philfort

I don't mind the ad, as long as it's for a good/interesting event, like Miles Smart's slideshow. Having to close the popup, is just too difficult for me. But having it, temporarily, in the corner of the main page would be fine.

Agreed - it's really annoying.

The traverse was pretty straightforward - over the lower hump of the ski area, through open areas and old growth forest, until you reach the upper basin (descending very slightly). This would be horrible later in the year, because the traverse across the upper basin would probably be extremely brushy. There are a few little canyons to cross on the traverse, but they were mostly still snow-filled for us. Traverse is on fairly gentle slopes, but there are very steep slopes above for much of the way.

Nice site, benman... Does anyone know if the Lava glacier headwall on Adams has been skied?

CNN reports: "Mudslides hit Mount St. Helens in southwestern Washington, but no injuries or major damage was reported." Phil

Wow.... I had semi-fantasized about doing a winter climb of the N face, followed by a ski descent of the White Salmon - guess your report will put a stop to that fantasy! Which side of the valley did you do the approach on? We did the approach in early June last year, and it only took 3 hours from the road to the base of the N face - we thought the rigors of the approach were grossly exaggerated! Even a group who followed the approached described in Becky only took 4 hours. (not dissing your 8 hour time - obviously it's a lot slower in deep snow than on spring hardpack) We followed the east side of shuksan arm from the ski area, then crossed the White Salmon valley above the brush. Although the traverse we did is somewhat threatened by avalanches (almost got nailed by one on the return), there was hardly any bushwhacking. Did you guys have skis/snowshoes? Did the White Salmon glacier look very crevassed? And, lastly, was the snow powdery, good for skiing? (e.g. in the open, above treeline, on the N facing slopes). (still thinking about skiing the white salmon) Phil

Hmm, I guess I don't feel so bad about publicizing the Enigma Gully/Slot couloir as a ski descent, if it's going to be included in a book! With that, and Selected Climbs II, it looks like the "undiscovered days" of the NW side of Snoqualmie Mtn are coming to an end. Oh well - I'm sure there are many more "NW side of Snoqualmie Mtn"s to discover. We were quite certain it's been skied before - it's a natural ski route, and not that difficult or dangerous in the nice conditions we had - we're certainly not "extreme" skiers or anything, or even very good at all :-). The only reason it probably doesn't see much traffic is because it is so hidden. You can't really see the gully from _anywhere_, even from the bottom most of it is hidden. When is Martin's book due out? It'll be nice to have a skiing guidebook for the Cascades that doesn't include things like Mt Margaret or Annabilis. Colin, congrats on New York gully. Here is a picture of your footprints from above: Phil

Hmm, Greg, that's not exactly the story I got from Dave. He said he was about to lead it - but then you said you were comfortable solo'ing it, and headed up. Well, then Dave just _had_ to too, to prove he was equal man or something.... :-) Phil

When we climbed back over the ridge, the NY gully guy's stashed equipment (firn skis) were still there - looks like they hadn't come down yet, but it was only 3pm. Whoever it was, I hope they post something to cc. The snow in the NW face gully is pretty tracked up now, I wouldn't bother skiing it until more snow comes :-) Phil

In response to why I don't take my MSR bladder into the mountains: because it isn't convenient to drink from. Much easier to have a nalgene in a holder on my waist belt. Also, the plastic cap has deformed a bit over the years, and it leaks a little now, and I've been too lazy to get another cap.

For any kind of mountaineering, water bladders suck IMO: 1) The hose freezes. 2) They leak Water Bladder Proponents will say 1) "Not if you blow the water in the tube back in the bladder." I've never seen anyone keep this up successfully on a cold day. Instead, the tubes always freeze, they can't drink their water, and now they must drink yours. Happened on Lib Ridge last summer, right Marcus? :-) 2) "They don't leak" Well, I've never seen one crack or break, but the filling hole or the "sucking valve" always seems to pop off. A popped off sucking valve (not mine) cost me the North Ridge of Baker (am I bitter?? nah!!). In fact, I seem to recall dbb having a leaking water bladder just a few weeks ago - was that on Mt Kent or something? I think those things are great for around camp (like, the big MSR water bladders), or for mountain biking say, when it doesn't get hit against anything and you don't want to carry any clunky nalgenes. In fact, I own an MSR bladder, and a camelbak. But I don't take them into the mountains. Instead, I generally take a couple of lexan Nalgene's, and keep one in an insulated 'cozy' strapped to my waist belt for quick access. ok, enough ranting Phil [This message has been edited by philfort (edited 02-16-2001).]

A note on range: they can work far beyond the 2 mile range if you're line of sight. I recall being near the summit of North Twin Sister 2 years ago, and having trouble finding a free channel (out of 14) to talk to my partners, because of all the conversations going on in Bellingham (presumably).

I have found them useful for belayer/climber communication. Whatever you do, DON'T get a Cherokee FR-460, like I have (they are extremely tiny, so I thought they'd be good for climbing). They break if you let the batteries run really low. Such as might happen when it gets cold. Switch the batteries to new ones, and presto - the radios don't work anymore, and you need to send them in for repair.

update: they were just spotted by a chopper, walking back down. Appears all is ok.

My roommate went to climb Drury Falls yesterday with a more experienced partner. They haven't returned yet. They were supposed to be back last night. Their car is still parked on highway 2. Just wondering if anyone was up there this weekend and knows what the snow conditions were like (avie danger, etc...), or if anyone saw them yesterday. I believe they crossed the river in a rubber raft. thanks, Phil

Wow, people are sure ready to pick a fight! I didn't find Dan's post too offensive - maybe I just didn't read into it like others did. My opinion: I don't really care if the trade routes are all crowded with people who don't know to go anywhere else. That's their problem. Who cares if they lack imagination and creativity in route selection, as long as they're happy. Although I guess it does kind of suck when I want to go climb those trade routes. Oh well. Moreover, I don't think dissing others for this lack of "exploratory/adventure" climbing necessarily implies elitism (and I don't know if he was really dissing them - more like just making an observation?). I certainly don't climb at a high technical level, and yet I've been able to find "exploratory/adventure" climbing. And the list of unknown routes I need to go "check out" keeps growing. I guess it comes back to that other "why do you climb" thread. That thread was kind of enlightening - a lot of people have very different reasons why they climb - very different than mine. And that's fine. I rhyme! Phil

Your exuberance is refreshing. If you want another nice climb in the area, with steeps snow slopes similar to Granite, but much less crowded, I would suggest the ridge west of Mt Defiance (some call it Banana Ridge I think). It has a summit at around 5300ft I think. The summit ridge has some nice exposure, with a north-facing cliff. You can reach it from the Mason Lake trailhead by following the unmarked path that continues straight after the hairpin, a few hundred yds from the trailhead. The path traverses, then eventually zigzags up a ridge, soon emerging from the trees. You can continue up the steep ridge (good in summer), or traverse right into the next basin to some steep (40 degree) open snow slopes. In a good winter, these slopes avalanche enough that the debris comes all the way down to the trail, offering a straight 3000ft shot up to the ridgetop, no bushwhacking. Right now though, this avalanche path isn't even close to being snow-filled, and the slopes above are still quite bare too - maybe by spring there will be enough snow. Here are some pictures from a somewhat misguided attempt to ski the face in dicey (icy) conditions: http://praxis.etla.net/~philfort/scary/scary.html Phil

There is a nice direct line to the summit, which we wanted to take - but it just didn't work out that way unfortunately. It looked like it would be quite technical climbing for the whole 1400ft with the current amount of snow cover. Lots of rock bands. The rock is really crappy. There was water ice bridging the largest rock band, but I bet it's thin. Here's what the face looks like in a good winter: http://praxis.etla.net/~philfort/images/RSP1.JPG There also appears to be a major gully on the right side of the face, with one large rock band. It was this rockband that had a big vertical column of water ice on it (probably a full pitch in length).

dbb and I went to climb the north face of Mount Kent on Saturday the 27th. We figured it would make a decent winter climb, and it probably would - with more snow cover. The only beta we had was from blurb in an AAJ that Dallas Kroke had climbed the "obvious gully" in 1994. We're still not sure exactly what he climbed, since there isn't one most obvious gully on the face (Maybe it's detailed in his winter climbs book? Anyone know?) It took us about 1.5 hours from the trailhead to reach the basin below the face - some bushwhacking, but not too bad with snowcover. The bottom of the face is characterized by steeper terrain - there isn't really an easy way into the interconnecting snow gullies. We climbed two pitches of pretty desperate, kind of scary, vertical tree/rock/snow climbing in a stand of trees, before we were able to gain easier snow gullies. With more snow cover (e.g. a normal winter), gaining the gullies might not be too difficult - right now though, unless you take to the trees like we did, your only other options are about a full pitch of thin, rotten ice. If this ice ever fattened up, there could be some great climbing here! (we did spot one nice piece of ice, about halfway up the right side of the face - a nice fat-looking vertical column). Once in a snow gully, it fortunately turned out to be easy cruising to the summit ridge, in a narrow 35-45 degree couloir. For pro we used mostly slung trees and pickets, with a few pitons and screws. We didn't end up taking the direct line we wanted, because it looked really nasty, and we didn't have the time or cohones. Steep thin snow with lots of cliff bands. But it might be a reasonable proposition with more snow. All in all, took about 10 hours car-to-car: http://praxis.etla.net/~philfort/Kent/Kent.html Phil South Ravenna [This message has been edited by philfort (edited 01-28-2001).]

Oops, I got ripped for $65 by Amazon. Oh well, still worth the price, this is an excellent (and very heavy and comprehensive) book, highly recommended. It's got some American content too, since a lot of American climbers came and pilfered the cool hard routes in the cdn Rockies from the locals ) Great photographs, especially the selection of colour photos at the beginning of the book. [This message has been edited by philfort (edited 01-28-2001).]

I was up there two weeks ago. I hiked up into the basin below Cascade Pass to check out a climb - unfortunately it was a whiteout, so I couldn't see much, but there sure wasn't much snow. Probably less than 2 feet at the summer parking lot (~3600ft). All the talus was exposed - it was pretty sad looking! The only places with enough snow to ski were the patches of slide alder. btw, when I was there, the road was _very_ icy the last mile or two before the gate (there was about 6 inches of snow on the road).

Wow, you're demanding! I was up around Snoqualmie Peak last wknd. Snow was bombproof, no snowshoes needed up to about 5200ft (as high as we went). The NE slab of the Tooth looked bare (rock), so I assume the N. Face of Chair is similar. The road leading to Ingalls Peak is closed to vehicles at '29 Pines' (a campground I assume), according to the ranger station (apparently due to logging operations - snowmobiles and foot traffic ok). I don't know where 29 Pines is along the road. I bet due to lack of snow, that the n slope of Whitehorse is mighty brushy lower down. I would guess that you could drive to the Big Four Ice Caves trailhead. don't know about anything else.

Why is Eldorado (one of?) the only peak in the Cascades with a sharp snow arete on top? Does anyone know what causes that, i.e. why it doesn't just melt off like on every other peak, or why the snow accumulates so thickly right on top? Is it the orientation of the ridge that's just right or something? Is it a remnant piece of ice/snow? Has anyone else given this any thought? Phil

Never tried it, but it sounds like a good idea. Probably a 6pack of Bud is enough, eh? I don't know about Cascade River road... assuming the 'bilers don't illegally enter the park, there aren't very many places for them to go up there, are there? I think the park boundary is still quite some ways from the Cascade Pass trailhead. Or maybe snowmobiles are actually allowed on the road to the trailhead?

This wreckless line of logic was also a joke! Sorry the sarcasm was not obvious. We were well aware of the dangers...