dylan_taylor

2 inches! and only a 20% chance of that...

There go the freshies... Maybe the snow will get blown all the way to bham. Boilerplate and man-eating sastrugi waves from now till the end of next week...

We did the spearhead on Feb 6-8, conditions were a little softer than they are now, but the whistler area had just had a big wind event prior (and during!) our traverse. We bivied in a snowcave on the tremor glacier on N.1. We made it to the hut the next night. The route seems to allow the skiier to avoid the nastiest of avalanch terrain. One couloir below decker is a little interesting though, and the worst part for us was skinning up a slope from fitzsimmons up and over to the overlord. It was getting really wind loaded. Should be bomber now. The stretch from the platform to the McBeth descent will be chattery. Have fun. It looks cold up there.

Cool! Nice pics! We did the spearhead traverse a week ago, and arrived in the hut on our last night. We didn't ski fissile - too windy. We came down from the overlord glacier. It was interesting how the front door had blown around, forcing the doorknob through the wall. It could make for an interesting pee hole if you were creative enough. The hut was drifted in with lots of snow (and playing cards?) on the floor, and on the back bed. Pretty nice respite from the wind though, a lot better than a snowcave or tent.

Climb: Mt Baker-Coleman Glacier Date of Climb: 2/15/2006 Trip Report: We had a nice ski tour yesterday. We skied from the Coleman-demming saddle. Back in town for late afternoon snacks. There was 3-5 inches of incredibly light wind-blown snow, and some graupel chunks to give it all a nice texture. Just under the light fluff was a layer of boilerplate, so you could carve high speed turns and kick up rooster tails of smoke and look like a rockstar, all while you are really thinking you are going to catch an edge and blow out an ACL seven miles from the car. It was COLD yesterday. It was fine, skinning up through the trees. But then when we got to the glacier, it felt like the instant arctic blast. I didn't take a thermometer, but my know my nose hairs start freezing at about +5 F. It was so cold that my skis wouldn't slide at the saddle - wrong wax temp. I had to double-pole it for a few hundred feet till the snowtemp warmed. No pics, i took slides. Gear Notes: should have had a facemask Approach Notes: 4wd + high speed quads.

I showed my hands to a hand doc in boulder a year ago. Definetly dupuytrens for me. I've got a large lump midway up the palm on each hand, over the ring finger tendon. Below the lumps, stretching towards my wrists, my tendons are elevated. my ring fingers are contracting and I have very poor flexibility of the whole hand. I can barely get my palm flat on a table and it is uncomfortable. The doctor said he's never seen it in someone so young (I am 30). Usually, he says, he sees them in people in their 50's and 60's. He says he keeps up on the literature of this particular disease because he has the gene (family hx) and he knows he's gonna get it. But his advice is often opposite of what I read in the above link. he was telling me "not to stretch or massage it - it'l only make it worse" he says. I don't know if he's full of it or not. Although he did say a lot of the same things you said mike: once surgery is performed, it progresses into second-stage dupuytrens - which progresses faster. He said surgery, though effective, would only last 5-6 years, and it would be like "pulling bubble gum out of a shag carpet". I recently heard that there was a paper published by some european doctors studying sports related injuries in young european sport climbers. A client told me about it. I wish I could get my (steadily warping) hands on it. Apparently, there are frequent cases of dupuytrens in young euro sport climbers who climb a ton and get overuse injuries. Sort of goes along with what that link stated and what some people here are saying. . I do not know if there is a genetic link to those cases, or if it is simply from climbing/training overuse.

Coolscan V ! In the interest of fastest acceptable throughput I do only minimal processing with the scanning software (ICE only) & do any further twiddling in photoshop. Are your samples both scanned and posted at the same resolution? Thats what I've been using as well! After many wasted sessions learning how to use this thing, and screwing up a lot of images, I think I will go to digi ICE only (and some histogram tweaking), and save the rest for photo-chop.

Its not a dmm cam but the idea is the same. use lighter to melt cord, and/or tie a knot in it first. The weedwacker cord has been on this cam for almost four years without incident.

forget cable. fine gauge weedwacker cord! Less than four bucks for 50'. You can repair cams for life.

Sorry, I was new to digital DEE and ICE when i scanned it, thus the blue cast in the shadows and the burned out highlights on the boulder. I aim to do better next time. You are right about my shadow. It is annoying. It stung when I noticed that after getting the slides back. It's tough with a fisheye when the sun is on your back. I am not a sophisticated enough photochop user to take that out. Nor did I think it was worth my time.

Impressive! Seems like the snowpack in the Tordrillos and the Illiamna area is hurting, as can be seen in the distant background in the Dec 20 photo here.

Good luck on your objective! Could you elaborate on your charity? I've never thought that "being active" demanded much publicity. What other things are you attempting to raise awareness of? How will this objective of yours raise the funds for it? Suerte!

Baker was fun yesterday. quite deep, very soft, kind of warm. At least it was snowing.

with what?

YAAAAAY! way to send mike and jay! I drove past the bustop almost every day for 15 years, never went in there. The lower hose looks nasty, nice work!

I've only been there during [our] winter season. From what I hear, there are plenty of good days in the summer dry season (June-aug are often ok, some folks have had decent though limited success in september). If you are flexible with your schedule and enjoy seeing all the other stuff that Ecuador has to offer than you can just go up to the huts when the weather gets good. One benifit of local guides is that they can often be hired spur of the moment (except during busy holiday seasons). Organizations like Safari, Ecuadorian Alpine Institute (big, gnarly 4WD A-team-style van), and some of the others mentioned also provide the transportation as well as the guide. If you walk around gringolandia for a while, you will see plenty of outfitters' offices that you can inquire with. Good luck, and good hunting.

The standard route on Illiniza Norte is a fun hiking route that you can do in flip flops if the weather is good, however, tennies tend to perform better in the occasional snow patch. Illiniza sur has gotten a bit more technical over the past few years. La Rampa no longer exists (as a snow and ice route anyway). Rumor has it some locals have been scrambling up it as sort of a bowling alley/rock climb. I'd prefer the normal route, which still comes in quite nicely, sometimes even with a pitch or two of ice. Summit is top left corner: My favorite out of all the peaks down there has been Antisana (i've never been to El Eltar or Sangay so i can't comment on those heaps.) In December 04 we saw no one there. It is the one peak you do not use a hut for (real camping in the grass, and human feces are hard to find!!!). True adventure, big glaciers, big slots, and no well-beaten trough to follow if the weather shits the bed. Here's a shot just below the summit cap: Then there's cotopaxi... Cotopaxi is sort of the dream volcano, though quite busy. The hut is fairly clean (much more so than the dingy green-slime-filled hovel at the base of Illiniza Sur - seems like we all got sick there - just from breathing the stale air in that place). The route is usually straight forward, and quite scenic. The summit is top notch If you're lucky you'll see Tungurahua and Sangay erupting simutaneously. As for local guides, there are some decent organizations with both good and bad guides (a lot are freelance and will work for anyone). However, I can not recommend them because I am biased because I am a U.S. guide. I've worked with Ecuadorian guides and I can say that the training standards are far better than Bolivian standards, but that doesn't always correlate to performance. I watched a "veteran" guide shortroping three clients (one of whom was my girlfriend) down a 40 degree neve slope with a horrible runout. He was almost tripping my girlfriend with a huge bight of slack, as he was speaking on a cell phone. I will not work with him again. Caveat Emptor: You get what you pay for. Suerte. Dylan

have fun in CO

Gosh, my poor, mysterious ice formation. It is so misunderstood... And finally: and and and

Darrin, those are amazing. Jeezus Mike, what an onslaught. ski porn almost...

well said...

"Alpine" or "Rock" Almosts: Jonny C., Bhagirathi III, India: Jonny C., West face of Piergiorgio, Marconi Valley, Patagonia:

Bouldering almosts: Bouldering in the buttermilks: Bouldering in Tapovan Meadows, Gharwal Himalaya, India:

allyoucaneat, that glacier skiing shot is awsome.

And finally, another scenic, a forest fire near my folks house near Boulder. I shot the photo from the driveway. The sparks are from a tree exploding...