AlpineK

Over Fourth, it's all downhill. A long way fortunately.

40 ehh? It's about time you joined the club. I think we can all unite in Kevbone snickering.

Those are some great pictures

Sounds nice. I need to get a new one in the next couple years. The question I have is when is somebody going to sell a cheap inflatable balloon to carry while skiing? [img:center]http://www.thegreenwichphantom.co.uk/uploaded_images/park-wolfman-6-737729.jpg[/img]

Trip: White Pine - Ski Adventure Extremo Date: 1/25/2009 Trip Report: Skiing on Rainier this weekend may have been a better call. Looking at the forecasts the indication I got was that the best weather/visability was east of the crest. We knew there was going to be avalanche debris, but we guessed we'd figure out how to avoid most of the mess. I guess we did avoid most of it, but what we couldn't avoid added a degree of adventure neither of us were looking for. In the end we didn't get to ski the rad sickness, but we did get a laugh out of the day. We made our approach via the Hansellator. Going up the logging road we decided to cut up early. We based this choice on our experience last year. In the end we got an exciting bit of brushwacking on skis. Eventually we made it back to the road and had a nice ski up the logging cut. We should have skied down this slope, but we were hoping to find sickness. Here's a nice view of Rock Mountain. On the upper slopes we decided to cut out early before the summit. I could already tell the snow depth had departed a week ago or so. Anyhow we traversed out and found some lines at the edge of the obvious slide path. In this photo you can see a lot of trees I don't recall seeing before while skiing. Things still looked sort of alright below. Eventually we got to a drop that looked like a mess. We skirted that on skiers right and found some more descent snow on the right side. Eventually though we had to confront getting back to the left and the logging road. Here's another view where you can really see the recent avalanche destruction. From here skiing across the debris was extreme, but not the kind of extreme you always see on the skiing movies. This was more the adventure version of extreme. Here's one shot, but it doesn't do full justice to a full on debris field. When we got to the logging road the rest of the trip out was kind of a boring straightline ski. That was ok since we needed a break. Eventually we made it back to the Hansellator and had a laugh on the drive home. Gear Notes: Skis, poles, and boots were nice. Approach Notes: HWY 2 to White Pine then up.

Yeah there is more commentary that can be humorous and directly relating to bc skiing.

db and steller bring up some good points. A private lesson where they know you aren't a total newbie and only want their opinion for use in the bc is what you want. Just to clarify one point. I spent a brief time in the 90s instructing skiing. Never use the term snow plow. You may know what that means, but most modern folks are used to different snow plowing equipment. The correct term is either, "make a wedge," or, "make a piece of pizza." A good instructor should also know what a kick turn is. It ain't like the old days at a ski area.

Stuff like the mountain pine beetle is affected by heat during the growing season. Longer warm weather and less cold cold snaps in the winter lead to lots of beetle breeding. The beetle has been here forever, but long term climate has made the beetle go nuts. Mountain pine beetle is currently going wild in inland BC. City American elm trees in the NW have recently been effected by the elm bark beetle. It sure took the little guy a long time to travel from the east to the west of the continent. I remember spotting some of the first dutch elm disease in the area during the 90s. That got brought here by shipping containers from Europe. Shipping containers with bugs have mostly killed off the American chestnut. American chestnuts used to be the dominant trees in eastern mountains. One of the most recent bad bugs is the emerald ash borer. Right now it's wrecking native ash trees in the mid west and east. Here's a map of affected areas. [img:center]http://www.emeraldashborer.info/images/USA.gif[/img] This is what it does [img:center]http://www.ingham.org/CE/hort/eab2.jpg[/img] This is what it looks like [img:center]http://www.ars.usda.gov/images/docs/4082_4266/Emerald%20ash%20borer_male.jpg[/img] It is yet again another insect that was brought to the Midwest in shipping containers. Since it arrived it spread. You'll see a lot of posters saying don't move firewood. This is part of the reason. Obviously the NW is a long way away, but just like dutch elm disease things spread. Oregon Ash trees are native to the NW, but several varieties of green ash are commonly planted as street trees in many cities. Longer average warm climate gives all these little fuckers longer seasons to breed and spread.

I've skied for a long long time. I always figured helmets were for racers. Last year I changed my mind and decided that a helmet was worth the dollars. After all there are all kinds of obstacles that no matter how good you are you can never be 100% on top of things all the time. I ended up getting a Leedom Prophet Web sales site I don't have a long experience with ski helmets. All I can say is they are fairly comfortable.

Trees are worth preserving. Trees are good You can find more information at these sites International Society of Arboriculture PNW Chapter of the ISA American Society of Consulting Arborists

Yeah you must have. There was a group in front of us then folks after us (you?). The snow on Red was fine, but the lower snow got us back to the car. The lower stuff wasn't anything great.

Trip: Snoqualmie Pass - Snoqulmie Peak Phantom Slide and Red Mountain Date: 1/16/2009 Trip Report: Here's a quick report on the conditions around Snoqualmie Pass. The funky January weather resulted in corn skiing. Temperatures at the pass were cold, but up high the inversion kicked in for t-shirt weather. On Friday the 16th two friends and I skied the Phantom Slide opposite Alpental Ski Area. Snow then rain led to a trick ascent and descent of the waterfall area. Up above the waterfall the slopes had nice corn skiing. As we gained altitude the warm weather kicked in to high gear leaving the snow thick and mushy. Right now skiing and lapping the lower 2000 feet seems like the thing to do. On Sunday the 18th two different friends and I skied Red Mountain. On this day low clowds lead to an ascent with little visibility, but when we reached the main slope the mist opened up and nice corn snow covered the mountain. As we got close to the summit the wind kicked into gear. Winds were gusting at about 40 mph. Just short of the summit we gave up climbing and locked down our heals. Kendall from our high point. Skiing down was nice. Lots of corn was the order of the day again. You had to do some route navigation to avoid old avalanche chunks, but it wasn't a huge issue. Base of the face with mist just above. From here a lot of navigation got us to the car. There are way too many slowshoe on the lower trail Gear Notes: You know skis, boots... If you've never been there a GPS might be nice. Approach Notes: We went off of old memories for the route up Red Mountain. That worked out with a couple unnecessary jogs

Hey all, I've got a vacant bedroom in my place. There's a decent amount of storage available with the place. This is in the Seattle Lake City area. Send me a PM for details and set up a time to check it out.

ah yes, the magnus opus on the subject! No accidents or injuries that day just fun skiing. Weird internet events kicked in later the next day. The internet is really trippy dude.

Huge pictures piss me off

No chance of a gondola up Snoqualmie. Right on the Alpine Lakes edge. I believe the resort had to drop some plans up on Denny Mtn too. You'll have to settle for fancy dining on top of Hyak in a couple years.

Slesse in the 80s This should be the beginning of the Index Climbing section

Back in the old days you could go to MEC and get Camrads for half the price of Friends Stuff like that got me through my days as a poor student.

Wrong page! It's on this one part way down. http://cascadeclimbers.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/860530/2 That was some crappy August skiing that day. Past that I can't comment.

I hear the cop says he thought he was using a taser.

Cool

then promptly made a few phone calls and the route was chopped by noon. The moral of this story is don't post pictures of your brand new route on a structure like this.

[img:center]http://mccurley.org/images/fuck_you.jpg[/img] [img:center]http://content8.flixster.com/photo/60/76/62/6076626_gal.jpg[/img] [img:center]http://content9.flixster.com/photo/99/99/11/9999119_gal.jpg[/img]

That looks reasonable. You might have to cut more later, but that's good for now. At least what I can tell from photos.

I had to post this picture [img:center]http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/01/07/dining/07squirrel3_500.jpg[/img]