Sanchez

Is the Tilly Jane locking thing a recent development? Kind of a bummer, made for a nice break spot when going to the N Side.

Wow if you just added in a part about going up one gully too early and having to rap down a few hundred feet whilst leaving behind an expensive ice screw this would be identical to my experience on Reid. Scary to say the least! The randomness of the falling ice is too spooky for me.

I have a recommedation: get a job hippy!! : ) I think you will have no problem finding what you are looking for. October will be pretty quiet as all the kiddies are back in school. And Rainier NP allows dogs in many areas too FYI. I would say buy a book on PNW backpacking trips, there are endless trips that fit your description. Keep living the dream dude!

The real question: did you have to eat your brother in order to survive? Or did you get a protein shake at the snack bar? : )

Nice! See any recent ski tracks on the way down or is it too far gone and sun-cupped for such activities?

Well yeah on the S Side every rock and bump has a name, but on the more "rare" sides of the Mt I guess things are a little more raw. I like it that way...

No avy danger, high rockfall danger, steep, possibly icy, sketchy, huge bergschrunds, zero chance of getting anything resembling a good ski turn above the palmer lift, no permits needed, sign the register. From late July through December this climb is what we lovingly refer to as a fu$%ing mess and it should be avoided at all costs. Go hike Adams, South sister, anything else. Hood in later summer is not a good plan. Try again in May. And you always do a night mission on hood unless it's the dead of winter and the conditions permit a daytime assault.

Congrats! That mountain scares me...

F**K those waterbars!!! Holy crap I nailed one of those going 25mph this weekend that was hiding neatly in the shadow of a tree. Really did a number on my sweet astro van. I'm just glad I didn't shred the oil pan or differential. Grrrrr...

Cool! Thanks for the Beta.

"the Elliot glacier headwall" I've never been sure of the exact definition of Elliot GHW, I though that was the fall line from cooper spur. From the top of snowdome, facing up on your left there was a ~200 foot section of loose brownies with a brown snow field below it and a set of boot tracks going right through it. I couldn't believe it... and right on cue a dumptruck full of rocks crumbled off it while we were sitting there eating breakfast. Someone had some balls. We liked your track ALOT better, but you're right that way is going to be shut down soon it seems.

Esta abierto amigo.

Were you guys up there Friday night or saturday night? We skinned up snowdome Saturday night with intentions of climbing sunshine but the snow was so soft by 7:30am we abandoned any hope of summiting and had a great early morning ski down. We saw a boot pack going left up sunshine under those loose sketchy cliffs, but another one went way right and we couldn't figure out how they crossed the schrunds. Great/perfect snow conditions for skiing but looked like a suicide mission to descend Sunshine in the hot sun, plus the wind was ripping violently out of the west.

Cool! Way to make things interesting on the up route. Glad to hear the ski down Emmons was still doable. We are heading up this weekend. Any advice on the ski descent related to conditions right now?

I think your fears were justified, of the 12 people who've died on Copper spur 9 of them happened on the way down due to warming snow conditions. Glad you made it down with nothing worse than sore quads. Any pics?

Wow you guys are hard core... my wife refuses to climb anything with me that hiking boots won't cover. Nice work finding a soul-mate and badass climbing partner all in one!

When is it too late to ski Emmons you think? A buddy and I have been trying to line up schedules and weather windows unsuccessfully for a month now- wondering when is too late. I imagine it's a pretty snow free approach to the interglacier by now, meaning hiking in or with skiboots. Then on the upper mountain when does the skiing get too hairy due to crevasses...?

(Wetslide) - I agree on all counts, well put.

In my humble opinion, these mountains are to be treated with a god-like respect, where any summit should be viewed as a gift, and any failure to summit should be treated the same (the gift being your life in this case). The moment you take this for granted, and start treating it as sport, adding trophy variables like speed records etc, is the when I feel the mountain is most likely to revoke your priveleges and teach you a one-time lesson. I can tell you aren't someone that needs this lecture, but I hope in your journeys you retain that humility that can be lost when you have so much success in the mountains. And congrats on surviving, because in my opinion that is the most amazing thing about your trip.

Snow is great because in addition to the bug protection you can keep beers and cheese cold in the snow. Plus you can camp anywhere, not just near a water source. June camping below snow line is an unpleasant experience, think amazon river-levels of bugs.

All my friends are paying for Cat skiing on Bailey and eating cheetos all day- I want to check out Thielson starting from the Hwy 138/Diamond Lake TH. Planning to ski/skin as high as possible on the SW ridge, boot it to the Spire, and if I can, climb it. Have never been to Thielson and don't know what to expect from the Spire, would be nice to have a partner to make that last 80 feet a little safer. Going to carry 2 axes and a 30m rando line to rap/downclimb, but if it's all crumbly rock I'll skip it (rock climbing in ski boots...). Sunday Feb 5th, hitting the trail by 7:00am.

Awesome aerial footage. Thanks! I'll be down there the first weekend of Feb looking to get a ski run on that SW face. I'm guessing weather and avy conditions will be a bit of a party pooper the way things are going. What does the summit spire look like in winter on the S aspect? Does it get pretty rimed up and covered, or still a mixed rock ice mess?

Wow you carried a 60m rope too? Heavy pack! So how did DKHW look? Were some of the chutes filled in with ice? I've climbed the south side out of consolation 3 times now after getting the base of the HWs and having to bail due to lack of coverage... it's a bit of a personal obsession now.

I also find that rubbing some of the athletic tape sticky stuff on the area in question before taping helps it stick way better. I assume that's because you're getting rid of any oils on the skin.

Both routes are going to be bowling alleys in June. Call me a wuss but I consider those routes closed for the season in May-ish. This year maybe you get a longer window.