mrr

Alright, I just gotta vent to somebody (and maybe save some of you from the same fate)... A buddy of mine and I made the 2.5 hour drive from B'ham up to Washington Pass this morning to get in a quick trip up the Beckey Route on Liberty Bell. As we get close to the Blue Lake parking lot we notice big orange 'No Parking' signs (the temporary ones they put up in construction areas) and a DOT pick-up truck blocking the entrance to the parking lot.... Hmmm, we wonder to each other, what's up?? We start to turn around to park across the road - figuring they're repaving the parking lot or something equally innocent, when the DOT guy gets out of his truck and comes over to deliver the most stunning news...Liberty Bell, in fact the whole area, is closed until at least 12:30 or 1:00 (it's currently about 7:45) for (get this) avalanche control... Needless to say, we're stunned. He goes on to explain that they've been trying for a few days to get in there and set off some charges -- but there always seems to be people climbing and hiking -- yeah, go figure. We ask politely how we might have known this and saved ourselves the trip -- he says he doesn't really know, but it might have been on the radio in Wenatchee... So, we keep on driving around LB and take a look up the chutes -- not much in the way of snow left up there...oh well. We ended up salvaging the day with a trip up towards Cutthroat...followed by a trip to the brewery in Winthrop. We did here a number of charges go off - but by the time we got back around the hairpin (around 2:00) not a flake of snow had come down (a few rocks though). Here's the kicker - we stopped at the ranger station in Winthrop and went in and asked the ranger how we might find out about these events in the future...and she had NO IDEA what I was talking about. I asked if she was aware that the DOT had closed the Blue Lake trailhead from at least 7:30 - 1:00 -- nope, all news to her. Anyway, I'm not sure what calmed my nerves more - the couple pints of Winthrop Wheat or dumping my day into this note - but thanks for reading and be warned... mrr