Devin27

Need some help from the climbers out there. I lost one of my Black Diamond black z fold trekking poles somewhere between the summit and the bolder field near snow lake. Not sure where it fell off my pack exactly. If you find it please let me know Thanks

Maybe try a half shank boot that will still flex a bit for trail. I also really like my Scarpa Mount Blanc's because they have a series of plates instead of a shank which still flexes on trail but stiff as a full shank for ascents.

I also use two layers of socks and always have for climbing and hiking. This will help pull moisture away from your foot and keep you dry. Your feet should not be constantly soaked in the boots. A little moisture is normal, but maybe try thinner socks or a warmer weather boot depending on what you are doing. Moisture will make your skin weaker and more susceptible to blisters As far as tape, a single layer of duct tape on the back of my heels does wonders for any problems that come up. Prevention and good fitting boots are key. Once a blister is forming it is almost always too late to prevent it. Consider getting your boots from a store that allows unlimited returns like REI, Sierra Trading Post or backcountry.com. That way you are covered if they are the wrong fit. That being said, I would try to go into a store and try on a bunch to see how they feel. You want your heels locked down in the boot and not moving around. If your toes feel crunched from the sides in a smaller boot, take a look at the Scarpa's which have a wider toe box usually.

Stars over Mount Baker on route to the North Ridge

Sunshine through the incoming storm on Mount Baker

Basalt in the shadows

Lava tube bouldering during a rain storm near Smith Rocks

The following story is true, only the names have been changed to protect the innocent

Black bird skies for a Mount Hood ski

Hi all, Just realizing that I can't find my climbing skins. Might have left then anywhere along the south side route, over near illumination rock, down in the groomers or even in the parking lot. PM me and I can describe them Devin

Also wanted to add a photo of a fellow skier

Skied over towards illumination rock hoping to avoid the ice and eyed that line. It looked pretty awesome and made me wish I had my tools

Trip: Mt Hood - Hogsback-Old Chute Date: 2/2/2013 Trip Report: Climbed and skied the Old Chute route of Mount Hood on Saturday under perfectly clear skies, great climbing conditions and significantly less than great skiing conditions. Had a group of snowshoers and skiers, though we never needed floatation. Arrived at the lodge at 11pm and crashed for a few short hours before our 3am walk time. Ended up getting moving by 3:40am and headed up the groomed trail through the ski area. Skies were crystal clear and wind was minimal minus occasional minor gusts. Overall fantastic conditions. Crampons and ski crampons were on from the start and we moved pretty quick to the top of the Palmer lift. Once we got off the groomers we found hard packed wind slabs and ice that sent my skies to my pack with 300 vertical feet. Our other skier with the fixed Violie crampons made it another 500 ft or so before he gave up as well. I hauled my skies to about 500 feet below the hogsback before stashing them after finding wind created ice formations that were going to make skiing very unpleasant (more on these later) Hit the Hogsback at the same time as the sun and headed up the old chute. Snow was still very firm, so cramponing up the steep slope felt secure and fast. Topped out at 9:30am, which we were pretty happy with given it was our first big ascent of the season and we made a few stops along the way. The ascent was great, the descent was much less so. The sun had not been on the old chute for a while, so the decent was very slow and involved a lot of down climbing. Once below the hogsback, we discovered that the entire lower slope had lost its light cover of snow that was concealing the endless field of windblown ice fingers which varied from breakable to bullet hard and made skiing pretty terrible. There was really no way to avoid it, as the entire slope was a mix of edge catching ice fingers and huge chucks of broken ice. Top 1000 feet would have been descent skiing Middle 2000 feet was torture on my skis and legs Lower 2000 feet groomers in the ski area. Back down to the car at 1:30pm and back in Seattle by 7:30pm after food. Couldn’t have asked for better weather, could have asked for better snow. Leave the skies and snowshoes at home until there is more snow. Photos Gear Notes: A ice plow would have been nice Approach Notes: Perfect crampon conditions, no need for floatation at all.

Who says you need cold for ice climbing?

Trip: Jim Hill Mountain- Stevens Pass - Henry Creek Basin Date: 1/20/2013 Trip Report: Ilia and I skied Jim Hill Mountain on Sunday in an adventure of varied snow conditions and interesting route finding. This “winter” ascent, felt more like a mid spring climb with light jacket weather in the basin and cloudless skies above. The sun didn’t get into the Henry Creek basin that was our approach route, but it was still pleasant all day. Drove past Stevens Pass and got to the semi legal shoulder (The one next to the for some reason illegal turn out near the start of the approach) at around 8:30. Skinned up the closed road and up to the first open clear cut. Plenty of skiers have been up here since the last snow, but still plenty of clean runs left. We decided to follow the road across the creek and then cut straight up the hill until we found the road again. We eventually ran out of road and had to cross back to the West side of the creek. Wasn’t an issue as the creek is mostly covered higher up, and there were many crossings. This is where we got our first hint of the fun yet to come. The cold weather and sunshine created an perfectly terrible tree bombed ice field in the trees, of which there are a lot on this descent route. Found pretty varied snow on the entire route. Fresh light powder in the clear cuts (fun), wind affected solid snow on the open slopes (wished I had ski crampons), and of course the solid chopped up ice in the trees (joy). Burst out of the trees and headed towards the summit. At the summit block, we made the wrong decision by going to what looked like easier terrain to the notch on climbers left of what looks like the summit. Skiing off the false summit block is possible if you are a better skier than me. I had to down climb after trying to side slip and failing. Wish I brought my ice axe, because it was a little too firm and steep to plunge step. After that was a sometimes pleasant, sometime less pleasant mix of the varied snow I mentioned earlier. No picture here because my camera was safe in my backpack and most of my concentration was on not hitting trees in the ice (didn’t help) and trying to turn when the snow turns from powder to solid mid turn. All in all, a really great ascent with a less fun descent (should be the other way with skis). Wait for better snow before heading up there. Gear Notes: Ski crampons would have helped for the ascent and a whippet or ice axe would have been nice for the ascent. Approach Notes: Follow Henry Creek until it starts to curve climbers left in the open basin. Leave the creek and follow the climbers right drainage towards the summit.

Maybe I found the magical route, but I climbed it back in July and just went up the most obvious center part of the gully. I found nothing above class 4 and mostly easy class 3. Loose rock was an issue for sure and I was happy to be the team there that morning. We did not use a rope at all and climbed in boots and I am not more than a decent rock climber. I could see a rope being nice for raps and climbing if uncomfortable, but we didnt need it. Right now though, it might be interesting with all the snow.

Snow stability is going to be a big issue with any steep narrow gully. Im sure you would want to bring crampons just in case, but you may wish you brought snow shoes instead depending on how much snow is up there. The reason most people do not climb up the cascadian is that it is a huge pile of choss (not an issue with snow) and a long steep hike (could be a big issue with snow). In winter conditions, you are going to find cold temps, wind and possibly lots of snow because of the elevation It can be done in fall/winter if you have the skills and knowledge to handle snow travel, access avy danger and deal with varied snow conditions. If not, I would wait until Spring or Summer to climb it.

Thanks for that link, I have been looking for a long time for one that works with my XSi that isnt as big and expensive as the cannon model.

Nicely done time lapse. Out of interest, how long did you have that running for and I assume you have to a battery pack for your DSLR. I burned up a battery in about an hour of shooting meteors on Shuksan

Wandered into your video at the base of the summit block. Nathan is Magua? Not sure I see the resemblance

Trip: NEWS and SEWS - South Face (5.7) and SW Rib (5.8) Date: 7/28/2012 Trip Report: Spent the weekend instructing and climbing at Washington Pass with the Boealps Basic Rock Class. I had actually not climbed in the Liberty Bell group yet and was excited to finally get up here. Climbed the South Face of North Early Winter Spire with a student on Saturday and then the Southwest Rib of South Early Winter Spire for fun on Sunday. Saturday- South Face of NEWS An easy “5.7”, very straight forward, but less known (We were the only ones on it all day) route up the gully between NEWS and SEWS and then up the south side of NEWS to the summit. Started out about 7am from the Blue Lake TH and took the climbers trail to the base of the gully. We found the route guarded by two furry sentries and took care to hang out packs out of reach in a tree. The goats followed us to the base of pitch 2 before I accidentally dropped a set of nuts from my harness and scared them off. Beta- - Pitch 1 goes up the slabs (many options from class 4 to 5.4 or so) and into the class 3 gully terminating directly below the huge chockstone (bet. NEWS and SEWS, on right) - Pitch 2 (crux) goes up to the left of the chockstone (5.6) and then traverses back onto the top of the chockstone via a 5.7 face ("bolted" with very old pitons) - Pitch 3 is class 3 & terminates further up the gully below another smaller chockstone - Pitch 4 moves left and up easy terrain (c. 5.4) starting about 20 feet below the upper chockstone and tops out on this upper chockstone (top of the NEWS-SEWS notch); - Pitch 5 climbs about 190 feet straight up and left (or north) from the notch on easy terrain (low 5th) and terminates when you run out of rope; - Pitch 6 heads up easy chimneys (up to 5.6 moves depending on variation) and tops out on low angle friction slabs just below the summit. The first “Pitch” of this climb is a single class 5 move over a pile of rocks to get just below the gigantic chock stone. I climbed this pitch unroped but threw a handline down for my student. The second pitch is the longest and best climbing on the route. Mostly low 5th with a few 5.5 or so moves and well protected by gear or the several pins on the route. The crux is the well-known 5.7 traverse at the end of the pitch to get to the top of the chock stone. The traverse is actually much more difficult for the follower than the leader. The consequence of a lead fall there would be minimal because it is protected by a ghetto bolt, however you must unclip this bolt when following and a fall would send you on a 20 ft pendulum into the chock stone below. This would likely result in serious injury but can be easily protected if the leader places a piece in a large crack above the traverse to protect the follower. The hardest part from here on out is route finding. Your goal is the climb onto the second set of chock stones at the very top of the gully, so do not be tempted to cut left up the ramp, this is the rappel route. From here, climb up the south face up the obvious easy class 5 terrain until you come to a split in the gullies about 30 ft below the gigantic overhang. Build and gear anchor and bring up your follower. Take the easier left gully, as the right does not have good pro and takes some committing moves. Continue working up and left over easy terrain. Do not go straight up or right unless you want to deal with offwidth pain. Top out in a class 3 gully and walk to the summit. The summit register is a giant pile of old beta sheets that people have signed and there is very little space left in the container for more paper, so a new one is needed. For the descent, ignore the trees with rap slings and head southwest of the ascent route to a set of shiny new bolts. Single rope raps (one of which is a full 30 meters so do not bring a 50m rope) take you all the way to the class 3 gully below the second chock stone. The rap from the lower chock stone is free for the last 20 ft and very fun. Sunday- SW Rib of SEWS Having the day off from instructing and wanted to have some fun on 5.8 offwidth, Brandon and I headed up the familiar trail for the SW rib of SEWS. Our friendly neighborhood goats were basking on the trail, but didn’t seem to take notice of us. There is plenty of beta on this route, so I will post my comments by pitch. Pitch 1- The crux of the climb. Mid way up the pitch is a 5.8 bulge without great positive holds that is interesting to get over. The climbing before and after is easy class 5th. Pitch 2- The famous offwidth. This pitch was much easier than the 5.8 it is advertised as. Great climbing with fantastically huge exposure. It is barely a crack climb, since the outside of the crack is basically an arête you can climb. We brought a #5 and it was nice to have near the top of the pitch, but you could do the climb without it if you are ok running it out a little bit, or place gear further in the crack. On the plus side any fall would be clean since there is a few hundred feet of free air below you. Pitch 3- Short easy pitch. You should continue past the tree and around the corner to the base of the slab pitch and belay off a gear anchor because it makes the slab pitch way easier than trying to belay from the ledge around the corner. Pitch 4- Hope you like runout slab, because here it is. The protection (when you have it) is solid, but it is pretty spread out. Route finding is easy, just follow the path on the rock that is not covered in lichen. The final move is a committing step across to get from the slab to a large crack with a tiny tree growing. The crack has great positive holds on the near edge, but you have to suck it up and reach for it even though your last pro is 10-15 ft below you. Climb as high as you can and make the step. Not too hard honestly, but that depends on your comfort on slab. Pitch 5- The bear hug pitch- I recommend not leading this pitch because it is pretty funny to watch your leader hump his way up the twin cracks. I actually never touched the left crack and did a lie back on the right crack that was easy, but placing pro this way might have been tricky. DO NOT END THIS PITCH AT THE TOP OF THE TWIN CRACKS. Keep climbing easy terrain until you see a face with a bolt above you. Rest of the climb- The rest is easy. Do not bother with the rappel from the rabbit ears, instead traverse around to the right (shorter but slightly harder and exposed) or left (class 2/3 but longer and very bad rope drag) of the big block to get to the gully and final cracks to the summit. Descended via the south arête route Gear Notes: NEWS- Minimal rack. Need more draws than pro because of all the fixed pins on pitch 2. BD Cams .3-3 and a set of nuts. SEWS- BD Cams .3-5 and a set of nuts. Used the #5 once. See Pitch 2 above. Could have made it without it but not for the faint of heart Approach Notes: Follow the trail to Blue Lake, climbers trail to the left in the second clearing and follow it all the way up until the very obvious fork in the trail and go right. Honestly just hike towards NEWS and SEWS, it is not hard to find

Trip: Buckner Mountain - North Face Date: 7/21/2012 Trip Report: Taking advantage of the nice weather, we headed for the North Face of Mount Buckner for our Boealps Intermediate Climbing Class Ice Outing. We did not actually find any ice, but did have a great weekend. Climbers: Devin (Scribe), Sara, Jim and BK We planned to carryover by climbing up to Boston-Sahale Col, across Boston Glacier, up the North Face of Buckner then down the SW side and back down the Sahale Arm. Sleeping in at the Trailhead, we headed up Boston Basin in low clouds around 8am. It is amazing how much longer the trail is now without all the snow that was on it a few months back when we got weathered off a Forbidden attempt. We reached the tree line and solid snow as we opened into Boston Basin under sunny skies and an awesome view. So many peaks to climb, so little time. After a short break to watch Marmot mortal combat, we headed up the snow and eventually roped up for the Quien Sabe Glacier. Snow was consolidated and made for fast travel all the way to the col. Since we got a late start, there was a ton of people heading down from the col while we were heading up. The bergschrund at the top of the Quien Sabe is easily passable but might start to be an issue in a few weeks. Now some shenanigans began as we had to climb around the pile O’ crap (Boston Peak). I had a desire to climb Boston Peak (Why I wanted to do this even I do not know, I blame the Bulger’s). However the climb turned out to be even more ridiculous that I expected. We followed the ledges down to the Boston Glacier, which was actually very straight forward route finding even though it was absolutely terrifying because of the ridiculously loose rock. I almost had a very bad day when a huge boulder slid right above me and almost got my leg before nearly falling on BK. Once on the glacier, Sara and Jim headed to make camp while I talked BK into trying Boston with me. We climbed on the rock next to the Boston Glacier towards the summit block of Boston, however we transitioned to the glacier too early I think and ended up separated from the summit block by an impassible Bergschrund. At this point it was getting late in the day and we decided to pass on Boston this time. The Boston glacier is surprising broken up and navigating to our flat spot for camp was interesting but not extremely difficult. Up at 3am and walking by 4 towards the North Face of Mount Bucker. It took us an hour to cross the Boston Glacier to the base of the route. Roped up and climbing the route when the sun started to rise. The lower North face is pretty broken up but you can easily traverse to the adjacent snow field to avoid all of the moats. Snow was perfect for kicking steps but hard enough to make for fast travel. Clouds moved in as we neared the summit, but route finding was extremely easy so no issues. Hit the summit at about 10am. Found only two other entries in the summit register from the year, one from the day before. As we headed into Horseshoe basin the skies started to clear. Now that we have completed the straightforward technical climbing, time now apparently for the shenanigan filled descent down the Sahale Arm. Crossing Horseshoe basin was more annoying than anything. Ages of traversing on a hill are less than fun. The “snow finger” that you’re supposed to climb to exit the basin was pretty steep with an unfriendly runout onto the rocks, so we went around to the broad gully to climbers left. At the top we made the mistake of going right around the large moat to get to Sahale camp. We should have gone left up the snow ramp. Instead we ended up on a steep sketchy snow bridge to get to Sahale camp. I do not recommend going this way. And because we needed more fun, here comes the whiteout. After some wandering and eventually finding the trail (yay GPS) we made it back to the cars and to Olive Garden for dinner. Great trip, but man do my feet hurt Gear Notes: 4 Pickets per team, 2 Screws (did not need) Crampons, Ice axe and ice tool and a prayer to the gods of loose rock to let us pass. Approach Notes: Trail is clear all the way to Boston Basin. Getting out of Horseshoe basin and back to Sahale was far more of a pain, though the ledges down Boston to Boston Glacier were a close second

Was just up there last weekend and looked but did not see it. Sorry. Which side of the road were you parked on?

Finally remembered to add photos from the trip. And yes, Danika had her first trad lead on pitch 2

Looking for photos and beta on the best route up this choss pile. I have lots and lots of TRs full vague reference to terrible routes, but would very much enjoy photos and beta from someone that found the slightly less terrifying route up this thing.