JoshK

"Mountain Hardwear designs, develops and markets the most technically advanced equipment and apparel available to outdoor enthusiasts and professionals, many of whom are icons in the global mountaineering community." BWAHAHAHAH...whatever This fits, columbia is cheap and mountain hardware sucks. It's a match made in heaven.

You should sue and get some $$$ for using your property without your permission

I realize that. My point is grazing cattle suck...wherever they are. It's not like threads dont drift from time to time around here.

My point is that in many parts of central and south america the chain saws are being used to destroy the forests in order to let more cattle graze.

Yeah, I've heard that coffee ain't so nice to the forests too. I can certainly believe that.

No ragging nescessary. You get the same thing no matter the size of the mountain, to a certain point. I think we all pretty much consider going up rainer in the summer via the D.C. a glaciated hike, but try pretty much any route on rainer in the winter and you at least better be prepared for shit to hit the fan.

My point is using land to allow cattle to graze is bullshit, period. It's what a huge portion of the rain forest is being ripped down for. Why? So this fat ass nation can eat mcdonalds cheap. I'm not a vegetarian, and never want to be one. I enjoy a nice fat steak every once in a while, or a burger for that matter. But the fact remains that the price we pay in order to let fat asses eat beef every single day is quite high, but in terms of public cost and cost to the environment.

Oh, but we should definitely be subsidizing ranchers, cause as we all know, raising fucking cattle is the best food-per-land deal around. IDIOTS.

Hope it works out for you...it's pretty warm up there.

Something tells me that the river doesn't care much about the border.

I didn't think the fraser was *that* much bigger? I know the columbia is longer, but I can believe the fraser has more flow as it's drainage is not only more northern, but isn't it more westerly?

Please tell me this is the name of a drink and not actually a milkshake made with tequila, cause that sounds really sick!

Dru, it does seem to me that the B.C. forecasts are a bit more conservative. It looks like they tent to err on the side of caution and would rather bump to a higher level than a lower level. I guess this doesn't surprise me; I've actually been surprised sometimes that they avy report in WA wasn't higher when I've gone out and found scary conditions. Actually, my closest call with an avy to date was during a period where "low" conditions were forecasted. From what I could see around me, the snowpack actually held quite a bit of danger that wasn't mentioned in the forecast. I suppose this could have been due to local effects in the area that I was in, but you never know. I'm certainly no expert. I just take the avy forecasts as a general go/no-go helper for the entire trip and evaluate the conditions as I go along. I think I almost always err on the side of caution, mostly as a side effect of not knowing any better, and I figure being alive is better than not.

SNOWPACK ANALYSIS..... Periods of very strong winds and very heavy snow accumulations were seen from about last Wednesday through last Sunday. Sites near and west of the crest accumulated 4-7 feet of snowfall during that time. Sites east of the crest accumulated less such as Mission Ridge with about 1.5 feet. This caused a major avalanche cycle near and west of the crest with many storm cycle soft slab avalanche incidents but no fatalities. Generally decreasing winds, much lighter precipitation and more stable surface crusts Monday and Tuesday combined with substantial snow pack settlement to reduce the avalanche danger. Total snow pack settlement at sites near and west of the crest varies from about 1-2 feet the past few days. An exception was Mt Baker which accumulated another 12 inches of snow on Tuesday. Heavy rain was generally seen on Wednesday in the southwest Olympics and in the Washington Cascades near and west of the crest from about Mt Rainier north. Many sites near the Cascade crest had roughly 2-3 inches of water mostly as rain with Mt Baker picking up over 4 inches. The loading and weakening by the rain and warm temperatures should have resulted in some large natural wet snow avalanches in the backcountry in this area. We have only one initial report so far Thursday morning of such an avalanche in a back country area in White Pine Creek east of Stevens Pass. Sites at Mt Hood had almost no precipitation Wednesday and another several inches of snow pack settlement. SOUTHWEST OLYMPICS...WASHINGTON CASCADES NEAR AND WEST OF THE CREST MT RAINIER NORTH... High avalanche danger above 4-5000 feet and considerable below Thursday. Avalanche danger decreasing Friday becoming considerable above 5000 feet and moderate below.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and eliminate the grand canyon. I'll get rid of the great smokies while I'm at it too...

Dude, see above...Howse of Cards...that's "sick". It's an amazing, impressive piece of climbing in an amazing place. The penalty for failing is great. Chris wanking on some oversized rock in the forest is not sick, no matter how hard you try to say it is. Well, I suppose if he fell, he could sprain an ankle.

Dave and I are racing to see who can spray more, that's why he is posting a lot.

Ummm...near alberta and with the ocean in the foreground?

I think the hurcules is supposed to be pretty burly. Jim sells them at his shop and I think I remember him saying he was pretty impressed with it. You may want to give him a call.

He probably just assume you were bagging on a spelling mistake, since that is what most people on this board seem to love to do.

I spent a day and a half in wenatchee a few years ago when snocrummie and stevens were both closed for nearly 48 horus. I imagine snocrummie getting closed costs a shitload because Seattle/Tacoma is a huge port, and I-90 is the largest highway, by far, heading back east. Of course, I think white pass opened much quicker than the other two, but I decided missing a day of work being stranded in wenatchee was better than driving around.

LOL...a submarine!? no shit!? hehe...portland's cool, but I wouldn't even really classify seattle as a "big city" even though it's much larger than portland. chicago, NYC, san fran...I think of those as big cities. I kinda tend to think of them having a metro feel that only a really big city has. Have you ever lived anywhere else? Seattle is a big ass city bro. Its way more urban and metro than a lot of other cities you probably consider big. Yeah man, and I dig Seattle. I don't get off my lazy ass and move for a reason. It is certainly one hellavu lot bigger and more metro feeling than portland, that's for sure. I dunno tho, when I think of really big cities, truly world class citys, I basically think of like NYC, London, Paris...shit like that. Maybe I'm confused and they seem all fancy since I am seeing them from the tourist point of view. I guess somebody could come here and say the same thing and I'd never know it. One thing is for sure...it doesn't just have to do with population. Most of my family lives in phoenix, which while large by population standards, is a shithole deluxe. On a related note, has anybody ever noticed that vancouver, B.C. is a very unusal city? Unlike your standard cities which seem to follow a very similar model: downtown financial district, hotel district, outlying areas, etc...vancouver seems to be a very huge condo city. It doesn't really have a concentrated downtown with large skyscrapers and financial buildings, but has more highrise condos and the like spread around the city. I noticed this last time I was up there...

wirlwind, you may want to consult a map of alberta, canada....

Klenke, I was just in the ballard fred meyer about 30 minutes ago. As of today or a few days ago they have a large guinness display setup near the south entrance. In any event, they had the actual guinness glasses for sale at $1.99 each. there were a ton of them there tonight.