zoroastr

Trip: Snowking - Day Hike Date: 5/25/2009 Trip Report: The idea looked good on paper: a brisk Memorial Day jaunt to the summit of a pretty North Cascades walk-up. In restrospect, the details of our grueling and ill-concieved death-slog might have made a passable episode of TV's "Jackass." 1. Most of the upper portion of the route is currently buried under a deep layer of heavy, wet snow--so, naturally, we left the snowshoes in the car. 2. After the first hour, the way is utterly devoid of water, and the single, tiny plastic bottle I brought was instantly drained. 3. The primitive climber's path quickly transitions from a typically steep North Cascades root ladder to a forrested half-mile section of deep but solid snice that doesn't really take a heel--very easy to get lost here; GPS would have helped. I was actually ready to abandon this fiasco when we met a very nice NOLS group who were doing a week-long mountaineering seminar and had planted their tent city at the base of the peak. The group had set up a couple of very efficient black bag water catchers and were cranking out snowmelt by the gallon. One of the group leaders very graciously allowed me to fill my bottle, removing the only real obstacle to a summit bid, and turning what would have been a pretty but dissappointing hike into a fine afternoon's climb--thanks tons, NOLS! Some snaps....The summit as seen from an approaching ridge. I'm very interested in finding out the altitude stats for this trip, because the approach ridge undulates over a series of rolling hills whose cumulative gain must be quite significant. The very nice NOLS people and their encampment near the base of Snowking... Once on the mountain, snow conditions improved only slightly. An older ski track gave almost no flotation. For some reason I've yet to fathom, Erick Johnson is in phenominal early-season shape this year--he took the lead for most of the way, grinding out the miles of post-holing like a Sunday stroll in the park. Very pretty summit ridge! Snow stayed deep, soft and wet all the way to the summit. Fortunately, the last few hundred feet ramped up enough to allow for a quick seated glissade off the top. From the summit, we were back the the NOLS tent city in one hour. After a brief chat, we started sprinting out of the valley. It was already 5:00 PM, and there were several miles of wet slop between oursevles and safety. This is really a tremendous summit for views, and a great place from which to launch an extended multi-peak traverse. The potential for unstructured wandering is everywhere! More summit goodness...

best sap shot i've seen ever! thx

HEY! You kids get down from there! Somebody could get hurt!

omfg

Damn! that looks like a great trip! Very nice pix, too. Thanks for taking me back to a favorite area...

Trip: Chiwawa Mt. - Lyman Glacier - Day Trip Date: 10/6/2008 Trip Report: Yesterday's weather forecast held enough promise to justify a return to the Chiwawa Valley and the kidney-jarring ordeal of the approach road to Trinity. Naturally, as soon as we hit the Spider Meadows, all thoughts of potholes, blow-downs and axle-high mud were instantly banished, and we knew we'd made the right call. The colors were amazing! EJohnson had done this trek a couple of summers ago and couldn't shut up about it, so I was eager to see what all the fuss was about. If anything, his ravings were an understatement; the place is spectacular. Here are a few snaps taken during the course of our one-day trek. Entering the Meadows... Spider Meadows, taken from the trail that links them with the glaciers above... I believe this is Mt. Maude. The shot was taken from the toe of the Spider Glacier. Nick, slogging the lower slopes of the Spider GL. EJohnson crossing a v-e-r-y receded Lyman Glacier. This is a crappy shot, but it shows our route. To gain the upper slopes, we pushed for the obvious snow finger and followed it to a point just below the bergschrund, visible here... Some random prettiness... EJohnson near the 'schrund. The finger was nothing but ice--very different from what Erick found on his last trip to the spot. The upper slopes of the Lyman. Because the terminal slopes of the glacier took us across a nasty fall line above the main 'schrund, we decided to hop into this moat where glacier meets rock, and simply follow it as far as we could. In this shot, EJohnson is seen emerging from the moat's exit point, a very narrow squeeze tunnel. Nick at the moat exit, demonstrating the downside to bringing along the Ten Essentials--he'll learn... Out of the moat and making good time to the main ridge... Gaining the ridge, with Fortress in the distance... Topping out after a bit of scrambling along the ridge. Heading down into the the adjacent valley via the opposite side of the peak, we were treated to a brief respite from the weather while still high on the Chiwawa summit ridge. Below the clouds and heading for the valley floor, we lost a thousand feet of vert in minutes with a boot-ski of the upper slopes and their half-foot of fresh dump. Parting shot of the ridge seperating the two valleys: our approach via the Phelps Creek / Spider Meadows, and our return to Trinity, using the valley shown here. We started the hike at around 10:00 AM, but needed lamps for the last hour. A great day in the hills! Gear Notes: We brought light day packs, aluminum 'pons, slope pokers, and Nick's wife's to-die-for cookies! Approach Notes: Approach road resembles the lunar surface; trail is still snow-free to Spider Meadows, light dusting higher up. Half foot of fresh on the peaks.

I hear ya. The day before the Lundin climb i spotted this one up in B.C. at the summit of a peak called Hardy. And have you ever seen the full-size grave marker on top of Mt. Si? What's with all these plaques, anyway? Is it a recent phenomenon? ..Like the proliferation of impromtu roadside shrines to accident victims? What makes people think they have the right to appropriate an entire mountain for the purpose of their own emotional gratification? What monumental hubris! Revised Gear Notes: Bring hammer and chisel!

Trip: Lundin Traverse - -MiniTR Date: 9/28/2008 Trip Report: Just a quick post of some snaps taken on yesterday's repeat of a local fave. Mellow and short, the traverse of Lundin involves mostly 3rd-class scrambling and one mid-5th step if you ascend the West Ridge, as we did. The ridge is pretty, and affords tremendous views of the Snoqualmie Alps and the Old PCT. Start of the W. Ridge. The step at the top of frame is airy and fun, but represents the only actual climbing on the route. Climbers lower on the ridge--I've done this one a couple of times before in perfect solitude; yesterday the place was lousy with peeps. From the step (5.5?), the rest of the way to the summit is a carry. A traverse of Lundin involves a considerable amount of light reading... Ejohnson watches the progress of another party as they descend the E. Ridge walkout--very purdy path! East Ridge descent route.... Gear Notes: We brought a small length of 9mm and a couple of cams to protect the ultra-short pitch Approach Notes: We tried an experimental schwack directly through the Commonwealth Basin... not bad, kinda fun, but my calves still resemble raw hamburger. Upside: got to enjoy a side of the valley that intelligent people never see --kidding EJ.

keeping a link to your report handy in case I ever get stuck for an example of the perfect T.R. ...thanks! ["Phyllis' Engine?" imho, possibly the coolest peak name ever!]

LP: I'm sure you'll love the route. It'll prolly be in shape for a while yet. I'm thinking of heading back into the area this weekend to snag one or two others. --good luck! My camera is (or, rather, *was*) a Canon A510 compact point-n-click, 3.2 MP. Unfortunately, it fell off my pack during the second hand traverse on Dorado. Luckily, since I followed it visually as it bounced down a hundred feet of ledges, I was able to retrieve it. The little camera, which I bought at Fry's for 140 bucks, and which served me well for three years, didn't survived the fall--the impact seperated the two halves of the body, and although I was able to compress them back tgether and get the LCD working, the shutter is toast. This weekend, I'm replacing it with another little Canon. I love these cameras--perfect for non-photogs like me. BTW: a couple of these snaps were taken by Tommy, who also carries a Canon, but he's got one of those 10-pound DSLR things. He took the dusk shot and the one of me rappelling. --cheers

Trip: Dorado Needle - Day Climb Date: 9/10/2008 Trip Report: With apologies to users of 1200-baud modems, I thought it might be fun to post a few large snaps from our group's climb of the Dorado Needle last Sunday. After getting weathered off the same route by horizontally-blowing snow the previous weekend, EJohnson, TommyU and I came back for some revenge during a spate of perfect late-season weather. It was REALLY great to get back on rock with EJohnson after a season of weird weather, conflicting work schedules and a broken clavicle. Tommy Unger, with whom we hadn't climbed before, turned out to be a glacier-probing, rock-hopping monster--nice job T.U.! This is a tremendous route, offering a thigh-burnning, boulder-strewn approach, miles of scenic glacier travel, and a short but exhilirating low-fifth-class route on solid rock. If you go for the single-day push as we did, you'll want to start quite early, as the boulder fields in the lower valley can be a bit tricky in the dark. V-e-r-y scenic approach! I had to suppress a powerful urge to yodel... The Triad... On the Inspiration Glacier, TommyU turned around to grab a shot of EJohnson, JohnC (relegated to the role of 'human ballast' for the duration of the glacier crossing) and Forbidden Peak in the distance... Nice big crack on the Inspiration Gl... From the passage col, we first glimpsed the peak (highest point, left). It was here that I began to entertain doubts about the likelihood of topping out. The shot is a bit deceptive; you have to lose a few hundred feet of vert before heading up the next glacier. Just before reaching the col, we found some very well-defined bear tracks and a huge scatpile--never saw the bear, but we were clearly not alone. Nearing the base of the route... Ejohnson, getting a feel for the place... Eventually, we opted not to try for the normal moat entry to the ridge--this looked really melted out and sketchy. Instead, we headed up the right-hand side via an exposed but easy set of ledges and a short chimney to rejoin the main ridge at a point well before the start of the intersting climbing. You might consider this option if the usual route is out of shape. As it turned out, the 'normal' route up the moat wasn't really that bad, and we rapped through it on the way down. EJohnson, starting up the ledges... Taken just after clearing the ledges and joinging the main ridge... EJohnson making good time toward the summit... TommyU committing to the first of a couple of exposed but short and solid hand traverses. After pausing briefly on top, we started a series of quick, fun raps down the ridge and into the moat... Back at the col. The alpenglow was nice, and we were able to get completely off the snow before turning on the lamps. The boulder fields were actually not that bad, but we were probably lucky to get down as quiickly as we did. Gear Notes: Glacier stuff, aluminum 'pons over running shoes, snax, water...blah..blah...blah... Approach Notes: Melted out below the glaciers...beware the boulders if coming out after dark!

To maximize your success potential on the one-day Prusik climb, you may wish to consider the Snow Lk. approach. Ejohnson and I did the route as a day climb from this side, and although I haven't tried it from the Colchuck side, I've hiked the entire C2C loop many times and I'm fairly certain we made better time on our Prusik day climb coming in from Snow Lk. ...could be wrong, though. Never actually mapped it. --good luck!

Ausgezeichnet! Kaum zu glauben! Vielen Dank.

Hinman....on 4-inch legs! ...i love it.

Great shots of the route...one o' my perennial local faves--relaxed, but nicely exposed. thanx for sharing.

Nice t.r.! I'm the geezer that met your party on the way up Aasgard. Just posted some snaps from the Witch's Tower. glad to hear your climb came off OK. Nice shot of the slab pitch--it was those slabs that started me thinking I might get some o' them fancy rock climbin' slippers. Haven't gotten them yet, but I hear they work better than my usual running shoes--maybe next season. l8tr

Trip: Witch's Tower - Enchantment Lakes - Parade Route - Day Hike Date: 8/26/2008 Trip Report: Had a Monday off, and so decided to take a short, easy scramble to the top of the Witch's Tower in the Enchantment Lakes area. I'm still nursing a fractured left clavicle, sustained as the result of a nasty bike crash four weeks ago, so I wanted to keep things mellow. Nothing wrong with the legs, though, so I made good progress up trail and down, completing the mini-tour in about seven hours C2C. I wanted to snag Little Annapurna as well, but after topping out on W.T., some shit weather rolled in, including a bit of frozen precip, so I started back--too bad, though, because halfway down Aasgard, the sun came back out and started laughing at me. Here are a couple of summit shots from the Tower. Once in the Upper Enchantments, the climb goes really quickly thanks to a snow-filled gully just to the left of the peaklet (not shown). Fortunately, I packed the aluminum 'pons for my running shoes, but a pair of stout boots would also have sufficed for the short 200-300-ft slope, which never exceeded 45 degrees or so, and which took me to the base of the tower in about 15 minutes. ..And another Summit shot. W.T. offers some tremendous views of the area--as good as those from the summit of Prusik. Ejohnson and I did the W. Ridge a few years back, and the Tower is a good place from which to view that other popular route... Coming down, I opted to try a scramble along a series of ledges just the opposite side of the snowslope (climber's left). The descent was really the highlight of the hike, as it involved alot of poking around, getting cliffed out, up-scrambling, more poking around, etc.--just the sort of thing that might have been annoying anywhere else, but in the Enchantments, bordeom is never an option. Finally, I began to notice a few cairns scattered about, and all too quickly I found myself back at the lakeshore. Taking note of the worsening weather, I hoisted a hood, cranked the toonz, and bolted for Aasgard and a highly enjoyable dirt-ski back down to Colchuck Lake. This shot is from one of the curious, perfectly flat living-room-sized ledges that you find a couple hundred feet above the lakes on the connecting ridge between Dragontail and L. Annapurna--perfect for a rogue bivy! Essential Gear for solo afternoon trail dashers: The 2GB Zen Stone, with rubberized protective bra. She'll take everything you can dish out then come up laughing. --cheers. Gear Notes: Crampons speed things up but are not really needed as there are numerous snow-free route options. Running shoes, a light shell, snax, toonz, and you're there. Approach Notes: No more snow along the way. Shocking lack of same on Colchuck Col! Perfect time to grab a hike in the area, although things are bound to improve as the larches start to catch fire in early Autumn.

Awesome t.r. ...just the sort of thing I wander over to CC for. Thanks! BTW: the macro shots are great!

Nice TR and pix! That route's a fave. A huge congrats to your fearless son!! I can't think of a better way to bond with your child than to be roped together on a class 5.7 pitch above a 600-ft drop. Also, thanks for the trail report. I'm thinking of a nice day hike up Chikamin. --cheers

JMO: thx for the t.r. I hope you'll give it another shot later this season. Congrats on making it as far as you did under those conditions! We waited until Sunday night to head up, but even under perfectly clear skies, it was all I could to to force myself into a standing position atop Columbia Crest--the winds would literally pull you off balance! They were the strongest winds I think I've ever felt....nice work.

Trip: Mt. Rainier - Parade Route - Day Hike Date: 7/8/2008 Trip Report: A sufficient amount of time had passed since I last hiked the DC route on Rainier that I'd forgotten what a trudge the thing can be. With my regular climbing partner out of town, I phoned office mate Alex M., who I knew was afflicted with a particularly acute case of that familiar noob malady, irrational volcano lust. I suggested the one-day push since, on balance, this entals far less suffering than the conventional two-day nightmare. The latter option usually goes something like this: Start by loading half the REI inventory on your back, lean forward to keep from falling backward under the weight, then bake for several hours in a torturous, summer afternoon slog up the Muir Snowfield to your destination: a thin sheet of blue foam on which you'll spend a sleepless night of tachycardia while breathing solar toilet fumes--no thanks. We arrived at an ugly hotel construction site oddly named "Paradise" at approximately 10:30 PM Sunday night and after sorting gear and prepping light day packs, headed up for the first leg of the overnight trek. What follows are a few snaps taken during the pretty but longish hike. I also threw in a couple of interesting shots from last season's trip. Sunrise pinks the firn, with the tent town of Ingraham Flats visible in the distance far below... Summiteers stretched out along the trail on the upper dome... Morning has broken... Some descesnders, with Little Tahoma... Alex, about to enjoy his brief moment as Highest Dood in Washington, flanked by a couple of other distant volcanoes... Tommy U., checking out a big crack on last year's hike. The fixed lines on last season's extra-long route... Well done, Max! Gear Notes: Small day packs and a short length of glacier floss. We roped up for the interesting section, but carried for the upper dome, and descended the route off-rope, with the exception of the fixed lines which we clipped. Approach Notes: Route's in perfect shape. Get down early to avoid 'pon balling.

Thanks for an enthralling and edifying t.r. ...Adding my voice to the chorus of well-wishers. Your physics training seems to have stood you in good stead; I especially liked the analyses of geothermal gases and caloric expenditure--could you attach a spreadsheet next time? [kidding]. --cheers!

Awesome! You've inspired me...right now I'm filling my pack bladder with French Roast and getting ready to head up the Corridor...hmmm...I wonder if I can get some NoDoz at Ken's truck Town...

bigeo: Glad to hear your trip came off ok...congrats! Sounds like you guys improved on our approach route--nice! Can't wait to check out the pix... --cheers

bigeo... the shoes didn't go on until we were out on clear slopes, above the trees below. Until that point, you're on concrete avy debris, then 'schwacking through a bit of snow-free forest slope, interspersed with gullies that were holding a bit of punchy, deepish snow below, but quickly firmed up as we ascended. Once again, the key to finding the "freeway" is to avoid the early temptation to head straight up into the cliffs of the main drainage, opting instead for the trees to the right. If you pay your dues with the early 'schwack, you'll more than make up for it higher up...enjoy!