spionin

Trip: mt rainier - liberty ridgeDate: 7/5/2010Trip Report:doug (cbcbd), bob (bob g, fka dirtbag_packwork) and i climbed rainier's liberty ridge route july 2-5.The route is in excellent condition, and our plan was to do it over 3 days with camps around winthrop/carbon glacier and thumb rock, followed by summit/descent. unexpected storm resulted in an additional (bonus!) bivy a bit above 13k ft.on day 1 we left the ranger station around 14:30, walked out of white river trailhead around 15:30, and reached the top of st elmos pass around 18:30. the clouds were rolling in by then, but the weather was fine. there were tracks from previous parties that we followed through a small crevasse jumble, stopped at the edge of winthrop glacier, and established camp at 20:00.the weather was ok, it was drizzling, and there was some wind from NW direction.day 2 was mostly warm and sunny. much sun screen was used. before dropping on carbon, we saw a party of two head out, and wondered why they had turned around. we roped up after crossing the bergschrund at the toe of the ridge, but unroped after getting up onto it. then followed the seemingly endless climb up the snow slope in baking temps. we followed lower on the ridge under all rock bands, and ascended the final slope toward thumb rock at 17:00. the weather was calm, there was a consistent cloud cover down below, and no wind. another party of 2 was camping at thumb rock. they had been there since 9:30 that morning, and were planning to start climbing very early.b/c we got to camp late and still had to make water, we got up later, at 1:30, and began ascending climbers' left of the ridge around 3:00. the party ahead of us was barely visible. we made good progress. our pictures from previous day showed some rock bands directly above thumb rock, so we decided to lean climbers’ right and go around on snow. this put us on a NW-facing slope, and around 5:30-6:00 we began to feel the wind picking up from that direction.we climbed very consistently, but visibility was decreasing and wind was becoming stronger and colder. around 8:00 we saw the other party stopped before an ice wall ahead of us. the weather had turned, and by this time it was becoming extremely cold, stormy, and we could barely see. we discussed making a stop and digging in, talked to the other party, but they were confident to continue. we found a corniced cave, dug it out, and pitched our tent to try to wait out the storm. the wind got stronger for the next few hours, and we could still occasionally hear the climbers above, taking siege of the wall! we let them know that we were parked below, in case they decided to come down.frozen hair!by mid-day we had decided to stay put until the following morning, and wait until the wind had calmed. we had a nice view of clouds from our cave, we watched lenticulars forming like giant alien spaceships, listened to the snow beating the tent, and drank hot chocolate. although we did not have much extra food, we did have a full large canister of fuel, and were not concerned about water or staying warm. it was still extremely gusty, but we hoped it would clear during the night. trying to get into the tent against the winddoing campsite chores: chopping ice for melting [video:vimeo] 2010-07-03 rainier LR 1 from veronika on Vimeo. [video:vimeo]2010-07-03 rainier LR 2 from veronika on Vimeo. in the morning it finally got quieter. we packed up and left at a leisurely 7:30. although it was again cloudy, it was better than the previous day. we began by ascending a long, less-than-vertical slope of neve with occasional patches of wind-buffed snow, which then gained some patches of solid blue ice. we roped up and simuled for a few hundred feet. there were two sections of more technical ice, but fine with three screws and simuling. doug leads the second part of the ice sectionthen followed a few hundred feet on iced-over snow, and finally the summit hump! we reached liberty cap around 10:20, and the weather was windy but friendly. after a short break we began descending towards emmons. we reached camp schurman at 14:00, 6,5 hours after leaving our cave. another person at the camp told us that the party ahead of us had come into camp schurman at 23:00 the previous night, 14,5 hours after we last saw them. we were glad to hear that they had descended safely. we were back at the car at 17:15.

hi there! was it you we talked to yesterday afternoon?

you got it dude. check your pm.

right on, you guys! that "patterns" photo is just unreal. how compacted was the snow? did you have to bring flotation?

oh, bummer dude! that's quite a trace to leave on a mountain.

Trip: MSH-mother's day ski - worm flows Date: 5/9/2010 Trip Report: cbcbd and i joined the select few [hundred] skiers, boarders, walkers, and at least one extreme iron-boarder in the annual mother's day attack on mount st. helens. per tradition, we all wore dresses. as pictures show, we persevered through rough weather and tricky route-finding to make this epic ascent and shred in the name of our mothers. on the ascent snowboarders have mothers too in case your dress gets wrinkled doug and fellow seattle mountain rescuers - the new fashion police who looks better? then we took it one step further, and started represent'n our MOTHERlands! Gear Notes: SUNSCREEN Approach Notes: 25 min from parking lot to start of snow.

thanks for organizing and hosting, matt et al.!

oh - it wasn't my birthday! it's the name of a tour in the guidebook. sorry for the misunderstanding

i ain't hatin' yeah, i think it's a good route with distinct skin-up/bomb-down sections. i think i only had to push myself on a flat section at the very end, and it wasn't bad at all.

Trip: wa pass - birthday tour Date: 5/1/2010 Trip Report: crap, i didn't mean to throw this into ice forum (habit, weird)... doug (cbcbd), dave (dbconlin), karsen, and i went out and did the birthday tour this saturday. it was awesome. i tried this tour last year (this same weekend), for my first go at tele, and we didn't get super far (surprise!). as it turns out, around the same time, dave and karsen had "the worst tour ever" on this route when their partner's unleashed ski made a trip down into one of the basins, forcing them to spend the day searching for it instead of making sweet turns. anyways, we all wanted to get back and do it right. the weather was just around freezing with almost no wind, and occasional pockets of fog made for flat lighting, though nothing that ever interfered with route finding. there were a few inches of fresh snow, sometimes over ice on south aspects, which made skinning interesting. the skiing was great, the company was great, and we dispensed with the tour in 5 hours flat. there are tons of options in that area for exploring, it's really awesome. after the skiing we had some beer and pizza next to the car, and doug and i went over to cascade climbers' annual ski-in for more beer, fire, camping, and hanging out with random skiers. THANKS!! doug skins up at blue lake col dave enjoys the sesh karsen climbs on at the entrance into the last, narrow, icy coloir doug, relax'n in the backseat how to retrofit skis to prevent your tips from diving

solid climb and a stellar report! thanks for the descriptions, the beta, and i really like the note about the strategy had you not found a cave. too bad about the weather, you guys. it was warm and sunny there on thursday.

+1

if so, i'd totally attend. -v

because this is what some of us have to get through before we can climb full-time but really, this is spam. just a funny coincidence.

i'd offer to ski-tow you in a sled, but that might be tad tough through the trees, dude. looks like it's either a b&b stay or a short approach from the tent

don't know. i'm guessing that if you brought another pair of of skis with misaligned bindings into it, they would probably still be misaligned. as a negative control, i have a pair of skis with properly aligned, same-type bindings that work equally well in the livingroom and on the slopes. with only two data points, can we really assign significane though? the wind really picked up around noon. around 1 o'clock things got really nasty. yes, had we turned around, we might have had an easier time.

good point. i came home, and in my very controlled livingroom, i clipped the boots in. it's definitely a problem with the binding. the rods are off by about 3-4 mm, big off, considering the length of the pins in the front. back to the shop this week i go. damn.

hey doug. yeah, i'm not entirely sure what's up. i can click into the front pins, but when i go to lock down the heel it torques the boot out of the front pins. this may have happened when i crashed, or more likely (since i've crashed MANY times before in much worse ways) the binding isn't mounted completely straight. i haven't skied on this setup before, so i don't know. yeah, my other skis have the same bindings and i've never had any problems. i tore my mcl two years ago when my binding didn't release, so i avoid locking on the downhill. i did it on the mellower terrain down below b/c it was the only way i could ski down.

i believe the latter moniker is still reserved for mr. alex lowe

Trip: mt baker - coleman-deming Date: 3/20/2010 Trip Report: on friday night my friends lee, rok, and i drove up [within 5 min walking] to heliotrope ridge trail to climb and ski baker. this was our first time up there. the weather was mild enough that we all slept outside, no tent, next to the car. we had followed noaa pretty carefully in the past weeks, and felt that the window we'd chosen was pretty decent. we weren't alone by far. once we got properly caffeinated, we started skiing at 2:15 a.m. the weather was clear on the approach, we had no prob with route finding. with a few stops for food we made it to the base of the climb about 6 hours later. at this point rok wasn't feeling well, and following a little discussion we decided to split up. lee and i would try to tag the summit, and rok would descend and wait for us. so we all had snacks (power bars and rye bread) and pressed on. lee and i pressed on as this pesky wind started to pick up... by the time we reached the top of the roman wall it was pretty difficult. we were intent on skiing down, so we carried our skis up. we definitely pushed it on the time, and selfishly decided to push for grant peak, despite being beyond the time that we'd told rok we'd turn around. anyways, we tagged the actual summit, and then all hell broke loose. i talked the NF ranger later, and she said that despite the clear forecast the rapidly changing weather brought on this tempesuous wind (do i hear 60-70 mph?), which really made it ... an experience. by the way, skis on back make for awesome sails. by the time we were descending, the wind was pretty tough to deal with. i crashed and tumbled pretty well on the icy descent and semi-busted my ski binding. after fixing the situation (read: putting the skis back on the pack and boot-packing down), lee and i made it down to the saddle. i was able to keep the ski on my boot by locking it (not good, but i felt pretty ok by then), and we skied our way down to the trees. this was another interesting experience: ski for a second, lean down to avoid getting blown over by the gusts, wait for clearing in the wind, ski again... the wind was strong enough to blow me uphill when i was clearly aiming down. we encountered one unstable north- northwest-facing slope that fractured into a 1,5 inch slab under my skis. yikes. but we made it down alright and met up with rok at a bar in glacier. huge thanks to the people who told our partner that we were still on the mountain, and told him that my binding was busted and it slowed us down, and who gave him a ride down to town. this was a series of marginal decisions on time allowance that nearly turned into a fiasco. but overall, an awesome day out, thanks to lee and rok! Gear Notes: axe! crampons! avy gear - the north- and northwest-facing slopes are wind-loaded!

nice to run into you guys, glad you made it! i hear you on the wind - pretty intense! -veronika

wow - awesome pictures. love the chunks in the one with "liz shredding"! i was in marseilles at the end of march last year, and it was frigid - none of this beautiful clear sky, splashing in mediterranean, or climbing on warm rock. looks great!

thanks for the report! check your pm, please.

awesome pictures of very happy-looking people. what's not to love? thanks for posting!

ooh! oooh! just looked at the picture, and it's got a drop tail! imagine that - i'm not alone (even though it's unisex) ...just sayin'