Snow in the PNW 13/14

[pipedream]

Well you already missed out on the legal pot wave... so unless you can either turn key presses into useful software or are willing to manage those who can, you're pretty SOL. That said, there's quite a bit of non-software engineering in the area, but it'd be tough to find an entry-level position at >= $30/hr.

[Jonathan S.]

Flying back right now from:
- Monday = Adams SW Chutes back up to Lunch Counter & Crescent "Glacier" (excellent!)
- Tuesday = Adams South Climb (excellent!)
- Wednesday = Hood base of Hogsback > Mississippi Head > Crater Rock > Palmer (excellent!)
- Thursday = Hood Palmer (wet!)
- Friday = fly home a day early (even wetter!)

Internet connection is kind of flaky here on the plan, but complete TR here:
http://timefortuckerman.com/forums/s...ad.php?t=16106
... or see the East Coast Roll Call Thread.

[GeezerSteve]

JS, you might have skinned past our camp at LC Monday morning. We skied Adams Sunday via the standard route to celebrate our friends' 100th Bulger (WA highest 100) summit. Didn't ski SW Chutes this year cuz the party was at LC. 3 of us stayed at the LC Sunday night to extend the party another night. Conditions were indeed excellent -- best top-to-bottom skiing conditions I've ever seen on Adams.

[bfree]

JS, you might have skinned past our camp at LC Monday morning. We skied Adams Sunday via the standard route to celebrate our friends' 100th Bulger (WA highest 100) summit. Didn't ski SW Chutes this year cuz the party was at LC. 3 of us stayed at the LC Sunday night to extend the party another night. Conditions were indeed excellent -- best top-to-bottom skiing conditions I've ever seen on Adams.

Congrats to your friend. But finishing on Adams? How did he manage to save that one for so long? I think that was my first of the top 100.

[GeezerSteve]

She. She tabled Adams as her 100th Bulger peak so that more friends (28?) could party with her to celebrate. Not so easy to get all those folks up Hard Mox.

[Jonathan S.]

Big Steve, I can't believe that were so close to meeting up in person at long last!
But congrats to your friend.
(I recall that Sir Si finished up some highest-something-other list with a really common peak that somehow had eluded him for many years?)

[SchralphMacchio]

Hung out at a wet soggy Timberline on Saturday and decided to bail on Hood in favor of known good conditions on the Sisters. Early Sunday morning we went for North Sister from Pole Creek. Access is a real issue with the burn area restrictions! Boy, what a slog that was, but the payoff on Early Morning was worth it. Snow was something between corn and summer snow. Still good coverage in that zone but rockfall is becoming more of an issue. One of the main lines down east face of Middle is still fat, though the gnar line on the NE face is long long gone - exposed choke, exposed schrund, nasty rockfall litter ... Looks like quite the line to score though!

[Cocximus]

Anyone know if I can rent some Vectors in WA during august/ end of jully? Big steve, your praises of the Vectors carry a lot of weight

[plugboots]

Skied a couloir on whistler peak, near washington pass two days ago.
Long approach in trees, rock scrambling, downclimbing a waterfall, scarry creek crossing.

Nice line, huh?

[pipedream]

Made it up to Artist Point today to ring in the unofficial start to summer by hammering car-served laps in the blueberry chutes. Coverage in the chutes should hold for another 10 days or so, get it while it's in!

[GeezerSteve]

Mt. Daniel is in shape

[pipedream]

Well I'll be damned if this isn't some very impressive skiing from a well-known padded seat occupant:

[jaja111]

That dude's a machine. I met him Sunday 7-14 while teaching the 3 year old to at least stop on skis in slush. He headed up from Heather at 12:30 walking the road, and appeared from the backside of table around 3 I think, coming back down a solid line. Made me feel like a loser only having bummed two rides up, to come down blueberry twice. Grandma's seems all done this summer. It appears there are some collapses at the water fall off that rock at the top.

[Norseman]

Some wiggle maniac had an awesome run on the Turtle/Wilson/Nisq today...

[Fortune_Cookie]

That is an impressive number of turns; what patience!

[alto]

FORTUNE COOKIEEEEE

[Jonathan S.]

Trip Report: July 21 (Monday), the “real” Mount Adams

After weeks of watching the warm dry weather since my late June PNW trip, suddenly the wx fx took a turn for the worse during my planned trip this week.

SW incremental price to fly out a day earlier for the only perfectly clear slot?
A lot!
Worth it?
Yes!





Excellent snow everywhere - well, except for the summit of course, but that is almost always the case with these volcanoes.

Key stats:
- Total vertical = 10,388'
- % skied = ~90%
- Miles = 18.73
- Gu packets consumed = 10 (plus 4 Odwalla bars)
- Water consumed = not enough
- Gray wolf sightings = 0
- Beretta Px4 Storm sightings = 0


Summit selfie with Rainier in the background:






Looking back up at my summit tracks (far left) - about a third of this actually skied quite well, about a third of it skied like it looked, and the other third skied ... even worse:






Ready to ski over 3,700' vertical in the SW Chutes:






Semi-successful selfie attempt with SW Chutes:






From the base of the SW Chutes, skinned back up my “NW Passage” (well, actually trending to the NE) to rejoin Lunch Counter, with the goal of skinning back up to the Piker’s Peak false summit.

Unfortunately, given my not-quite-alpine start of after ten o’clock, and given some thin clouds, at ~10,000' elevation the snow was just starting to firm up.

Deviated from the main South Climb route after awhile to find an entirely untouched snowfield down to ~8,460' then skinned back up to ~9,540' where once again the snow was starting to firm back up given the late hour.

Even the main Lunch Counter snowfield skied very well, with such wonderful wide-open expanses:






Maxed out the Crescent [not-really-a] Glacier, played connect-the-snow-ribbons for awhile, then finally rejoined the dry hiking trail, with some bonus views of Mount Hood catching the evening sun:









Hustled down back to town so that I could repack quickly and get some [insufficient] sleep before waking very early this morning so that we could take advantage of the relatively dry slot in the wx fx ... or alternatively, sit at our respective laptops in my motel room, trying to get some work done while obsessively checking the radar map!

[NoPostholio]

Great beta JS - thanks

Good luck on the hood

[Jonathan S.]

Good luck on the hood

Thanks -- I'll need it!
Good news = I'll have the Palmer all to myself today.
Bad news = The lifts are closed for some very good reasons...

[Jonathan S.]

Trip Report: July 22 (Tuesday), the “real” Mount Adams

Waited until the radar map showed the rain moving out.
But as I suspected, the lack of rain was nevertheless accompanied by a lack of visibility:






I wasn’t worried about skiing safety given that the terrain is all fairly mellow on the South Climb route.
But we were obviously at high risk for being stalked by packs of predatory gray wolves.
So we turned around after a little over 4k vert.

Light rain started up after we maxed out the lower Crescent [not-really-a] Glacier.
But it stopped shortly after we played connect-the-snow-ribbons and transitioned to hiking.

Dual selfie with the clearing valley in the background:






From the drive down, looking back up at the mountain’s cloud deck :






While driving back from dinner (burger at the Station Café of course), saw that all the campers (counted about 15 heading up during our short tour) were finally enjoying some clearing (before being subjected to utter misery overnight and then the following day):

[Jonathan S.]

Trip Report: July 23 (Wednesday), Mount Hood

Went out to my car this morning at the Trout Lake Valley Inn and ... no rain!
Went out again ... rain.
Back inside, thunder.

Thought of the three camping parties we had seen heading up yesterday afternoon:
- Five or so adults = utter misery.
- Young guy with chipper and nicely made-up lady = will she break up with him on the mountain or wait until back in civilization?
- About eight teenage girls and an adult male leader = will the negligence bring only civil lawsuits or also criminal charges?

Instead of Adams, checked out Hood:






Yes, the Palmer will be mine, all mine!


Or is that so good after all:






Arriving in the parking lot, I decided to refrain from the usual depressing windshield picture.

So I took one out the side window instead:






After two full laps plus one to just a little past the [today-not-so-] Magic Mile, I’d had my fill of over 6,000' vertical of very nice groomed untouched corn ... and my boots were filled with water!

Time for the hot tub (although I did remove my lycra race suit first):






Once I finally built up the courage to go back out to my car to retrieve various wet items, I was greeted by ... brilliant sunshine?

Fortunately the Timberline webcam still looked horrible so I wasn’t tempted to go back up for more laps:

[Jonathan S.]

Trip Report: July 24 (Thursday), Mount Hood

Planned to start skinning at civil daylight, but checked the radar map and went back to sleep, hoping for some more clearing.

And sure enough, when I woke again at civil daylight, the radar map was clear everywhere ... except at Mount Hood:






Lifts were posted as delayed when I started up, then shortly after they pulled the plug entirely for the third day in a row:






Snow surface conditions were:
- very nice wind-softened freshly regroomed corn down on the Magic Mile (sure burned lots of diesel fuel just for me!);
- bonus fresh snow from there up to the Palmer mid-station; and,
- mix of firm groomed and pockets of windblown fresh up above.

Meanwhile, weather conditions were . . . various combinations of bad.

I made it up to the top of the Palmer only because I knew from the prior day that the gate rental shack (now covered in rime) forms a perfect windbreak for the skin>ski transition:






Went up for another partial lap to the top of the freshies.
Then called it an outing (at 4,310' vertical), a four-day (sort of) trip (at 24,750'), and a season (at 534,800').

Hopped in the car still wearing all my wet clothes and even pack, heading down for:
- hot french toast (which I usually don’t like at all, but any hot food sure felt great now);
- hot laundry dryer (stripping down to my underwear in the laundry room, fortunately otherwise deserted);
- hot tub (interesting conversation with a father & son taking a weather day off from thru hiking the PCT);
- hot shower (such a better form of liquid H20 than on the Palmer); and,
- hot air boot dryer (for my water-logged ski boots).


And finally, back at the airport, I knew this was coming up, but still, I couldn’t resist looking:

[powpig]

Pics don't look like that much, but reports are Whistler gotta foot last night.

http://www.vancitybuzz.com/2014/07/3...ntains-photos/

[NoPostholio]

Trip Report: July 24 (Thursday), Mount Hood

Planned to start skinning at civil daylight, but checked the radar map and went back to sleep, hoping for some more clearing.

And sure enough, when I woke again at civil daylight, the radar map was clear everywhere ... except at Mount Hood:






Lifts were posted as delayed when I started up, then shortly after they pulled the plug entirely for the third day in a row:






Snow surface conditions were:
- very nice wind-softened freshly regroomed corn down on the Magic Mile (sure burned lots of diesel fuel just for me!);
- bonus fresh snow from there up to the Palmer mid-station; and,
- mix of firm groomed and pockets of windblown fresh up above.

Meanwhile, weather conditions were . . . various combinations of bad.

I made it up to the top of the Palmer only because I knew from the prior day that the gate rental shack (now covered in rime) forms a perfect windbreak for the skin>ski transition:






Went up for another partial lap to the top of the freshies.
Then called it an outing (at 4,310' vertical), a four-day (sort of) trip (at 24,750'), and a season (at 534,800').

Hopped in the car still wearing all my wet clothes and even pack, heading down for:
- hot french toast (which I usually don’t like at all, but any hot food sure felt great now);
- hot laundry dryer (stripping down to my underwear in the laundry room, fortunately otherwise deserted);
- hot tub (interesting conversation with a father & son taking a weather day off from thru hiking the PCT);
- hot shower (such a better form of liquid H20 than on the Palmer); and,
- hot air boot dryer (for my water-logged ski boots).


And finally, back at the airport, I knew this was coming up, but still, I couldn’t resist looking:

How far of a dirt walk as of now to snow cat pkg lot, 5-10 min?

[Cocximus]

Hello PNW. I’m having a beer looking at Rainier from my buddy's deck in Issaquah. Glad I brought my skis Any pointers to where it would be best to head for some good turns?

Also what's good to do on the weekend around Seattle?