed we continued north to Red Mountain and started skinning around 10 am. I took my Son-In-Law on His first Backcountry Weekend. He is a strong skier and in great shape so He did enjoy Himself.

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The Skin In

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Terrain - this is from Saturday , Convict lake

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The Usual Suspects

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Found Deep Pow in The Hippie Chutes

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Big Terrain

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Fridays target


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end of the day

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The Old and The New

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Old School Represent

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Had a great weekend. Should be great snow through July. Probably hit sun cups before running out of snow


Sorry about the sideways, upside down phots. WTF ??

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Originally Posted by Blaster

IDK. Rad skiing but not worth getting killed. I was kind of put off by that post once I realized what almost happened to the next guy to drop in. https://www.instagram.com/p/Cp75NLIrtXz/

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You can see that slide at the end of Bernie’s pov when he looks back up hill. Pretty consequential terrain


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If skinning to red slate, is there snow from the car?

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If skinning to red slate, is there snow from the car?

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Right now everything is skin from the car . Finding Parking is the bitch. Not many spots plowed and thats seems to be determining where most are touring

Sherwin slide.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Mammoth/com...mammoth_lakes/

Couple shitty shots from slightly south...

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And another couple shitty shots from slightly north...


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double blasting shitty pics...

3/31 Friday slightly north
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Fun times to be had in the southern part of the range. Should be even more fun with a proper corn cycle...
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very strongly considering a week in bishop in early may. any recommendations for a guide?

https://www.wolverinepublishing.com/...astern-sierra/

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Originally Posted by akokskis

very strongly considering a week in bishop in early may. any recommendations for a guide?

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https://www.ryanahuetter.com

Wondering if anyone has heard of someone skiing the buttermilks before? Last weekend I had the pure joy of going bouldering and skiing pillows on Grouse Mountain in the same day! This has been such an epic season.

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A buddy and I are headed that way early next week. It seems like you guys have gotten crushed this season! We are uncertain on what roads are open, or when they might open what is the best resource for that info? I've looked at the Mono/Inyo county pages. I'm guessing those are going to be the best.

Also, can you camp at the Convict TH? Good camping close? Would be a truck camper.

Thanks for any info.

Road conditions ... Division of Traffic Operations - Road Information - California Highway Information

Current incidents ... CHP Traffic (ca.gov), Communication Center "Bishop"

Hey I will be in Mammoth this Friday to Tuesday and am bringing touring stuff. If anyone would be so kind as to allow me to tag along for a day tour I would be grateful. I will be there with my intermediate skier non touring friend but she has encouraged me to get out there for a day.
I am from new England and have skied and toured with TGR mags in Utah and Jackson and it's always gone well. Avy 1 and I will bring my stuff. Distance runner so I should be able hang in terms of fitness.
Best skier on the mountain!!!!! Joking [emoji3]
Thanks


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Originally Posted by Doughnuts01

A buddy and I are headed that way early next week. It seems like you guys have gotten crushed this season! We are uncertain on what roads are open, or when they might open what is the best resource for that info? I've looked at the Mono/Inyo county pages. I'm guessing those are going to be the best.

Also, can you camp at the Convict TH? Good camping close? Would be a truck camper.

Thanks for any info.

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You're not technically supposed to camp at the Convict parking lot, they've got signs up, but of course that seems to mean different things to different people. Dispersed camping is tougher than usual this year with all of the snow on the ground. Benton Crossing Rd has some options to the E of Mammoth.

I spent a few days down there recently, here's info I've got on the roads. It's tough this year, there's so much snow down low and very little work has been done on the access roads. I'm not complaining, they've got more pressing issues than getting access roads open.

Twin Lakes Rd. is good to go. Glacier Lodge Rd. is plowed to within about 2 miles of the summer TH. Onion Valley Rd. has a soft closure at Seven Pines. We could drive to about 7K before being blocked by snow. McGee isn't plowed and you'll have to start from 395. Rock Creek Rd. isn't plowed at all which makes it a no-go unless you've got a sled. Convict is open as usual.

I can't personally attest to conditions on the other roads, but I imagine 120 is plowed up to Poole Power Plant Rd. (since folks have been skiing V Bowl) but PPR probably isn't plowed. Not sure about Pine Creek but they usually try to keep it open to the mine. I highly doubt Virginia Lakes Rd or Lundy Canyon Rd is plowed at all. I highly doubt Bishop Creek is open beyond Aspendell. I've heard Whitney Portal Rd. won't be opening for a while.

Anyone have beta on dirt roads like McMurray Meadows Rd? Seems like Tinemaha has been skied recently, so I'm guessing it's passable with 4WD and good clearance.

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Originally Posted by whatsupdoc

You're not technically supposed to camp at the Convict parking lot, they've got signs up, but of course that seems to mean different things to different people. Dispersed camping is tougher than usual this year with all of the snow on the ground. Benton Crossing Rd has some options to the E of Mammoth.

I spent a few days down there recently, here's info I've got on the roads. It's tough this year, there's so much snow down low and very little work has been done on the access roads. I'm not complaining, they've got more pressing issues than getting access roads open.

Twin Lakes Rd. is good to go. Glacier Lodge Rd. is plowed to within about 2 miles of the summer TH. Onion Valley Rd. has a soft closure at Seven Pines. We could drive to about 7K before being blocked by snow. McGee isn't plowed and you'll have to start from 395. Rock Creek Rd. isn't plowed at all which makes it a no-go unless you've got a sled. Convict is open as usual.

I can't personally attest to conditions on the other roads, but I imagine 120 is plowed up to Poole Power Plant Rd. (since folks have been skiing V Bowl) but PPR probably isn't plowed. Not sure about Pine Creek but they usually try to keep it open to the mine. I highly doubt Virginia Lakes Rd or Lundy Canyon Rd is plowed at all. I highly doubt Bishop Creek is open beyond Aspendell. I've heard Whitney Portal Rd. won't be opening for a while.

Anyone have beta on dirt roads like McMurray Meadows Rd? Seems like Tinemaha has been skied recently, so I'm guessing it's passable with 4WD and good clearance.

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Thanks for the beta. Exactly what I was looking for! I'm seeing in the guidebook for the Eastern Sierra that the Poole Power plant road is typically plowed year round? The last update on the Mono County roads page has the PPR not being plowed as of the 6th... I'm assuming with this year not being typical they have other priorities which makes complete sense.

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Originally Posted by whatsupdoc

You're not technically supposed to camp at the Convict parking lot, they've got signs up, but of course that seems to mean different things to different people. Dispersed camping is tougher than usual this year with all of the snow on the ground. Benton Crossing Rd has some options to the E of Mammoth.

I spent a few days down there recently, here's info I've got on the roads. It's tough this year, there's so much snow down low and very little work has been done on the access roads. I'm not complaining, they've got more pressing issues than getting access roads open.

Twin Lakes Rd. is good to go. Glacier Lodge Rd. is plowed to within about 2 miles of the summer TH. Onion Valley Rd. has a soft closure at Seven Pines. We could drive to about 7K before being blocked by snow. McGee isn't plowed and you'll have to start from 395. Rock Creek Rd. isn't plowed at all which makes it a no-go unless you've got a sled. Convict is open as usual.

I can't personally attest to conditions on the other roads, but I imagine 120 is plowed up to Poole Power Plant Rd. (since folks have been skiing V Bowl) but PPR probably isn't plowed. Not sure about Pine Creek but they usually try to keep it open to the mine. I highly doubt Virginia Lakes Rd or Lundy Canyon Rd is plowed at all. I highly doubt Bishop Creek is open beyond Aspendell. I've heard Whitney Portal Rd. won't be opening for a while.

Anyone have beta on dirt roads like McMurray Meadows Rd? Seems like Tinemaha has been skied recently, so I'm guessing it's passable with 4WD and good clearance.

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Thanks for all this. Were you able to park/skin from 7k in OV or did you have to start down by 7 pines?


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Quote:

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Originally Posted by whatsupdoc

I spent a few days down there recently, here's info I've got on the roads. It's tough this year, there's so much snow down low and very little work has been done on the access roads. I'm not complaining, they've got more pressing issues than getting access roads open.

Twin Lakes Rd. is good to go. Glacier Lodge Rd. is plowed to within about 2 miles of the summer TH. Onion Valley Rd. has a soft closure at Seven Pines. We could drive to about 7K before being blocked by snow. McGee isn't plowed and you'll have to start from 395. Rock Creek Rd. isn't plowed at all which makes it a no-go unless you've got a sled. Convict is open as usual.

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Thanks for all this. Were you able to park/skin from 7k in OV or did you have to start down by 7 pines?


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We skinned from 7K in Onion Valley.

And Poole Power Plant Rd is typically plowed in my experience but not this year it seems. It’s not too far to skin up the road to whatever your objective is.


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McMurray Road good to 6200' just past Birch Creek. Blocked by a mud bog.
High clearance vehicle helpful but probably not necessary.
The road to Birch Creek TH is totally blown out.

Some pics/road beta from the last couple of days. some of it is a repeat of What'supdoc's great beta, but it's a cut and paste from my post to the FB group. Sorry for the long post but i'm on sabbatical for 2 months and have too much free time. If anyone's going to be on the East side/Shasta, ping me since my regular partner is skiing in Greenland :)
..... FB post:

Some pics and road conditions report from the last few days (4/9-11), mainly on the High Sierra. The summary is that things were still transitional when we went so check ESAC before you go down there and/or pick your route/aspect. Some routes have a lot of Avy debris as well that needs time to smooth out.

Snow conditions: Coverage is outstanding (duh 😊), so there's lots of lines doable this year, even some southerly faces that usually don't hold snow. When we went the snow was still transitional for all but direct southerly aspect due to warm temps/lack of enough freeze/thaw cycles so make sure to check ESAC before you go and or pick your line/aspect.

Round top South side 4/9: Skied it ~11am. Slightly too early for the top 500ft, perfect for the middle 1k, then mush below that. Big wet slide started naturally from the rocks near the sisters and ran 1-2k ft. Might post to SAC if I caught it on video. Bunch of folks skied Moon Crescent and her sister chutes that day.

Big Pine/Mt. Alice 4/10: Temps were high so we started early. Felt like a good freeze on the way up (even the TH at 7200ft was supportable, 0 pole penetration), but we found that Easterly aspects had a superficial 10cm crust and below that up to 1ft of rounded grain sugar below. N faces were breakable. Direct S face skied great corn from 11.5k to 10.5k at only 10am, and flat section as well from 10.5 to 10k. Direct E gully below that was a tad scary due to it having thawed past the top layer in many places even at 10am. Lots of huge avy debris from past slides as well recent

Convict/Mono Jim: Given an even higher night time temp, we punted on our objective and picked the S side of Mono Jim instead and started super early. Got to the top at 8am to wait it out, and all would have been great if it weren't for the cloud cover, so we waited on the summit for it to soften. By 10:30 the S face was great corn from ~11k down to 9.6k, and pretty good on the N facing flats below that. The final N face/sage brush run was breakable and or rotted out/shallow snowpack near shrubbery.

Road conditions: We bailed due to the high wind forecast today, so I had plenty of time to checkout the plowing conditions on various trailheads on the way home. Knew that they'd be closed at usual spots, but was curious how much progress they have made given that Fishmas is only 2+ weeks away. There's lots of work to do:

1) Big pine/Glacier lodge Rd: plowed to ~2 miles from the end of road. 2-3ft after that. Even the high trail on southerly faces is still all snow above the road. Road is a quick ski back to the car. Room for 10+ cars to park easy.

2) 168/Aspendell: Lots of construction on 168, with a mile or so of 1 lane only. Still snow on the road past the closure at Aspendall (see pic). Southerly faces still have great coverage for accessing Emerson, etc. (for now).

3)Buttermilk road: Road in great condition until past the bouldering area ~1mile from 168. After that you’ll need at least 10 inch clearance 4wd to get past there. I didn’t drive much further, but was told by folks I met while skiing that many of the access roads to Basin or S side of Tom (Horten crk, etc.)are not passable due to road damage. If anyone can confirm this and the locations of closure, that would be great. I didn’t have time to drive there that day.

4)Convict: Plowed to the lake with the right side parking lot cleared (15+ cars). Plowing hasn’t started on the S side lake road, nor any campgrounds, which are deep under snow.
5)Mammoth/Lake Mary: Wowzah! Tons of snow 😊see pic. Even Main St. in Mammoth is not fully plowed yet. There are parts where it’s 2 lanes, then all of a sudden 1.5 lanes due to snow.

6)Benton/Hot springs: small pull out plowed right on Benton Rd, but ski/snowshoe from there to Willy’s or others. Bridgeport/travertine looked driveable w 4x4 from 395, but i didn't drive up.

7)Junelake/158 north: Plowed well to the gate slightly north of Grant lake. It looks like they’ve started plowing past that (see pic).

8)120/Tioga pass: Plowed to lower closure/Pool power plant road. Pool rd. plowed well past that (Vbowl access). No work has started on 120 past this (at least from the last storm?)and judging by how much snow is still on the steep Southerly face above it, I’d doubt this will start/open any time soon due to Avy risk/rockfall.

9)Lundy: plowed to lower gate ~ 2miles from 395. Plowing hasn’t even started after that.

10) Virginia lakes: Plowed standard spot ~1 mile from 395. Plowing hasn’t even started after that.

Monday 3/10 Big Pine:
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Tuesday 3/11: Convict:
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Pinner:
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Mendenhall looking sportier than expected for this year.
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Plowing status Aspendell:
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South slope access still holding snow aspendell:
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Buttermilk road/bishop views:
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Tom:
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Plowing status N June lake loop/Wood/168:
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Plowing status Lundy:
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Plowing status Virginia lakes:

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Dana Plateau/Vbowl/120 plowing status:
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Tons of snow still on the Steep S face above 120. That's gotta delay things due to Avy/rockfall risk
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Looking for a meaningful gift for that special someone? Wanna add some dazzle to your front lawn or pool area? act fast, they only have 2 left. Walker. (all joking aside, this is part of the reason i love 395 to my core and i don't have 1% of the artistic talent these folks have....):

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Side note:
I really think there's great value in sharing beta/stoke and this East side thread is the best example/place imho... I love this thread and want it to keep going, not just with conversation but with actual stoke/beta. So many forums have died out (Ttips, Split.com, even some TGR threads...etc.) Posting here can save someone from a long drive to the wrong place, or to make sure to ski at the right time/aspect, etc. Every day/weekend is too precious to be wasted. But man is the process painful. FB is, to be frank, kinda evil, but it's easy. It doesn't take 2 minutes per pic to upload or spin my pics upside down. I'm not cool enough to have in IG or whatever is newer. Maybe I just need to figure out a better way (link to pics/FB, etc.). Wanna do the right thing, especially after seeing what'supdoc, Frush, others, but man it takes so much more time here :( /endrant

Wow Mr H, thanks for that. I'm out of town for a few weeks but hoping to get some nice spring skiing in this year. I also sent a link to this to a friend of mine who's super stoked but doesn't know about TGR.

Thanks for the update!