Jason4

I don't ice climb but I assume that falling pillar is a pants cleaning moment at least and probably much worse. How would it have been if he had been on top rope instead?

I hiked to Cascade Pass in early July last last year too and skied fall line with some scrambling through the waterfall band back to the trail head. I think you should use common sense for mountaineering and expect a wet wintry mix up there this weekend. Take whiskey in case you get rained out and have fun.

It's true, I was up there yesterday.

There is parking at the Blue lake trailhead for maybe 4 or 5 cars and also more to the east on the north side of the highway. Check my instagram feed @jasonspeer for a shot of the LB group from yesterday (I'm at work and don't really feel like uploading to another photosharing host from here). I didn't have time to get out on the snow but I did go to Mazama on a drive for work mostly so I could scope out the conditions. The campgrounds on the east side of the crest are mostly free from snow and obviously the further you go to the east side the less snow there is. I think you'll be ok sleeping in your car this time of year but I haven't tried it myself.

That looks like a really fun trip. I've heard from very good snowboarders that Larrabee can be intimidating but you make it sound like a great winter/spring objective. I hope I can get out with you again soon.

Nice report and great pictures! It's reassuring to know that someone else thought the skiing was a bit challenging and also that we weren't the only ones that Dan flew by. He really does move at an astonishing speed. We watched him do a kick turn on a hard, steep slope above an open crevasse and I blinked and missed the other two that he did...

Dan, it was good to meet you up on the WS and I felt silly offering caution on snow conditions after I realized who had just flown past us. JasonG, I wish I had known that was you in the group of 4, I would have wandered down to the bivy spot to say hi before we cruised down Winnie's. We should get back up there together again soon.

PS I have a pair of Koflach SuperPipes in my closet that I bought when I was 13 back in the fall of '93. They were a lot cooler in memory than they are in real life. The welts are soft and won't hold well in a snowboard binding, they don't have enough support for heelside turns, they are heavy, and the heel on the sole is really thick. There are better alternatives out now.

As a snowboarder for 20+ years and into my second season of splitboarding ~40-50 days on the split now I can tell you that skiing is better for transportation if you aren't already a strong snowboarder. Think about it for a minute, skiing was originally meant as a way to get around in the snow and somebody thought it was kind of fun. Snowboarding never had that limitation and was fun right from the beginning! That does make it kind of a bad way to get around in the mountains. One of the reasons that skiing is so much more efficient is the boots and if you aren't willing to give up the leather climbing boots then you're back to splitboarding. The board that you are thinking about cutting is too short. I have found that my sweet spot would be 160-164 and I would prefer a board with camber. I'm riding a Lib Tech T.Rice with a dynasplit set up and the board rides better than the boots but even when I was on soft boots with Karakoram bindings the rocker makes skinning a little harder. I recently went back to a full camber board in the ski area when I broke my latest solid and realized that camber is a lot more fun than rocker but requires more aggressive input. Do not get tempted to ride in soft (relatively) leather boots with plate bindings just because you have toe and heel welts. You will not be able to handle anything firm on your heels without the support of a highback. I was in conditions yesterday that would have been downright scary with really soft boots and no highback. Check splitboard.com and craigslist, more stuff is starting to pop up used since gear has gotten so good lately. Check into the K2 Panarama too, I think they have hit the pricepoint the best but it might not be the best riding board. Ski gear is going to be a lot lighter, a lot more efficient, and cheaper!

What's your current location?

Avy probes are good for other things than just probing for avy victims. they can be handy for checking snow depth, feeling layers in the snow, checking thickness on overhanging cornices, tent poles, and other penetrating tasks. They also don't last a lifetime, in the last two avy courses that I've been involved in I've seen two probes fail. Last year it was mine, this year it was the instructors. Pick the longest and strongest probe you can handle carrying, the difference in weight and space in your pack won't really be that big of a deal.

That's a great price for an AIARE 1 course from a reputable provider, if anybody is on the fence they should jump on it.

For what it's worth I carry a 203cm probe and plastic bladed shovel in my slacker pack when I typically won't be more than a couple of minutes outside of the ski area. When I'm not bumping on the lifts then I have a metal bladed shovel and a 300cm probe in my avy tool pocket.

I would have been happy with just the amount of snow that we have if it had only been soft over the weekend. There were so many cools lips and features waiting to be played on near Herman Saddle but it was hard enough that it felt like a skate park.

Thanks for understanding my intentions and sorry to imply anything negative about guides, the ones that I know and have met are great guys.

This is ABSOLUTELY UNTRUE. AIARE courses are courses with a set curriculum and are not "guided trips." Many students who take these courses take them with partners or meet potential partners at the course. Guides who teach these courses are extremely concerned about the long term safety and well-being of the students in the course. The last thing that a guide would ever want to hear is that someone who took one of his or her courses was killed in an avalanche. The majority of the students that we see in avalanche courses are local climbers and skiers. Many of them will never participate in a guided trip, which makes the instructors even more paranoid about preparing the students effectively for the field. Guides who are avalanche instructors take their position extremely seriously... Jason Jason- Please tell me what part of what I said was untrue or disagreed with any of what you posted "in argument". I think you and I have talked in person on the same subject and while I can see very large advantages of going through a guide service for avalanche education you have not been able to give them to me yourself. As you said, all AIARE courses are taught from a set curriculum. As I said to Kurt, I'm sorry that worded it poorly and if you thought that I implied more than I said then you read into it further than I intended. Thanks Chris, you captured my intentions better than I did. It wasn't the quality of education that I intended to highlight but the motivation of the unpaid volunteers in the climbing clubs. This has become a more polar conversation than I intended. Also, thank you for the disclosure and for what it's worth I'll send people your way if I have the opportunity. Sorry to sidetrack the conversation, in regards to the OP some of your options in the region in no particular order are: Pro Guiding Service, North Bend, ask for Chris Everett Mountaineers (probably won't fit your schedule) AAI, great company, more expensive than EM, ask for Kurt Mt Baker Ski Area, it wasn't an accredited AIARE course last year but it was very similar, that may have changed this year Several other guiding services in the Seattle area that I'm not familiar with.

I can't speak for all of the clubs in the area but when I took the course through the mountaineers the two lead instructors were very highly qualified and under them there were 7 volunteers who were all AIARE instructor certified. Each of the instructor certified volunteers were responsible for a group of up to 7 students and had 2 assistants. The assistants primarily helped demonstrate techniques in the field and were expected to walk somebody out if they had to leave for some reason without having to take the entire class out. The low level assistants were not instructors.

Sorry guys, I have lots of respect for guides and didn't mean to offend anyone. I think you have misunderstood me though. My experience is that the climbing clubs teach from the same established curriculum and that they are teaching friends who they care about and see regularly. I did not intend to take anything away from the education provided by professional mountain guides. I agree that guides care very much about their clients and developing their abilities and I also agree that death would be bad for business and that guiding is not a job for someone without a passion for the mountains. I also don't think it's fair to short change the climbing clubs.

I don't disagree that the guide outfits have repetitive experience but one of the things that the clubs have is an interest in the students actually learning. At some point the club instructors and the club students will probably be real partners together and will depend on one another where that relationship will likely not happen with the guide.

AAI in Bellingham has a great reputation and they offer courses throughout the winter. I took my first avy course ~14 years ago and took the AIARE 1 course with the Everett Mountaineers last year and was very happy with the course. I had a good base of understanding going into it but was carpooling with a friend who had never taken an avy course so we had good discussion on how she felt about the course. The only downside to the Everett Mountaineers is that the course if only taught once a year and it doesn't fit your spring plan.

I would try to be more patient with new skis. I don't know how Meadows looks in the summer but I know that there isn't much in the way of grass and there is lots of scree under most of the trails at my local hill.

My everyday touring ski happens to be ~130 underfoot and 164.5cm in length. I find I have better glide than most of the partners I go out with (verified by who slides further out into the flats off of rollers) and better traction too (based on who starts slipping first on climbs). In soft snow it's not really a big deal but on firm snow and steep traverses the width really sucks. Of course I'm much happier than any of the skiers in 2 feet of spring slush when I pin my 2 halves back together and snowboard down.

Yep, I'm the same one, somehow I've managed to get the same (fairly generic) name on all the forums I'm on. I've followed your thread and mod descriptions on SB.com. It actually sounds like you've gone softer than I want to go but I'll probably follow down a similar path. I'd be interested in pictures of the slits cut in the lower boot and if you're ever up this way it might be enlightening to try your boots on if they are close enough in size to get an idea of how far I can go with it. Thanks for the help.

I tried on a pair of the BD Slants last week and the fit was much better than the TLT5. I'm assuming that the Prime will be the same fit as the Slant so I ordered a pair of the closeout Primes that are floating around on the web. Hopefully all this will work out and I'll have a more efficient split set up. The Zzeros and similar boots seemed to be too stiff, as a splitboarder I'm looking to the softest end of the AT boot spectrum and as light as possible. I'll report back after I get my kit together.

I'm a splitboarder and I have a problem... I'd like to make the jump to hardboots this year for long days in the skin track and for the spring split mountaineering adventures. I'm looking to lose the weight of strap bindings, improve side hilling, pick up more secure automatic crampons, and reduce the width of the boots for skinning and crampon security. Of course, the obvious answer is TLT5s but the more I try them on the lower my hopes are that they will ever fit my feet. I was able to try on Dynafit the Ones and Black Diamond Swifts last night and the Ones won't work for me either but the BDs seems like a decent fit out of the box. I'm thinking about picking up a pair of the closeout Primes that I've seen on the internet but reading reviews of them, especially the Cold Thistle review has me second guessing myself. Someone else has already modded the Primes for split use and they can be had for a good price. What else am I missing that's similarly soft or softer, is lighter, and will fit a wide (maybe high volume) foot? My fit issues come from my dead flat arches. My feet are the widest at the midfoot where my missing arch should be. The TLT5s left me feeling like the sole of my foot was floating because I was effectively chaulked between the two sides of the boot and just hanging. The One was better but still not doable for more than 20 minutes. The Swift didn't have that feeling but my toes felt a little squeezed but not bad.