genepires

did you need a telephoto lens to get some of those photos? Seems like dome is pretty damn close but I thought dome was light years from anything else.

I like my feet. Getting frostbite and losing toes is not a uncommon occurrence and not to be discounted. If the common wisdom is to use a size larger boot (assuming you can still ski without falling over which may be worse) I would suggest you follow it. It is common wisdom learned from others pain. BTW, I don't ski so my knowledge of what you are doing is Zero. But I have been to denali. We had it nice above 14K. Many others didn't It is a crap shoot so stacking the odds in your favor is always a good thing. There is a good chance of getting the skiing shut down above 14K. Are you ready to be able to hike the rest of the way in your ski boots? Very envious of skiers on the way back to the airstrip, though.

damn near centrally located in the darring-town slabbage meca. You can see exfo dome and squire creek wall. and several other slabbages also!

Is the hardware still in the leg? I have a friend who had a similar situation and time line as you a couple years ago. He mentioned the huge amount of damage that would happen to the bone if it broke in the same place with the plate still inside. He was able to ice climb but there was pain in the general location the following winter. he had the hardware taken out a couple years after the accident.

haven't been up there lately but the NOAA pin point forecast looks cold for weekend. highs of low 30F. https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lon=-120.6521987915039&lat=48.508989062540536#.XbrXrcR7laR

yeah the last time I was up there was 12 years ago and it was snow and ice from the point where you bust over the ridge to well above the winnie slide area. damn.

how much for the pants alone?

that winnie slide photo is a shock. I have been up that route a handful of times, the latest part of the season was mid august and it was bare ice top to bottom. I never saw any exposed rock like in your photo. I guess 12 years of climate change.......

I buy one even on horrible predicted years. Shitty day on the hill is 1000% better than sitting at home. even in years where it was predicted to be warm and dry turned out to be pretty OK seasons overall. but warm and normal precipitation could mean some good alpine tromping times. Warm and dry better.

according to NOAA long range outlooks https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/multi_season/13_seasonal_outlooks/color/churchill.php winter looks a little above normal temps and normal precip.

that is just like every one of my trips except for the free food, free beer, good weather, light packs, easy hike, easy climb, clean route, perfect rack, perfect crack, perfect camp, good sleep, free heli flights, ect ect. I often have bears wave at me though.

the coleman deming side has a large end to end crevasse. you can pass it on either side but you will have a brief exposure to hanger ice cliffs above. whether you are willing to expose yourself to objective hazard is the question. the easton side is getting complicated with much of the snowpack gone and you are dealing with erratic crevasse patterns down low and large crevasses opening up high. I think there was even another large end to end crack on the upper headwall. which one is easier is a crap shoot right now, especially later on this month. sulphide glacier on shuksan should be in better shape as the bedrock has less undulations and therefore less cracks. but the real summit is got some 4th class scrambling that you may want to bring rock gear for.

another cool obscure mountain TR. I like where we are going. thanks for the TR. very good photos too.

wow! thanks for the TR. that is a pretty cool looking mountain and one I have never heard of before.

If you the quiene sabe glacier route on Sahale, do it in May or early June. Above the saddle and below the rocky summit bit usually a big ass cornice. Plenty of room to traverse safely on the windward side to get to rocky bits. The views and experience is better with that cornice. Real alpine. The rocky bit is only 20 meters or less depending on snow levels.

I proposed to my lovely wife on a forced alpine bivy in wind river range. Good epic.

in addition to the above rec's, try improbable traverse on guye peak. the traverse is easier than it looks. while not alpine, spend weekends up in squamish. Tons of routes to master your multipitch experience. same for icicle canyon in leavenworth. when it is raining in squish. there are more moderates in wa pass to try. burgundy n face, serendipity artete, poster peak, west face south early, n face concord tower, and a couple variations around the beckey route on lib bell. those are a bit step up (5.8-ish) from das toof, but a season craggin at squish and icicle will get you up to speed . fun times ahead!

i may catch grief for this but old ropes are fine for glacier travel. even if they are a bit static-y. the nature of glacier falls is such that the rope cutting into snow takes a bunch of the forces and makes the rope seem dynamic. I am not suggesting to use a static rope like back in the DAY, but an old rope that has lost some stretchiness is not a big deal.

yup to DPS. 50m x 8-ish (whatever on sale) mm rope is great for glacier travel. 60m is kinda long and if there are 5 people in group, bring two ropes.

in an alpine rock environment, 50 meters is a good length. chances are you will experience too much rope drag when making pitches beyond 40 to 50 meters anyway. then you have to deal with that extra length at every pitch change over. I found that teams can go faster with 50 meter ropes, especially if there are short rope sections like on serpentine arete or even on ne butt slesse. Plus alpine rarely do long rappels where a longer rope would be good. shorter rappels make dealing with rope eaters easier. I did almost all of my alpne climbing in a pair of 50m doubles. whether I brought one or two depended on the route. If the rope is too short in the alpine, simu climbing takes care of that. You should be very solid rock climbing and not pushing limits in alpine. Short bits of simu should not be a problem.

why did you go around via sharkfin instead of heading up to the base of the west ridge of forbidden and then drop down? Been a long time since i was there but that was the way back then. maybe things have changed since? It was one or two long raps from west ridge saddle to snow field. maybe that snow is gone.

wow! that top out is really broken up. times are a changin over the eyars.

from 8/15 so not that long ago but things do change quickly. One thing to note that may not be in the below report as it is expected that most guides know this already as it a situation that has been around for a month or so now. There is a large crevasse running end to end (may be the 8800 crack in report below) on the coleman glacier which would be your decent route. Wont see it on the way up. End running it to the east or west will put you into potential ice fall danger from baker or colfax. either run quickly through there or some have been rappeling off of some fixed pickets. No idea if that is still accurate. Should be exciting! Hey Crew, Just wrapped up a 1:1 summit day on a 3 day North Ridge with Mountain Madness. We are camped at the hogsback and figured I'd spend some tent time sharing conditions. The slope immediately above the hogsback is now a combination of recently glaciated terrain and dry glacier, making travel in the dark slow. We took the standard ascent to the football field that you would for the CD, thinking that this would help us avoid some shenanigans on the low traverse but in retrospect, I don't believe we gained any time by doing so. On the descent we went hard skiers left and managed to stay on a combination of snow and dry glacier with only a few short sections of loose 3rd to link everything together. The 6600 traverse is holding strong but Jeff's words from late July are certainly still true. There are several spots that require exposed movement on dry glacial fins that are a little sporty. I personaly wouldn't want to be in there with a guest that's not solid on their feet right now. Running water is available in one spot early on, moving across the Coleman but I did not encounter any after that. Once on the route, a friendly boot pack allowed for short roping almost all the way to the ice step, requiring just one short pitch to the the right side of the nose. The exit straight up is still holding strong, above which there was a track heading to a bridge that is about to collapse. We managed to gain the summit plateau a few hundred feet climbers left of this bridge but you will likely need to end run the whole crack within the next week or two. The 8800 crack has a super solid rap anchor above it and a 60 left us ample rope to spare. There is also enough room to comfortably stage pre rigged guest between the anchor and the lip. Thanks to whoever put that in! Colfax has been shedding nicely, I'm attaching a photo. We opted to move through the debris and it took about 5 minutes total with a strong guest. The firn line is creeping up fast and starting to expose some of the slope above the football field. Ignore the straight line at the beginning of my track, my phone was still in battery saver mode. Let me know if you have questions.

it has been getting climbed pretty often by the guide services. reports from them have been making it sound good. I will try to find the recent one and give it to you here.

cutting a couple strands and leaving it sounds more like attempted murder than sabotage. very un canadian.