Snowman_Jim

It's time to liquidate my collection. I'm moving back to the Caucasus where I spent the last year and everything goes into storage again - or gets sold! I hoped to sell the entire collection to Chessler but he isn't buying this stuff any more. I'll sell the entire collection, any one series, or single issues. I can send a spreadsheet with what I have and what each item retails for from Chessler. (Which is a guideline, the condition of his copies and mine may differ. Everything is negotiable.) A rough summary of what I have: AAJ #57 - 83 (1983-2009) except 66-68 Mostly in new condition CAJ #78 - 88 (1995-2005) except 86 ANAM 1985 - 2008 minus a couple years early on Summit / Mountain Journal 1984 - 1996 Climbing #160 - 188 (1996 - 99) plus a few newer Rock and Ice #15 - 104 (1986 - 2000) few years missing Climbing Art #1 - 30 (1986 - 97) missing a few Mariah / Outside Vol 1-4 (1976-79) Couloir - Various issues since 1996 to 2007 Backcountry - Various issues 1995 - 2003 Yep, lots of stuff. Too much to keep storing. Ask about specifics, or ask for the spreadsheet with everything listed.

As far as I know the only route on Rainier that avoids glaciers (and their crevasses) is Success Cleaver. I do not believe it's a beginners route. But I'm no expert on Rainier, the crowds, hype and politics/fees are enough of an incentive for me to go elsewhere. Adams and Hood do have routes with large crevasses, but the beginner routes on both mountains do not. Many routes on Hood avoid glacier travel. On Adams the south side route avoids them, I don't know about any others.

I don't have any comment on the photo, haven't even looked at it. But I find this comment interesting. This is something you do better when somebody is watching? Or evaluating? As opposed to other times?

Sure you can look for a way to get involved. With a lot of things, such as grant committees for state agencies. But try to volunteer for a fee committee which the feds rely on to implement fees. You can always get involved from the outside in various means of protest, but good luck getting involved in the inner circle of recommending and approving the fees.

"The recommendation for the fee at Skull Hollow was unanimously passed by the Pacific Northwest Recreation Resource Advisory Committee – a group of volunteer members ranging from guides to state tourism officials who represent different areas of the outdoor recreation arena and make recommendations on new or increased recreation fees on Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management land ..." These advisory committees are stacked with lackeys from the start. Local guides = people who rely on agency permits to operate. Does anyone really think they'll offer "advice" counter to what the agencies want? The committee members claim they don't make the decision and only offer advice based on what the agency presents to them. (Which they expect to be objective?) The agency claims that for all practical purposes the committee advice is followed for the final decision. Talk about passing the buck back and forth ... This is the way fees are being implemented in many places. Has anyone here who has no vested interest ever been asked to serve on one of these fee committees? Don't expect to be any time soon.

Well, it wasn't a parking permit but I just came back from court today for a traffic type ticket issued by the USFS which was dismissed by the US Attorneys office. With their apologies. The alleged violations were related to vehicle and driver licensing by the state of Oregon. No moving violations were alleged at all. It was issued in a parking lot at a trailhead. So now we have a federal agency attempting and pretending to be involved in vehicle and driver paperwork issues. I would think this is still something very much a state power under whatever is left of the 10th amendment. The USFS lady couldn't write a ticket for state law violations so she wrote it for violating a CFR which refers to special orders issued by the agency. This was back in May. I asked the clerk who covers all this stuff in Portland at the US Attorneys office for a copy of the forest order violated as well as the specific ORS (state) statutes violated. Eventually they dug up an order that is ancient. It refers to specific ORS statutes, none of which apply and one of which no longer even exists. For good measure she threw in copies of a bunch of ORS sections that govern how the state does things, are not referenced in the forest order, and have no relevance at all. She told me it would be set for court when I pointed the above things out in a written response. I got a phone message a while ago that it was today in Medford so I drove over there ready to make the case. Nobody seemed to have me on their list and there was no indication of where to go. After eventually being routed to a courtroom with trials and sitting through one the law clerk prosecuting this stuff said they were dismissing it. Nice of them to tell me. She seemed straight forward though and said she had never been given my contact info by the others when it was bounced around all over. She spoke to me afterward and told me that the forest order was a worthless piece of junk ("as I had pointed out in my letter" in her words). She also apologized for the inadequate and shoddy discovery response from Portland. So if you get a USFS ticket of any kind be sure to research it. Ask the US Attorneys office for any specific info that is relevant such as local forest orders, etc. Make them be very specific about what law they are charging you with - they seem to like CFRs that are vague and refer to other documents they hope and assume you won't ask for. It may seem like a lot of time and effort but it isn't really. I found everything I needed, or references to what I needed to ask for, online with little trouble. The biggest waste of time and money was driving to Medford which should not have been necessary. The other trial I sat through was also USFS. The judge did not just listen politely, find the guy guilty, and impose a slap on the wrist judgment. This is sometimes how these CVB trials go, but he gave the defendant adequate time and guidance, asked good questions himself of both parties, and spent time deliberating. In fact he didn't even render a decision but took the case under advisement. It was a pleasant surprise. So if you get a good judge you do have a chance to make your case and you do have a chance of winning if your case is good enough. When it comes to fees many of them clearly violate the authorizing legislation. The US Attorneys office has much more to lose than a defendant in terms of being embarrassed in federal court. They are expected to be 100% on top of their game, random citizens aren't. And most citizens aren't appearing regularly. They will try to build a solid case, but if they are fed garbage by the USFS and the end result is likely to be an embarrassment in court they will dismiss it. (However, in some cases its not about the specifics as much as an underlying issue or an effort to create precedent. This has been true of fee issues in some cases.)

Well, it wasn't a parking permit but I just came back from court today for a traffic type ticket issued by the USFS which was dismissed by the US Attorneys office. With their apologies. The alleged violations were related to vehicle and driver licensing by the state of Oregon. No moving violations were alleged at all. It was issued in a parking lot at a trailhead. So now we have a federal agency attempting and pretending to be involved in vehicle and driver paperwork issues. I would think this is still something very much a state power under whatever is left of the 10th amendment. The USFS lady couldn't write a ticket for state law violations so she wrote it for violating a CFR which refers to special orders issued by the agency. This was back in May. I asked the clerk who covers all this stuff in Portland at the US Attorneys office for a copy of the forest order violated as well as the specific ORS (state) statutes violated. Eventually they dug up an order that is ancient. It refers to specific ORS statutes, none of which apply and one of which no longer even exists. For good measure she threw in copies of a bunch of ORS sections that govern how the state does things, are not referenced in the forest order, and have no relevance at all. She told me it would be set for court when I pointed the above things out in a written response. I got a phone message a while ago that it was today in Medford so I drove over there ready to make the case. Nobody seemed to have me on their list and there was no indication of where to go. After eventually being routed to a courtroom with trials and sitting through one the law clerk prosecuting this stuff said they were dismissing it. Nice of them to tell me. She seemed straight forward though and said she had never been given my contact info by the others when it was bounced around all over. She spoke to me afterward and told me that the forest order was a worthless piece of junk ("as I had pointed out in my letter" in her words). She also apologized for the inadequate and shoddy discovery response from Portland. So if you get a USFS ticket of any kind be sure to research it. Ask the US Attorneys office for any specific info that is relevant such as local forest orders, etc. Make them be very specific about what law they are charging you with - they seem to like CFRs that are vague and refer to other documents they hope and assume you won't ask for. It may seem like a lot of time and effort but it isn't really. I found everything I needed, or references to what I needed to ask for, online with little trouble. The biggest waste of time and money was driving to Medford which should not have been necessary. The other trial I sat through was also USFS. The judge did not just listen politely, find the guy guilty, and impose a slap on the wrist judgment. This is sometimes how these CVB trials go, but he gave the defendant adequate time and guidance, asked good questions himself of both parties, and spent time deliberating. In fact he didn't even render a decision but took the case under advisement. It was a pleasant surprise. So if you get a good judge you do have a chance to make your case and you do have a chance of winning if your case is good enough. When it comes to fees many of them clearly violate the authorizing legislation. The US Attorneys office has much more to lose than a defendant in terms of being embarrassed in federal court. They are expected to be 100% on top of their game, random citizens aren't. And most citizens aren't appearing regularly. They will try to build a solid case, but if they are fed garbage by the USFS and the end result is likely to be an embarrassment in court they will dismiss it. (However, in some cases its not about the specifics as much as an underlying issue or an effort to create precedent. This has been true of fee issues in some cases.)

I think if you hit snow it's most likely going to be in the Howlock and Sawtooth area, I'm not familiar with that. Anything forested and at all northerly can still have quite a bit. If you can avoid that kind of terrain you shouldn't find so much. Going around Crater Lake there are a surprising number of snow patches, but the only place they are still widespread enough to make following any trails too hard would be between Cleetwood Cove and the north entrance junction. Along that section of road the snow was almost continuous. That is sloped to the north slightly, treed, and I assume about 6000' or a bit higher. I know what you mean about access, between being able to ski from the trailheads and being able to follow the trails there is a period when routefinding in the forest with discontinuous snow can be a real pain some places.

I was up at Crater Lake Park yesterday. It's hard to say for sure about any lingering snow below treeline, but I wouldn't expect too much. Thielson looks quite dry from the south. From a distance this may not mean no snow below treeline, but everything open is pretty much dried off. A friend who isn't really a climber at all did Thielson recently with no problems. I doubt she would have if the trail had been too hard to follow due to snow. There were cars at the Mt Scott trailhead, and I'm sure it's being hiked regularly. There is quite a bit of snow on the western bowl, but I believe the trail goes south of that. The final stretch along the ridgeline may have some snow. There is enough in the western bowl for somebody to have skied it, although this strikes me as more desperate than appealing. From a distance the east face of Scott looks pretty much entirely dry. Bailey also looks pretty dry from a distance on the south and east aspects. I'd expect the more northerly aspects which I could not see may still have quite a bit of snow. The north bowl of McLoughlin still has snow top to bottom, and the NE bowl is only slightly less covered. (However, the north facing bowl on Pelican butte looks pretty snow free, perhaps because its lower in elevation.) I'm not familiar with Howlock at all. I can't imagine having to go cross country. You may encounter a few sections of snow, but at this point they should not be extended and the way across will probably be clear. Mosquitoes may be a bigger issue than snow. They vary a lot with location and time of day but are getting pretty bad in some spots.

Any mountain worthy of a discussion such as this one is WAY too crowded. I recommend climbing (or skiing) something where public toilets aren't such an issue!

Finally got around to scanning this old slide. I'm sure the wooden piton is even older than the slide is, probably by quite a bit. But I guess you never know for sure. We came across it while climbing something in the Chamonix area, I couldn't tell you what it was we were on any more though. [img:left]http://www.snowman-jim.org/climbing/gallery2/d/1767-1/wood-piton.jpg[/img]

Paul - The photo above is 6/21 and things are changing quickly. I found the Devils Lake trailhead area open enough to drive in and park in the upper lot even though a report no more than a week before that indicated the only parking was on the shoulder of the road. Below 6000' you'll see very little snow right now, above 6500' there is a lot. In between depends. I don't know the elevation of Chambers Lakes but I think that area can be slow to thaw out. An alternative that comes to mind is to camp at treeline below the Hayden Glacier towards the edge of the SE ridge of N Sister, that will be mostly or totally snow free and has plenty of water sources. I would expect that by the weekend of the 4th the south ridge of middle will be mostly or totally snow free on the western windward side. It's not too steep or hard anyway, even if there are some patches of snow. I doubt I'll try the west side again this year since I have some other obligations and even though coverage is good it won't last forever. The West Face left is described as steep enough for rockfall but not steep enough to be interesting, and the west face right is a similar angle. It might be possible to head to the SW ridge but I wouldn't assume that, the entire face can pretty convoluted and anywhere you leave the snow everything will crumble. If I were uncertain about the west side but wanting to climb something other than the s ridge I'd go for Thayer Glacier Headwall. It saves the slog around the mountain and can be done without a bivy. It's a comparable angle to WFD but much more open without the same degree of funneling of everything. You just need to be topping out early due to the aspect which catches the first sunlight. (One party a few years ago discovered the hard and painful way that this is not a good descent route to be on mid-morning!) For the WFD I'd swing out towards the west along the far edge of Collier Glacier from Prouty Point. There used to be one large crevasse just below that area but staying up high to cross to the west edge avoids it. From the far edge of the glacier you should be able to inspect the entire couloir with some small binoculars. Snow coverage is very good this year but all you need is for one spot to be bare and you can be forced onto tenuous dinner plates for a while until you can get back into the couloir or hit the traverse snow field. It's worthwhile to check it out as completely as possible before heading up it. You'd also have a good view of the WFR and a chance to see how it looks for escaping to the SW ridge. I've never worried much about crossing the glacier, but YMMV. There used to be the one large crevasse well above the roll over, which should be visible from some perspectives even when bridged. The roll over and the area around it may have some noteworthy crevasses. If you cross low, below that, there shouldn't be anything to worry about. But I haven't been there in a while now, and I may do a bit more solo glacier travel than a lot of people even though I try to be conservative.

The "West Face Direct" (WFD) was the first route I ever did when I arrived in Oregon a long time ago. "Ballsy" is probably an adequate description - not technically that hard but you don't want to spend a lot of time in there and it really needs to have complete snow cover. I was actually out there Sat trying to ski around the mountain to have a look at it since I've thought about doing it again if I can catch it in just the right condition. I gave up at the NW ridge (going ccw from Pole Creek) since I could barely see where I was going at all, let alone anything higher on the mountain. (I did get a lot of photos of the avalanche debris below Villard Glacier and EMC though - very impressive. They are posted in my own gallery: http://www.snowman-jim.org/climbing/gallery2/v/2010-06-19-nsister/) I know the area well enough from experience not to get lost or end up on the wrong mountain, but there didn't seem to be much point in doing the circumnavigation that day. (In better weather it's an excellent trip and I highly recommend it.) I suspect the WFD has good coverage right now, although I'm not too sure it will be solid firn you can cruise along on. I think it's a route you're best off soloing - that's the quickest way up and out of it, there's not much room for belays from safe spots, and I'm not sure how much good a rope or belay will do if you meet large stuff coming down while you're going up. I fortunately did not experience this, but near the base I do remember hearing a lot of small bb or pea sized objects go whizzing by. I did it too late and there was a bare section that was like a half cylinder of plaster-like rock that would be hard to do safely. It was possible to climb out of the couloir on the left, work up a bunch of loose small dinner plate rocks, and regain the snow higher up. Any single small dinner place knocked loose quickly multiplied with everything funneling into the WFD below. It was a very memorable climb but I'd strongly suggest moving quickly, making sure conditions are ideal or close, and making sure there is complete snow/firn coverage from the base up to where the traverse comes in from the right. I had considered going back in Tues or Wed had it been in good shape, but I didn't feel conditions were what I wanted them to be on those days. Jim

There are several NWS products, I think there may be some confusion here. The discussion is the forecasters narrative that is issued with each update. (Usually somewhere around 3 am/pm and 9am/pm) This is by forecast office, not by zone. Mt Hood will differ from Mt Baker because Hood is covered by the portland office and Baker by a different one - I assume Seattle. The discussion covers their opinion of the models, updates they made from the previous forecast, possible updates the next person might be considering, etc. It usually indicates their confidence in the forecast which I find especially useful. (My favorite read something like "we're unanimous in our outlook, but we could be unanimously incorrect". There are also zone forecasts, which cover smaller areas within a forecast office region. Usually these are delineated by geography, so the mountain zones will specify freezing or snow levels etc. These give the forecast for each specific time period such as today, tonight, tomorrow, etc. How far ahead they go seems to depend on the confidence. The discussions are excellent for an overview of whats going on, the general confidence, etc. The zones are the best source for details such as freezing levels, amount of snowfall, etc. Use both of them. The clickable map is a cool idea but I agree that it is probably just interpolating from the broader forecast. I would take any refinement it offers to the zone forecast with a grain of salt.

There might be but I wouldn't count on it. I haven't bothered going up that way at all so no first hand knowledge of it. A couple weeks ago somebody who drove over the pass told me it was very thin at pass elevations. We've had some storms since then but the snow level has been very high. In Klamath Falls it rained quite a bit over New Years eve and New years, not even close to snow. (About 4100' but on the dry shadow side.) Crater Lake sounds like they have a decent amount, the rim area is in the vicinity of 6000'. And the brunt of some storms seems to have gone just enough north of 140 to make a difference between the pass and Crater Lake. There's only one way to find out, of course. But I wouldn't expect much of a base, especially at the trailhead elevations.

I didn't realize there were two different situations. I know there was a rescue effort for the one out in the Christmas Valley vicinity. But it makes sense that these were different since I had heard different details. Perhaps there is some blame to be placed on a GPS that suggests such a route. But it seems to me the driver should be prepared to dig out. In one case they couldn't get unstuck from the snow, and I would guess they didn't have a shovel. The photos from one of these, I think the second case, showed the road they were on. It was well covered in snow. It was clearly not plowed or otherwise winter maintained. You would think they might reconsider their route at some point. I'm certainly glad everyone was found ok in both cases, but I wouldn't put too much of the blame on a GPS unit. I used to have an atlas a bit like this. It would show a passable dirt road as a direct route, and in reality there would be a network of four wheel drive routes. I once followed what looked like a dirt road from Silverton to Lake City and ended up with an adventurous trip over engineer pass. I was actually somewhat fond of that atlas.

The road to the rim from the south is plowed most of the time. They may get behind during big storms. The north entrance is closed and unplowed. I believe snowmobiles are allowed from the north entrance to the junction with the rim road. I'm pretty sure the main visitor center is open all year, the one at the rim is not. The cafe/gift shop at the rim is supposed to be open. The trip around the lake is fantastic. I took three days doing it in late winter a long time ago. The east side is pretty remote, getting out in any direction over there is a long ways. I only saw two other people who were finishing (in the other direction) shortly after I began. The area south of the lake is windblown and the route can sometimes be hard to follow so a map and compass are essential to have. There are only a couple avalanche areas on the trip around the lake, and they are well known and avoidable. However, if you ski for turns in other places there is a lot more potential. Mt Scott is all steep open slopes, the slopes down Mt Garfield to the visitor center area are steep and open, and anything inside the rim is avalanche terrain (and also prohibited). A couple weeks ago a guy took a ride on the Mt Garfield slopes, got strained out by some trees, and spent some time in the hospital with a broken pelvis I believe. Mt Scott is a long approach, and a long way from anything if you do have any problems. It has some large avalanche paths on it. In the later spring it can be approached from the east using some forest roads off of 97 that go up to the park boundary. It is an easy day trip, even with multiple ski runs, from this side. However, before the forest roads melt out this is also a very long approach. A snowmobile would be a great way to do this trip.

Actually this isn't true, at least on the searching. There was a search that involved quite a few people. I think most of it was through the Klamath County sheriffs office but I assume Lake County was involved also. Apparently they were finally rescued when a relative used the same GPS and followed the same suggested route. Although previously I thought I had read that cell phone signals were used.

I could be wrong, but I thought Willi Unsoeld and Janie Diepenbrock had cords out when they died on Mt Rainier in 1979. I don't know about that particular case, but there have been victims found that had deployed an avalanche cord. Unfortunately none were found very quickly, or alive. There was one case where the cord had been deployed and melted out first in spring, before any other clues. It really wasn't a great idea. But before beacons I guess it seemed like the thing to do.

What I find interesting is this tidbit from the text that accompanies the video:

Here you go - the topo as a jpeg is attached. The full article in pdf format wouldn't upload for me, it may be too large. You can get it here: ftp://i-world.net/pub/ Jim

I never knew Brutus personally but remember him from rec.climbing in the early days of the internet (as least as we know it). He was one of the characters in the Holy Grail Spoof. Wow, was that ever a long time ago! Very sorry to hear the news.

CAI is the alpine club. That's sometimes a good venue to find partners. Once you are there they may have offices you can inquire in also, as well as buying maps. The Austrian club has offices in numerous cities. Language depends where in Italy you are. In South Tyrol German is the more common and preferred language, in other regions that's not likely to be the case. English is very common throughout Europe in cities and in towns of any size, and among younger people who have all learned it in school. The places I've had to use my limited German have been in the valleys, with somewhat older people. There it is useful to be able to ask directions, pay bills and get change, book a room, etc. If you are going to be near the Italian side of Mt Blanc you can try going over to Chamonix to the visitor/climber info center there. They keep a book you can post a note in, or reply to somebody else. I've never encountered this anywhere else. I'm getting ready to go to Austria for a few weeks and joined the couchsurfing.com site. Not that I need a couch, or necessarily a ski partner either. But for larger areas, especially with universities, like Innsbruck there are a lot of members who seem to willing to meet travelers and help out with local connections. Even if you don't find a climber directly you probably have a good chance of a local pointing you in the right direction or recommending somebody they know. If you go that far stay three weeks. It's a long trip and a great experience, and even if your time here is limited you will probably have more opportunity to climb in the US than in the alps. Jim

If aspect relating to solar radiation is different for your purposes that aspect relating to wind that might be your third feature. Many avalanches, and most fatalities, on Mt Hood have been in May and early June and this is a significant contributing factor. The effects of incoming radiation will also depend on slope angle, I don't how complicated you want to get though.

The Senate bill to repeal the fee program authorization is S. 868 sponsored by Baucus. Although it was introduced a while ago there are still only two co-sponsors. It also is still in the Energy and Natural Resources committee. Once government fees are introduced it seems pretty much impossible to reverse them, but it's worth a few minutes of your time to contact your senator and ask them to support, or even co-sponsor, this bill. Wyden and Cantwell are both on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. New fees, and fee hikes, are supposedly approved by committees that represent the public. But it's probably not worth your time to try to contact members of these committees since they are indebted to the Forest Service or BLM. They are put on the committee for that reason. Here is an interesting article with some insight on the fee approval committee system, from a snail-mail newsletter from a group called "Keep the Sespe Wild": RECREATION FEE COMMITTEES The FLREA fee law, enacted a few years ago to replace the initial Recreation Fee Demo program, is supposed to rely on public input to authorize all new fee proposals, as well as cost increases at current fee sites. The public input comes from committees known as RecRACs, whose composition is spelled out clearly in the FLREA law. The most fundamental problem with the process, according to Western Slope No-Fee Coalition President Kitty Benzar, is the committee selection process. "Members are supposed to represent the public, but they are hand-picked by the Forest Service and the BLM. They are from groups that are beholden to the agencies for their particular activity, and are likely to want to do the agencies' bidding," she explained. To date, the RecRACs have approved at least 523 fee increases and 228 new fee sites in under two years. Only 27 fee proposals have been turned down. The Western Slope No-Fee Coalition has produced a report on the status of RecRACs nationwide, called "The Fix Is In." It is available on their web site at www.westernslopenofee.org. Kitty Benzar has also undertaken a series of trips to attend various RecRAC meetings (Colorado, California, and Nevada). These meetings are important for a number of reasons, including educating the RecRAC members, (who vote on new and/or increased fees), on the specific requirements spelled out in the FLREA fee law governing the RecRACs' activities. Of course, the US Forest Service (who pick the RecRAC members, propose new fees and want the RecRACs to support them) have not educated their committee members as to the legal restrictions on new or increased fees - namely that fees can only be legally levied or increased where general public support for each proposal has been documented. Forest Service documentation of public support for fees is often sketchy, nonexistent or downright made up. For instance, a Washington state fee proposal was approved, for which RecRAC members were told that half the 36 comment cards were in opposition. In fact, it turned out that 28 of the 36 cards were strongly or somewhat opposed to the fees - hardly qualifying as "general public support." The Colorado RecRAC approved new fee sites in June 2008 for which no public comments had been sought. Nor were the proposals posted on their web site. The Forest Service merely announced them in the press and received no opposition. Again, far from the documentation of "general public support." Beyond this, RecRAC meeting are often closed to the public, meeting minutes can be delayed and ambiguous, and public comments have even been filtered and withheld by the Forest Service. The October 2008 California RecRAC meeting in Sacramento was attended by Kitty Benzar and by Peter Weichers, a Kern River kayaker. (Both of them had testified against the FLREA law in Washington DC in June 2009.) The California RecRAC members had received a number of comments from the public opposing the Klamath National Forest fee proposals on the agenda for their October meeting, since the required documentation of general public support was lacking. During the all day meeting, Kitty Benzar and Peter Weichers, were able to critique the RecRAC fee approval process, and to discuss RecRAC procedures at length with some committee members. At the end of the day, the Klamath National Forest fee proposals were still voted forward by the RecRAC members, notwithstanding the complete lack of documentation of general public support.