manninjo

Trip: Colchuck Lake - Ice/Dragontail + Colchuck conditions Trip Date: 02/11/2018 Trip Report: Went up to Colchuck lake on Saturday thinking there may have been enough melt freeze lately to make ice fat on Dragontail, probably still too early this year. Some ice on the northern aspects but looked pretty spicy through zoomed in views. We climbed a neat consolation ice line on the lower flanks of Colchuck Balanced Rock and enjoyed the sunny and windless alpine ambience instead. Skinning the road required a fair bit of walking but booting up the summer trail was easy with a snowshoe track packed down. Nice and consolidated snowpack made for easy traveling. I feel like alpine climbing in the Cascades you can have good ice, good snow, or good weather. Oftentimes you can choose one. Getting two or three to align is elusive, rewarding when it happens though. Here are some conditions photos from February 10+11 of Triple Couloirs, Gerber-Sink, and an ice flow coming down the lower flanks of CBR with some vintage tat at the top. Gear Notes: Cascade winter grab bag. Two ropes would be nice Approach Notes: From Icicle Creek

Sent you a PM about the tech bindings, thanks.

Thank you for the system update, it looks like a big improvement over the ubb software! I went to message someone privately regarding an item on the yardsale, and it said my message inbox was full. If I go to my profile, I do not see an inbox anywhere or place to delete messages... is there something I am missing here?

sent you a pm - Joe

Public comment on the proposed fee increase is open until November 23 - please let the NPS know how you feel if this increase doesn't jive. https://parkplanning.nps.gov/document.cfm?parkID=442&projectID=75576&documentID=83652

I've just been to the Bend and Royal Columns separately, but it looks like a trail connects the two crags on the side of the river across from the road. Is walking between the crags something people do? Does one risk getting shot by a hunter if they were walking around between the two crags out there? Wondering in case of carpool situation in which some prefer one crag over the other. Looks like a mile or less flat walking on the map.

Bring out the gold stars for this trip report! Bravo sir.

Have a Monday off randomly and can leave Seattle about 10:30am, climbing around noon until dark. Happy to drive from the area. Mostly hoping to lead 5.10s. Email is manninjo at gmail.com. Joe

Thanks! Yes, much of Ptarmigan is/was especially skiable with the conditions we had. I also forgot to mention the skiers who passed us at St. Elmo's were later seen skiing Liberty Ridge. I consolidated some condition-type photos, looks like a couple have partial views to that part of the mountain. https://goo.gl/photos/a6fzbN53TLh14vkw7

Trip: Mt. Rainier - Ptarmigan Ridge Date: 5/28/2017 Trip Report: Climbed Ptarmigan Ridge on Rainier over the Memorial Day weekend. It was the kind of trip that gets you reinvigorated on being out in wilderness, in the alpine, not too far by car but far enough away from an increasingly urban Puget Sound region (while keeping the urban agglomeration in sight at the same time). There is some beta in this report to add to the very useful stuff that already exists online. We left Seattle early Friday afternoon and the trailhead by 4:20pm (after running into two well-known speed ski-mountaineers from Utah in the parking lot), camped at St. Elmo's Pass (where a Ptarmigan was sighted, Chili-Mac was spilled, the International Space Station flew overhead, and two skiers passed by at 4am) and the 10,300ft Ptarmigan Ridge high bivy Saturday. With Alisse in the lead crossing the Carbon on the second day we saw no less than 13 people climbing towards Liberty Ridge. The sun on the glacier was merciless and the slopes to gain Ptarmigan Ridge felt endless. We had passed some wet slides on the way up and so Andy led a chossy downclimb in the vicinity of a rap station to avoid some solar slopes, after which we belayed a snowy traverse to access the high camp. We spent the balmy afternoon and evening hydrating, listening to rockfall clatter down the route, eyeing the ice cliff for signs of instability, looking over at the climbers camped at Thumb Rock, wondering about a helicopter that buzzed the mountain on the way to the Emmons (we later learned of a relatively positive outcome), and conjecturing about conditions on the ridge. Alarms set for 2:30am, we went to sleep around 8pm. The ice cliff woke us up at 10:30pm when it randomly calved. Later the wind whipped up and made for a fitful night. A groggy start and we were out of camp by 4:15am or so. We jogged under the ice cliff and started climbing the well bridged bergschrund by 4:40. At this point it was light enough to see without a headlamp and arguably a bit late to be starting up the route. We climbed slowly and steadily up the first chute, finding excellent crisp snow. At the minor rib we completely stretched the rope and did a long running belay, keeping at least one picket, ice screw, cam, pin, or nut between us, across the horizontal traverse and up another chute to the where the variations diverge. Gorgeous pink light illuminated the cliffs above the traverse and also brought down a few small stones. It was a relief to reach and climb in the shade. We had seen some perverse-looking ice towers on the left variation which looked quite unstable and that simplified our decision making. Right was right. An unintentionally long break was had before continuing up another chute filled with 60 degree windslab. After burrowing through the overlaps, we reached a small saddle with a bivy site. Another steep snow chute led to a fun and easy mixed pitch below the rock step. Unable to locate a fixed pin to belay from, I set a two nut and picket anchor 20 feet below the step. There is still a fixed pin at the crux as well as other options for gear. I'd seen this rated anywhere from low-fifth to 5.6 to 5.8, and in the condition I found it, there is at least a move or two of what I would call Joshua Tree 5.7. The feet are small initially and the good holds are a very long reach with an ice tool. I stemmed out left to a rocky smear, tapped my right front points into the centimeter thick ice smear on the right, and committed to a lock-off on my tool to reach high to a good hold with my bare left hand. This was not before some cursing about the apparent unexpected difficulty. Immediately easier terrain followed, with excellent snow to bring up my partners off a deadmanned picket and rock I chopped behind to create a hybrid rock/snow bollard. As others have written, the steep climbing is effectively over after the rock pitch. The day was flying by for us, it was already nearly 1pm and we still had 2000 feet to gain to the Liberty Cap summit. An uneventful slog on tired legs led us to the top by 4pm. The weather was still holding out, the slight chance of convective showers never materialized. A nice bootpack led down to the col with Columbia Crest and down the Emmons. A few shortcuts were taken, one of which involved jumping a crevasse. We elected to stay at Camp Sherman for our third night. Some nice skiers gave us water and interesting conversations were had and overheard as the sun set over Puget Sound City and the water and Olympics. Disaster was avoided in the morning after an errant blue bag was located in the snow after being partially buried. A few long glissades on horribly gloppy wet snow got us down from Steamboat Prow. We encountered a mama bear and young cub on the hike out to round out what had been an excellent time in the mountains. To cap it all off, we went to the all-you-can-eat lunch buffet at the Muckleshoot casino and gorged on a strange and wonderful variety of foods including crawfish, steak, pizza, sushi, clam chowder, pasta, bread pudding, chocolate mousse, and big mugs of coffee. And there was no traffic getting back to town. Thanks to Alisse and Andy for the great trip and thanks to Joseph who generously and selflessly loaned us his megamid and who would have been there if not for the recent knee surgery to enable a return to climbing later this year. The route is in excellent condition and seems set to stay that way for some time. Most of the blue ice I've seen photos of on the route is still buried and the route will undoubtedly get sportier as the season progresses. Gear Notes: 60m 7.8mm twin/half rope 6 alpine draws 1 blue dmm offset stopper 1 medium HB nut 1 small lost arrow 1 thin knifeblade 1 small blue metolius cam 3 pickets 5 ice screws of varying lengths - too many this early 1 ice axe 1 ice tool crevasse gear megamid Approach Notes: Pay for climbing pass online, print permit form beforehand to impress Ranger with your organizational skills. White River Campground > St. Elmo's Pass > Curtis Ridge > Ptarmigan Ridge

Sweet, looks like that will help clean things up. I would add, at the top of the magic alder tunnel approach thing, you will eventually be forced to go left or right. Both ways look like they could get you to the start. Make sure you go right, otherwise you will end up fourth/low fifth class traversing back over to get to the starting pitches.

Trip: Snoqualmie Pass - Guye Peak lower southwest flank - Ice Flows Date: 2/11/2017 Trip Report: A couple weekends back I noticed some wild looking ice on the lower cliff bands on Guye Peak's SW aspect. It is just visible on the right as you are driving up to Alpental. Saturday came around and we went to have a look (aka gawk at the gnarly stuff and find some more moderate lines to lead). The ice had held up reasonably well after the rain this week, and the approach slopes were stable, with a few inches of windblown on top of the recent rain's ice crust. The ice crust was partially boot supportive, with the inevitable lurking random post-hole. These icicles had been a bit fatter earlier in the month - gully on left of icicles looks like it goes too? I'm curious to know if they ever completely connect. We climbed a nice, somewhat crusty and relatively steep 15m flow below this photo - the left of two parallel columns hidden in the trees (no photos). Belayed in trees 30m above the base. Above, a brief snowfield led to a curtain with a belay cave on the right. From the cave, this nearly 60m meter pitch climbed the curtain, steep snow, and more lower angle ice to a prominent tree right of a protruding dead snag. This aspect could be tricky with conditions (and may not even form very often) and we were fortunate to have cloud cover and snow flurries most of the day. There appears to be a number of lines in shape right now, from steep snow to moderate ice to some pretty extreme looking stuff. And its hard to beat leaving and returning home in the daylight in winter while having time to get a beer in North Bend on the way back. Gear Notes: Two 60m ropes, ice screws, smaller rock gear, slings. Approach Notes: From the primary Alpental parking lot, head across the road to the summer trail and turn east, walking past the beacon search practice area; about 1/2 mile. The lines are located at approximately 3400 ft. 20-50 minutes depending on conditions.

Sold

CL post for rope with photos - asking $30. http://seattle.craigslist.org/see/spo/5990120231.html - Sold to man with canoe Also have BD First Shot V thread tool - like new condition. 50% off retail, $10 local pickup, $15 shipped, obo. http://www.alpinist.com/doc/web10f/ms-kl-bd-exp-first-shot I can be pretty slow at checking messages here so best to email me - email address is username here at gmail.com.

Climbed at Kiddie Cliff on Wednesday night. Thankfully didn't get car towed from Lot 4 at Alpental. There is a really nice track all the way into the falls for skis or snowshoes, and a newly excavated trail to a tree anchor at the top (there are a few different ones). Snow was stable on approach and around falls. Use two 60m ropes to rappel or TR. No photos but with the full moon it was pretty nice. The upper tier has a good 30 ft steep section with relatively thick ice of varying degrees of plasticity. The bottom tier is mostly buried.