Water

James Kelly, 48-year-old landscape architect from Dallas. Brian Hall, 38, a personal trainer also from Dallas. Jerry "Nikko" Cooke, 36, a lawyer from New York City. Not from NJ. Sympathies for those who knew and loved Rev. Robert J Cormier--sounds like a great guy, very unfortunate, cruel twist his partners turned around just shy and this was supposed to be his last significant mountain foray..

if you're climbing to get out then maybe fri-sat but frankly looking at the weather it isn't much of a question--if you're from the area at least. I understand when things are set in stone due to travel, unfortunate as that is. If you work during the day one benefit of going sat night is it isn't after a long day of work and barely getting any sleep. You can sleep in saturday and get try to nap in the afternoon/be all prepped. Yes, looks like up to 2ft~+ of snow could fall the higher you go.. keep an eye out for any alerts from NWAC. If anything Sunday will allow more time to stabilize but sun could cause wet slides--dont want to be going up the old chute while it's baking at 10am. sunrise summit.

the "trail" has some blowdown around mile 16.. and the bridge is out over the steel cliff river, so you have to ford it or set up a tyrolean traverse. Also kinda muddy between miles 4-7. so.. at my cursory glance the weather looks quite nice on sunday...am i missing something? Though I'd be wary of fresh snow up high as it relates to avy hazard. The link below is from a recent report: http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1123797/TR_Mt_Hood_South_Side_Route_5_#Post1123797

very nice, glad that you were able to thread the needle with a micro window of weather--thats pretty neat. Always enjoy days like that. I've always done this when it's mostly melted, the potential of finding bunk rime or verglas in the bowling alley has never been high on my list.. but seeing this in winter--I can tell in some respects it standardizes the mountain--holds it together a bit better--as you know in late summer n. sister is probably best candidate of mountain located in mordor.. baked, parched, red, crumbling, and all sorts of weird phallic lava-tube gendarmes, esp. on the west face of the s. ridge. So.. to answer your question, I have one of my own as well.. I was a little unclear about your access. In summer from Soap Creek there is a turn-off/climbers trail that takes you up along Soap and basically allows you to go up the gentle apron of the SE ridge. Maybe that is what you are calling the E ridge? Maybe just in my circles/sources but have not really heard N. Sister get called as having an east ridge. Unless you mean just going up thayer glacier headwall? [EDIT I see you mean the Glisan Pinnacle] [Other way I've done it is stay on trail over Soap and continue on chambers lake trail and veer straight west off it around 6600ft into the treeline and moraines area--a very nice place for camp for a climb of North and/or Middle. From there gain SE ridge by going straight north, again better to get onto the apron of the ridge than trying to go up it further west on either the north of west side of it.] edit: http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/140145/North_Sister_Direct_E_Butt

if you want to borrow my stand-alone GPS from garmin you can, I am thinking of selling it. Mostly because I use my phone exclusively. Rmaps is a free app I use on my Razr M--with my separate SD card with space I have USGS vector topo, google terrain, google satellite images, and bing/microsoft sat shots all downloaded of any area. I put my phone on airplane mode then turn on GPS. it works great everywhere I've used it (rainier, steens mountain, hood, adams, etc.. GPS is GPS. My phone probably has a more advanced GPS system than the garmin 60csx I have which was designed in 2006 or something. Battery is another story, but for quick reference it works great. paying for any map program is a rip off imo.

I dig the report a lot! very nice pictures. if I may piggy-back a question or two as it appears there are some folks familiar with hawaii here.. I injured my foot req. surgery earlier this year so climbing and backpacking are out for the summer--wife and I are planning our first trip to hawaii for fall (sept-oct). looking for nice beaches to relax on/swim at and snorkeling. Maybe a pretty drive? Probably won't do much in the way of any hikes almost on account of the foot, though who knows how close to 100% I am by then. Accommodations can be basic. don't need top star eateries though places to get breakfast or basic meals, we'll cook a few nights if we can wherever we stay. Have been told kauai is our style and been told the big island is 'neat'. Maui seems to come up for beaches but we sure as hell dont want to do any 'shopping' on vacation or any of the upsell/upscale experience.. thoughts?

As you know the lighter the gear = the more expensive it tends to be. The TLT is a premium cost for fairly slight weight savings, and a nearly identical design. Dane has done some posts at TGR and his blog about getting a One PX down to TLT weight with a few mods. In my case I went with a One boot last year due to that price/weight/performance thing being pretty close on the map, and still being a huge upgrade from what I had (garmont axons). Boots in person would be your best bet.. but that could prove to be very difficult as jake said. You can always order from SAC and then living room fit the boots and eat the $7 shipping return charge if they're a no-go..

that is a cost-effective setup for $ at end of the day but I would generally recommend going dynafit (or similar brand) direction due to the weight savings. Lets be realistic though, what is your cost object? $1000 max? If so you might be able to swing that.. can probably find a dyna compatible boot for $250-300..i saw a mastraeli RS for $299 or something I think recently. Could get the bindings at around $300.. leaving you with $300~ for skis and skins...can be had with used or blemished/new skis. Basically it will take some shopping around and time. If your top end budget is $1250-1500 you can probably buy all new and not have to 'shop' it as much at all basically, just look for 'ok' deals or sale, dont buy a semi-custom or cottage ski for $600-800+ or a new boot for $750.. but if you want to spend $500, the setup you listed is probably more where you're at--it will be hard to find a light weight tech-binding setup for 'cheap'.

http://www.nwac.us/avalanche-forecast/current/mt-hood/

Yes. You should have a shindig when it's published! Sell them, sign them. And get all the drinks you can down bought for you. And a DD or taxi ride home as needed.

i've read/researched discussion about rope freeze into v-thread and never read of an instance of that happening. If there is flowing water and the rope is wet maybe its a less than great idea. Seems fine in this instance. put me in the camp of don't give a rats about the lock. but ride your sled in wilderness ok i'd be pissed. rainier is a bitch about access even when things are 'open'.

Chris, if you haven't checked out Mike Gauthier's climbing guide thats pretty solid over-view of almost every conceivable route on the mountain. I'll email you some camera phone pics of the pages on this route if you'd like, pm your addy. http://www.amazon.com/Mount-Rainier-Climbing-Guide-Edition/dp/0898869560

we climbed kautz that weekend and came down the DC. lets just say I was a much bigger fan of the kautz than the DC. At least on Sunday afternoon the 'wall' or whatever was pretty chill to negotiate but we did see the remaining team behind us take about an hour to do it. With 'some' experience climbing it took about 5 minutes but for those not use to such situation I guess it was a real impediment. it was a gorgeous weekend for sure, great climbing conditions.

bivy doesn't have wifi? I get wifi when i'm just in the parkinglot--and even down by the river. But it doesn't make it over there?

i tried bumping it for a while. I certainly haven't put the work in but would be willing to do whatever I can. It is hard to believe there isn't a good, modern, comprehensive hood book.

end of may being a few miles from the TH is more than par for the course. But this is a low snow year so might get as close as a mile away, depends on our spring. Rain melts snow faster than sun. as for glacier, especially on the 'early' season variation that goes a little more to the East and past Red Butte, you never cross a glacier from TH to the summit. It is debatable if the 'crescent' is a glacier anymore or more like palmer snowfield.. it may be more of a permanent snowfield than have much ice or ice movement. really dont think you need to spend any energy worrying about crevasses on the standard southside route up adams.

um..no bikes in wilderness areas amigo. the boundary is about 200ft from the TH.

when you say gatorade is absolute garbage that will negatively impact performance..do you mean for an athlete at the top of their game, trying to maximize their training or execute their craft to the highest level? For the weekend warrior who is in good shape but not setting any speed records.. does it matter vs if they got a good night of sleep or ate something else beneficial or detrimental the night before? Anecdotally I've found the 'ade of whatever sort to be more beneficial than plain water when I'm doing something, assuming I take the same snack consumption breaks, I like having those extra calories with my agua while I'm going up--to me it seems to help.

great TR. a real hoot. lots of pics, and a quick entertaining read. i laughed good at the squirt, nice recovery.

MattP is correct. I am a very incremental climber so in my research Kautz seemed like a good progression from Emmons ..anyways in my research I believe I came across info that said Kautz was one of the main ways up the mountain for a time--somewhat like Cooper Spur on hood being the primary route until road access on the south side. In an average snow year I think you're looking at a mostly snow climb for Memorial Day, weather conditions aside. We took a trip there in early June last year to ski it but maybe blessing in disguise wind issues forced us down in the middle of the night. Only because in retrospect I'm not sure I want to ski that even with good conditions...hehe. We did climb it later (july) and it was a blast, but had two melted out sections about 50ft each of rotten glacier ice, but it wasn't very technical, big steps and shelfs in a lot of places.

i dont want to come down criticizing (for the record I like your TR's and adventures!!) but i think that you're talking about solo'ing and saying it's not rolling the dice is what jared says sounds foolhardy. Every fall, roped or otherwise, will certainly have science behind it...biology of muscles, psychological state, environmental conditions, geology, physics. Sure probability stats won't explain an accident, they're just a number. You can quantify all sorts of factors but without frankly acknowledging that 50ft up soloing a 5.6 is much more dangerous position than 50ft up with your last clip 10ft below, it doesn't seem like an honest assessment. Comparing to driving isn't appropriate, unless it is to on average driving faster than the speed limit or conditions would indicate, or, driving with a very low-level buzz, or without a seatbelt maybe is an even better example. by solo'ing alone it seems like that is rolling the dice--you never know when a few wasps could swarm you on a 5.7, or the day you develop a slight allergy to the fennel seed bagel you tried for lunch, causing you to feel faint or dizzy. is solo'ing not undue risk? id post a TR but hey, i hurt myself climbing... haha

never an excellent climber for sure in part due to other interests. And 3 weeks post op of lisfranc ligament surgery so probably never going to get any better than whatever I was before. Nice full circle hurt myself climbing and now permanently have dyneema going through two bones in my foot holding them together. Anyways... 1) backpacking (wife will do this almost every weekend when its nice so that puts it at the top) 2) fishing 3) photography (goes with most outdoor activity) 4) skiing 5) gardening (really like cacti and succulent plants. Brought my collection out with from Michigan almost 8 years ago)..one day when i'm old and creaky i hope to live somewhere like new mexico where my cacti and succulents can thrive. things I would like to get into: road biking kayaking ..maybe scuba

well none of you lucky bastards has had this injury or heard of it except someone who responded to a pm who mentioned Lisfranc in a post 10 years ago. For any poor soul who gets this injury down the road and goes hunting on CC for info, feel free to pm me even if it's years from now. Injury blog: http://lisfranconsciousness.wordpress.com

how can these talked about shirts be acquired by pdx folk?

i'll second going the dynafits if the intention is BC, get going on them now, fooling around with alpine bindings doesn't gain you any knowledge for BC as far as binding understanding goes. One other thing if you're a new skier, you'll probably rip gouge and scuff your shiny new planks pretty good through your first year. If you roll with that fine, no worries. I considered it badges of honor but at the same time was happy I hadn't opted for some primo full price cottage company ski running $750 and north. No sure where you are with finances but the initial entry cost to skiing.. once you have all your stuff and are 'ski-worthy in ability' the idea of springing for a more primo ski becomes much more palatable and accessible. From someone who put off getting into skiing for a few years due to the initial costs. i was told 90-100mm underfoot of course with rocker. I opted for a ski with a bit less side cut for skimo objectives vs touring. my tails also have a very slight rise which is great for sideslipping, i like that. look up praxis--thats cottage stuff but they have some great deals right now..Also i hear only positive stuff about the offerings from G3--their entire touring line has been lightened.