Frikadeller

Trip: Redemtion on Loowit - Worm Flows Date: 5/30/2009 Trip Report: So, from the last TR I posted, which was basically a "split-boot decent" of the lady. So, my partner in crime called me late on friday night, requesting my assistance with the lady. OK I said, I guess I can do it, as long as I can be back in PDX before 4:00. (I had other obligations, with my wife, that ARE more important than a mountain!!) So we got together at 0430 at crimey's house, and caught another partner in the mix. We made our way, with greasy jimmy dean sausage sandwiches and coffee, and made our way to Marble Mountain Sno-Park. Started hiking around 0530, and it was kind of cold. Not much snow at the TH. This is the kind of patchy snow that keeps you from thinking that you might actually be able to skin up the route. Not just yet! Oh well, at least one of us tried to skin... Moving on, to the treeline, things got even more splitboot-ish. Nah, the entire trip was a splitboot trip... We moved on, and relegated the fact that Loowit only allows you to carry your gear, not use it. So we got above the trees, and moved on till we saw the first monitor. Breaks, smokes, red-bulls and whatever. More bootin' after that. Of course, time is flying, and I have a commitment in town, and so does the aquired partner. Maybe a summit is out of the question, and the snow is getting shitty. So, we transitioned back to downhill mode around 7000', and burned turns back down... Check out the oldest spiltboarder I have ever met: Ralph.... Older than your dad!! Dropping in: So, yeah, got back to PDX by 1600, too late, but I picked up this rad salt/pepper shaker at a local store off the hill of St. Helens... The mountain before the eruption: The mountain after: That's the coolest salt and pepper shaker I have ever seen!! Gear Notes: Splitboards, Skins (not used), Harcheisen (not used), Ice axe (not used) crampons (not used) It just a hike now a days... Approach Notes: Lot's of walking

I have always thought that it was funny how the old chute, and stuff above hogsback get's really nice for skiing/snowboarding within the first hour of sunlight, but the stuff lower than hogsback need waaaayyy more time to corn up. I like the beer approach. But knowing me, and beer at altitude, I'll just sit up there until all the beers are gone, and five smokes later, i will have lost interest in skiing.

So was this on the zigzag glacier, or lower? I don't think I have ever seen rock fall that large while traversing from the palmer to I rock. It's starting to sound like maybe hoodie is done tolerating people on the south side.

Oh, yeah. Fuck the snowcats on the southside, These fuckers will tell you that you have to ascend the hill to make sure you're out of "their way"..... Wrong!!!!! Fuck nutz!!! Snow cats are supposed to YEILD to climbers and skiers traveling up hill....

Once in the 1930's there was proposal to build a tram from cloud cap inn to the summit. They had funding and all, but the FS lawers shot it down, and the funding was lost.

Bring your helmet, you are gonna need it. Two weeks in a row, I got pummeled in the chute by ice. I suspect it will be no different this weekend. Take the "center" boot pack. It's free from the snizz that falls from the upper towers. At this point, I am thinking of taking up learning to rock climb....

+3 on the bullfrog stuff. That stuff goes on like vaseline, and stays there for the duration. But, I did recently find out that the stuff my wife has been using works really well, as well. It's made by "coppertone" and it's called "extended coverage, sweat proof, sport stuff. No red shit after three days on the Hoodwand in full sun!!!!!

Yeah, I hear that they shrink in size.... Boyle's law is not a "bitch" in this case.

I have had good luck with the older Black Diamond Sabertooth crampon. They fit my Scarpa Denali boots, and my Garmont Libero tele boots with little or no adjustments. But I don't climb ice routes, so......

I climbed it this Saturday AM, and got hit by quite a few large pieces of Ice on the upper traverse. Some of the hits where as big as dinner plates, including the one that hit my shoulder, which is still in pain as I write this. If you go, take the lower traverse boot pack, it's out of the way of most of the falling junk, and pretty safe. You still might get hit, but at least that's just climber ice fall, and not the stuff coming off the upper towers that make no noise, nor do you see it until it hits you.

WTF, that sounds like a load of bullshit if you ask me!!(I know, no one asked.) BTW, there has always been a "Permanent gate" at Cloud Cap Road. But, now they are limiting access? That stinks of more bullshit. There is an established car camp ground at cloud cap saddle, complete with bathrooms and all. Are they closing that as well, permanently? Or.....Could the "special closure" be because of the recent wildfire, and the FS is concerned about dead fall, etc. on the road? From what I saw when I was last up there in the fall, right after the fire, it looked like the FS fire crews had cleared any potential hazards from the roadway. (burnt snags, potential deadfall etc.) Something about this story sounds not right. Why would the FS go through all that work to secure a road access, only later to close permanently? On another note, we as the users of the area, and subsequent "owners" (you pay taxes, right?) could always just arrive with bolt cutters and cut the lock on the gate. Bring a chainsaw to clear the road, and viola, access. Hell, one coule even show up with a mini track hoe, and "remove" the gate permanently.

REI also sells a commercial version called a "wag bag"... Never used one, but I hear they work. I suppose just as well as Mt. Hood Bluebags...

Generally anywhere above the palmer (read: not where the lift skiers can easily get to it) is usually very safe to stash gear. I have never had any issues with anyone (other than ravens) messing with my gear. There are several flat spots with rocks etc that make nice places for a gear cache.

Yes, Because that is the restriction placed by the Forest Service pertaining how many "heart beats" can occupy the wilderness at one time , in one team. It's an out dated requirement that eliminated horse teams and oxen teams from traveling on trails in the designated "wilderness" around Mt Hood. It is still enforced, epecially when it comes to thru hikers on the PCT, which hits Mt. Hood. The PCT allows pack animals and stock to cross wilderness. Remember, Pack animals and wagons at one time where considered the ATV of the early 20th century. Hence the regulation.

So... Did ya need the rope?

Pfft.... AT skis.... We all know the REAL DARK SIDE is a SPLITBOARD!

How did the road look?

Depends on how you would like to enter Valhalla. Some people use screws, pickets, and ropes and two tools on Leutholds. So just go at it solo with only an axe and pons. It all depends on conditions. Last weekend I heard of several parties being shut down early by icefall at the hourglass.

I have had some batteries from a couple of older Makita impact drivers that the batteries died, and makita stopped making those batteries. I took them over to Batteries plus on NE Broadway @ around 30th. They just replaced the worn out cells, and installed new ones, and glued the plastic case back together. Now my favorite impact driver is good as new.

Is that what that little ice block structure at the end of the hogsback is being used for?

Yeah, I saw them lowering her with a rope on saturday morning, and they where moving down the hill pretty fast. I was pretty impressed by the teamwork that crew was doing to get the injured party down on their own self reliance. 45 minutes later two PMR dudes where running down the side of crater rock, and stopped to ask if I had seen an accident, and I was , like, "dude, I saw them, like, lowering someone down, like, 45 minutes ago"...

Yup! The snizz that was raining down on me was coming from the rime ice formations, and some serious sized stuff too. There where no climbers above me when the mountain erupted.

You know, you don't have to climb with the mazamas every time. There are plenty of other people that climb the mountains. (Not trying to harsh the Mazamas, just sayin') As a good example, I climb solo alot, and just this weekend, I happened to hook up with another solo climber as we where skinning up and decided to climb together. It's that easy sometimes. there is also plenty of "plans and partners" forums, here and on other sites, so.... there is no real excuse to keep a party small (3-5 people)

Awww dude, thats too bad. You could still have had a fun time skinning up to hogsback, and then dropping in from there, and still had a great ride. Remember, it's not always about summits, but the line you ride back down!!

Oh,I did not take your comment as harshing on my climb. I think that you are right, and had the person I was with not suffering from "summit fever" I would have turned around at hogsback, because I cold forcast the impending doom just by observations of the conditions (and the 10,000 newbs flailing around up there) but thought that if we went fast we could make it. and we did, just barely. If I had the intestinal fortitude to leave my mental security blanket of snow cover, I would love to clamber the rocky stuff. But you can't really ski back down rocks, now can you? maybe one day, when I decide that a set of cams and nuts seems more of a reasonable purchase over some hot shit ski or snowboard mountaineering equipment, that will be the day I will probably never look back at some rock and ice belching choss pile volcano climb again.