philfort

Wow, hardman slaphappy! Guess you found it in the right conditions - but yipes, that's some hardcore glissading! Anyone else have tales of "extreme glissading"? (intentional or otherwise :-) I wonder if the C-J couloir has ever been skied....

Here's what the Carbon looked like 9 days ago: And a blow up:

Oh, I was thinking of Mt Terror I think... oops

Oh what glorious fun 'tis, gregm! I recall our roped glissade down the Interglacier, in side-by-side attack formation, and the looks on the faces of the ascending climbers about to be "tripped up" by us, as we headed towards them at high speed....

This is the route Jim Nelson describes in Selected Climbs II as "Exposed class 3", correct? Typo? The actual text description made it sound a little tougher than that.

And how far apart are the bolts?

Very cool... good job! Pictures?

A very helpful link on my Links pages is the "Planning a trip? Find out which places to avoid" link: http://praxis.etla.net/~philfort/Links.html They have a great search engine.

The scariest part is the suspension bridge across the Carbon. However, there were still a few talus fields that the trail crossed that still had snow (but not much) on them, so if the snow is hard, it could be exposed, and your wiff might be scared. I did not go past where the Carbon "bends" (~5600ft).

quote: Originally posted by Backcountry: What was the hike like up to Moraine...are the av chutes "fun" around Dick Cr.??? um, it was pretty snow free until around Dick Cr. Don't recall any avie chutes. At least, none that had snow in them. Things are looking bare up there.

I hiked up to the Moraine Park area from Ipsut Creek on Sunday. I could tell that the "access ramp" that leads through the Carbon icefalls to the base of the ridge wasn't nearly as smooth as mid-June of last year (when we climbed Lib Ridge). It appeared to have several cracks going all the way across it.

Training: for what it's worth, before climbing Rainier last summer, I would try to run up a local peak twice a week during the evening (in addition to regular weekend stuff). That seemed to keep me in good shape, and I didn't have any problems on the climb. Started a month or two before the climb. Didn't bother with any extra weight on the back, that just kills your knees. Mailbox peak is a good one for that (4000ft vertical, and continuously steep trail).

Things might be more stable by Sunday, after two or three days of warm sunshine, followed by colder temps Saturday. Right now though, things are probably an avalanche-fest. Read the current forecast at http://www.seawfo.noaa.gov/products/SABSEA 30-40 inches of new snow since Saturday. yeesh. I was up near Granite mtn this morning, and while there was some nice skiing, the sun was quickly turning the stuff there into two feet of heavy mush.

http://www.ultrasupercool.com/Denali/denali.htm I think it's shameful that he has kids, and he going off to climb something as adventurous, crazy, and "out there" as the West Butt!!

I would recommend the DC or the Kautz, over the Emmons. The Emmons is reallllly boring, featureless 5000ft snow slog on 30 degree slopes (unless you do it late season when the crevasses get nasty). At least that's the way it was when I descended it last June - I think there were two tiny crevasses you had to step across. The DC is much more scenic. More crowded than the Emmons, but hey, what's the difference between 100 other climbers, or 60 other climbers. Never tried the Kautz, but I hear it's nice.

scottclimbs: Why did you make the same post three times?

I'll put in a second vote for the e-trex. It's so tiny and light. Of course, you should never *rely* on the GPS - always have a map and compass backup. (in fact, you really need a compass to work with the GPS for most navigation anyway). But I'll have to disagree with Rodchester. Need to get somewhere in a whiteout above treeline? GPS is the way - unless you don't mind wasting time. Repeatedly taking bearings with a map & compass will be nowhere near as accurate as zeroing in on a GPS waypoint (assuming the waypoint is accurate to begin with). A trip two summers ago comes to mind - arriving in Boston Basin in light drizzle with about 50 foot visiblity. We were planning to climb the N ridge of Forbidden, so we needed to get across Sharkfin col. None of us had been there before. We bailed, partly due to the drizzle, and the time and effort we knew it would take to reach the col - a mile or two of taking compass readings in 50 foot visiblity - how accurate can you get in that??? But with a GPS, we might have decided to continue on. We *knew* it was sunny above the drizzle (the cloud deck kept lowering, and the next day, when we would have been on the ridge, turned out beautiful & sunny), so the climb would have been a go! [This message has been edited by philfort (edited 04-26-2001).]

Goatboy, here's a picture of the top of the NW couloir from that wknd last October: Looked like a cool climb.

goatboy, oh, yeah, I guess that was us. Your mention of freezing rain made me think you guys went a different weekend. We did the climb on Saturday and camped high, then left Sunday morning - the weather was a little threatening then, but no precip. I guess that's another reason not to do the Sibley Ck approach - a little known fact, but the weather is far worse in the Sibley Creek/Triad area, than in Eldorado/Roush creek!

I went to climb the NE face of Eldorado last October. We approached via the regular way, and met another party in the parking lot that was going to climb the NW gully, approaching via Sibley creek, and coming out the regular way (they were leaving at car at the regular lot). We never saw any sign of them that weekend. Hmm.

Consider the Lowa Civettas too. Easy to walk in, a little softer than most plastic boots maybe, but I still climb water ice in them. They are fairly "low profile" (less clunky). You can get them at Pro Mountain Sports, or Feathered Friends...

To clarify the snowmobile sno-park permits thing (ORV tag, etc....). Snowmobilers do *not* have to *pay* for sno-park permits. They come "free" with registration, which costs less than 20$. (or else, registration is "free" with the sno-park permit, depending how you look at it). I think I paid $18.75. That's right, it's about the same price for a skier to buy a sno-park permit than it is for a sledder to register his vehicle AND get a sno-park permit. Sure, the snowmobile permits are only valid at snowmobile sno-parks. However, those are often groomed areas. Where trails are groomed for non-motorized users, these users must purchased an additional 20$ grooming permit, 40$ in total! PRetty funny!

jason_h, as to why they should not be able to use the land to same extent as climbers, hikers: Snowmobiles infringe on others enjoyment of the wilderness. Mountain bikers do also, to a much a lesser extent. Climbing anchors virtually not at all. Therefore, snowmobiles should be the most restricted, mountain bikes less so, and climbing anchors not at all. There is no line, it is a gray area. However, I would like to add it seems that sledders can't really "police" themselves very well. All these hot-headed anti-snowmobile arguments from climbers, exist for a reason. They are people's opinion, based on what they've seen and heard. I've seen loads of trash left by 'bilers, I've seen them completely ignore the wilderness boundary in the Alpine Lakes, I've seen them zooming around inside the crater at Mt St Helens. This gives me a negative view of snowmobilers. It's not something wrong with me, it's simply the way they are perceived, and it's *their* fault - the anti-snowmobile sentiment is completely understandable. A few bad apples spoil the whole bunch. I've met nice sledders too, but those don't stick in my mind for some reason. Sledders need some serious PR work, and for that to happen, some of them need to clean up their act. Phil (PS: and what's with all the pro-snowmobile posts using Alpine Tom's "10w-40" remark to bolster their argument that snowmobilers don't leave very much trash? Presumably, what Alpine Tom saw was a bottle oil left by a sledder, and he just happened to refer to it as "10w-40". Unless someone's been driving their car up on Mt Baker :-)

But just because you got to the top, and back down safely, doesn't mean you've conquered the mountain. I'm afraid I'm with Joe Poulton on this one. ... I know, I know, it's just a word. But it has implications.

We can certainly guess and say, yeah, they were exercising poor judgement, but we can't know for sure. Maybe they knew what they were doing, and had assessed the slope for stability. Most likely not, but you never know. As for snowmobilers and trash - well, the title of this post was "WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT SNOWMOBILES ON MT. BAKER???", so I think it's appropriate to make comments about the trash they leave. retiredpop, I'd have to disagree with your assessment of the hiker vs snowmobiler trash, but hey, that's just my opinion. If y'all get a chance, and you're passing through Snoqualmie Pass, go check out the Gold Creek snowmobile sno-park once it melts out (maybe it already has?). You won't believe how much trash there is there (consisting of Coors boxes, beef jerky packages, and *2-stroke* oil containers). Absolutely disgusting! This winter I used snowmobile support to get into the Ingalls Peak trailhead to go skiing. Admittedly, I only recall seeing one piece of trash, a budweiser can, which wasn't bad considering the amount of snowmobile traffic. But what did piss me off what the disregard other sledders had for the Wilderness boundary (which goes along Ingalls Pass ridge). Perhaps the "No snowmobiling past this point" sign wasn't visible enough, or perhaps they chose to ignore it; whatever the case, there were a lot of snowmobiles zooming around right below Ingalls Peak, and around Ingalls Lake, well within the wilderness boundary. There were also lots of old sled tracks there. Thanks for reminding me of this, I'll go write that letter to the Forest Service I've been meaning to write. Favourite quote from a sledder arriving at Ingalls Pass, just shortly after we had skinned to the top. He turns off his machine, looks around, and says: "Where in the hell am I?"