philfort

From the standard winter closure (MP 134) to Rainy Pass is about 22 miles I think? Then maybe anotehr 5 miles to washington pass. but Robertm said it's closed at MP 148 now. I didn't know they had a "gate" there. In any case, there might be some dry pavement beyond the gate, before you'll be able to ski.

I like Big Bosom Buttes. The red Beckey also lists a "Squatter Peak" next to Old Brownie, but I guess those aren't official names.

yeah, I actually blurred the "boring" parts of the map to get the jpg to a smaller size so it loads faster.

To get an idea of what the weather is doing "cascade-wide", I made a map of washington web cams with clickable thumbnails: cam map There needs to be more cams in the North Cascades... Something seems to be going on in Leavenworth right now. I've only tried this on IE, so things might look messed up in Netscape...

Cayuse pass is now also closed for the season.

MntnrMichael, a topo map would probably be the best person to answer your questions: http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?z=10&n=5198064&e=613942&s=25&size=l

On www.turns-all-year.com there is a trip report from Chinook Pass yesterday... they said turns were good.

I bet coverage would be ok, but I doubt it will corn up given the forecast this wknd. It will probably be icy.

Sure. In Alex's example, Joe falls with force T when tied directly into the anchor, falling from height X above the anchor. If sally belays him through a draw, and Joe falls from height X above the draw, he's not going to put force T on the draw, since the belay will slip a bit. But say he puts force 0.8T on the draw, Sally will feel an upward force of 0.8T, give a total force on the draw of 1.6T. Whoa! You're right bolt_clipper!

Hmm, Loren is right here, assuming "ideal" conditions, that is, no friction, yadda yadda yadda... If Joe falls with force T on a draw, and Sally is belaying him just below the anchor, she will also feel force T upwards, and the draw will have a force of 2T on it. So it definitely doubles. Tie a string to your finger, pull down on it with a force of 10LBS. Your finger feels 10LBS. Now, instead, loop that string around your finger, and pull on one side with a force of 10LBS. In order for the string to remain in a fixed position (i.e. equivalent to Sally holding the climber in a static belay), someone else has to pull on the other side with 10LBS. So your finger will now feel a force of 20LBS. Of course, in the real world there is biner friction, and the belay isn't static, so then things get really complicated, and the force probably isn't doubled...

Agreed, the approach is "easy"... a lot of elevation gain, but it's on nice soft trail or meadow or glacier. Except for the stupid talus field. Go for it. But could anyone who was up there last wknd give a guestimate on snow depth (there was about 1-2 feet at 6000ft in Terror Basin last wknd, though it was patchy, so I assume something similar?). I was thinking about going into Boston Basin for some turns...

How deep is the snow up there right now? The website says the road is gated at MP 20. Is that at the Eldorado lot, or the steep switchback?

PS.,I've ordered paper ones from maptown before. They arrived quickly to Seattle, like in 2 days or something.

I've heard from a couple of different sources that this high pressure thing is expected to break down by mid-December...

Try http://toporama.cits.rncan.gc.ca The maps are actually identical (contour-wise) as the 1:50000 paper maps, except: they're squished horizontally, the names of peaks or towns aren't on them, and there are no elevations marked. They kind of suck. They also have aerial photos of some mapsheets, but again, they suck compared to what you can get on terraserver for the US.

I find it hard to believe skiing down the backside to 410 would ever be an issue. I don't htink you'll have any problems. But just going along the closed portion of 410 is only about 5 miles to the White River turnoff anyway, so I'm not sure it gains you much. (although parking might be hard down there, compared to the ski area). FWIW, I think snowmobiles are allowed on 410 and White River rd, to the campground.

quote: Originally posted by RobBob:

I think the only way without bushwhacking is via Burgundy Col. I've done part of Silver Ck in spring, and while it was fine on skis, it seemed it would be brushy w/o snow. However, it would seem to me that Silver Ck is more straightforward route-finding, since you follow a valley bottom; whereas with Burgundy Col, it's easy to end up at the wrong col (which may or may not be a problem), and there are misleading paths. Also sometimes its hard to pick up the climbers path from the valley bottom, although the forest is quite open, so not such a big deal. I've also done the Willow Ck approach, which may be the quickest way up, but this has bushwhacking and route-finding.

I was at Rainy Pass last weekend, and there was just under 2 feet of snow at highway level, and about 3 feet @6000ft. We had good views of the Liberty Bell group in the afternoon. The west sides didn't look too snowed up from several miles away, but all the approach gullies were snow-filled. The north-facing rock where we were was in "winter condition". Didn't see any ice anywhere. Tuesday's rain has probably melted off a good amount of snow. [ 11-21-2002, 01:22 PM: Message edited by: philfort ]

quote: Originally posted by terrible ted: Does anyone know of a case where someone was completely buried by a PNW avalanche and recovered alive? If you look at last year's incidents on the csac site in Washington, there are a number where people were completely buried (or very nearly so, with a hand sticking up, or in one case, a tiny piece of binding showing), and recovered successfully. Not all PNW avalanches are heavy wet things, I've seen powder avalanches here where the debris was not that firm.

I played around with using an OR-style rope bag (long and narrow) as a picket bag: clip one end into the ice axe loop on the bottom of your pack, and then the other end somewhere higher up on the front or side of you... sort of makes a diagonal bag you could slide them into. I have never tried it in the field though. I usually just let them bang against my legs and start getting pissed off at them. Clip them to my harness, or sling around the shoulders, but clip a hole just about the middle so they don't dangle so low.

quote: Originally posted by Off White: I thought the new Vol 1 used the same author photo as the new Vol 3. You're probably right... I guess I don't know my Beckey flower photos!

quote: Originally posted by Off White: a slick dark brown with the goofy Beckey-with-flowers photo on the back. Maybe it was brand new when I saw it (5 weeks ago I think) and I failed to grasp the recent vintage. The slick dark brown with flowers is vol 3 Rainy Pass to FRaser River, but it's actually dark red. Get your Beckey colours straight! The new brown one has been out for less than a year. I flipped through it briefly and didn't notice a whole lot that was different.. except for some new Rainier pics, and the rating of the south route on Garfield has risen to "class 4+"

Mike King can probably hook you up: http://www.whitesaddleair.com The central Coast Range is full of places that meet your requirements. Buy a map and choose a spot.

quote: Originally posted by iain: so I made the stupid joke that Chimborazo, on the equator, would be easy from all sides. Or maybe it could also be hard on all sides