[TR] Red Mountain Ski Descent - Commonwealth Creek to Southwest Face 4/17/2004

[JayB]

Climb: Red Mountain Ski Descent -South Face to Commonwealth Basin

 

Date of Climb: 4/17/2004

 

Trip Report:

The original plan was to head up to Camp Muir, but a look at the temperatures displayed in the forecast left us haunted by visions of clattering down an endless continuum of filling-loosening chunks of refrozen spring snow, so the hunt for an alternate destination was on. After scouring the report for warmer temperatures, we were stunned to see Snoqualmie Pass at the top of the list. So it would be off to The Pass and Red Mountain the next morning. We further resolved that not only would there be no alpine start, we would make it a point to delay our departure in order to allow the snow to adequately thaw itself in preparation for our arrival. The forecast didn't actually call for freezing temperatures overnight, but when you are out avoid the nightmare that is the refrozen slop o' death, you can never be too careful.

 

Shortly after exiting the parking lot we encountered the one and only significant objective hazards of the day - the festering minefields of recycled purina besotting the first hundred yards of snow beyond the trailhead. After navigating this treacherous strait with nary a skin tainted by our passage through the fecal gauntlet, we felt unstoppable and cruised along Commonweath Creek for a while, then veered just a bit east until we found ourselves just right of the base of the ridge that joins the south and southwest faces.

We broke left and skinned to the crest of the said ridge on old spring snow that was decidedly less than frozen, and slogged our way to the ridge's junction with the southwest face.

From here we zig-zagged through a variable procession of rain, mist, and snow flurries towards the summit, skinning through snow that varied from isothermal slop to an inch of late spring powder on the way to the summit.

 

After taking in the view, rehydrating, and unwittingly ingesting a pack of long-since-expired beef-sticks, it was time for the descent.

The nausea induced by the consumption of the said beefsticks generated a state of mind roughly akin to alitude sickness, which from this point forward lent the outing a more alpine feel.

 

The new snow lasted for all of one-hundred vertical feet of the descent, followed by a corn-harvest for the next several hundred feet, beneath which point it was non-stop crud-busting and chunk hopping down a gulley to the skiers right of the summer route up the ridge.

 

A brief detour to the skiers left put us on a more open aspect leading to the base of the south face and eventually the basin floor.

Toss in a mile or two of skinless touring down a gradient that's almost continuously working in your favor and another safe passage through the minefield and you've got yourself one hell of a pleasant day in the mountains.

Line O' Descent..

 

PAUL KLENKE PHOTO!!!!!!!!!!!

Squigly red line by Jay Brazier

Gear Notes:

Usual BC Stuff, keen ability to distinguish between feces and pine cones.

Edited April 19, 2004 by JayB

[Norman_Clyde]

I'm not so good at predicting snow conditions. Is there a software upgrade that will allow me to add a Zone of Powder, Corn and Slop to my Topo program? Once I dial these zones into my GPS then I will know what grade of wax to apply on my descent.

 

Seriously now, that looks like it was fun.

[klenke]

for the trip report

for poaching my photo off of summitpost without asking me or even crediting me. Bad show! Bad show!

[JayB]

Yeah - my bad. My understanding was that you should credit a photo if it's taken off of someone else's personal/professional web page but if it's dumped on a public site it's not as critical, but I stand corrected. Many apologies.

 

The funny thing is that I originally had the credit in there originally , but then stopped and asked myself "Is anyone really going to care if I poach this photo from summitpost" and I edited it out. Shows you what I know.

[klenke]

Jay, if you had simply linked (image sourced) my photo I wouldn't have minded. However, this is not what you did. What you did was save my image to your computer, annotate it for your own purposes (doctor/alter my photo), then resubmit. I wouldn't even mind you doing that as long as you told me you were going to do so. Plus, you used the words poached as if to admit you were doing something a little illicit. I guess you took the chance that the owner (me) would not have noticed. But, as you know, I'm active on this site, so you might have known I was going to see it.

 

If everyone did what you did, it wouldn't be a very fair world to those who've made the initial effort (to get to the location to take the photo, develop the photo, scan the photo, clean the image, upload the image, etc.).

 

Now you know how I feel about it. If you want to image source one of my photos, that's fine (unless you're going to be using it for monetary gain...like on a business-oriented site). If you want to alter it in any way first, you have to ask my permission. The fact that it is on summitpost makes no difference. I still own the copyright to the image (whether explicitly expressed on the image or not).