TR-Solo Lovers Lane (Lane Peak)

[yngeagle]

Man what a sweet line- I don't think I have ever climbed and skied a better route\line! Lovers Lane is the furthest

left chute on the pic. I attached

 

The pic I attached is from another year and todays conditions where not exactly what is on the pic., practiclly the same except less snow. Anyways, the Peak is in the Tatoosh range just S of Rainier. i parked and skined from Narada Falls and made it to the base of Lane Peak in about 45min. I was puzzeled at first, because Lane Peak didn't exactly look like I had seen it before but I new I was in the right spot. I ran into two snowshoers who were debating on if they were going to try Lovers or the Zipper which is just to the right of Lovers- Zipper has been done by the mountaineers a few times.

 

The conditions for avy was good so I decided to make an atempt solo. I split the climb into 3 sec. The first startes below where the chute startes. In fact it starts alot lower than what you see in the pic, the first funnal I ran into was sketchy, because I only brought one tool and my crampons. And the first sec was fairly thick alpine ice and almost verticle for about 5-6ft, and it would have been nice to of had my second tool. Some mixed climbing was also apart of this first sec. I would say this was the crux. After I made it through, you go up the widest part of the chute, which looks like a tear droop. I then came to another funnel where this time the only way through was to do some rock climbing and it was the same as before about 6-8ft, and it was proably around 5.7 sandbag because of ice and snow. Oh ya at this point I left my skis here. At this point I am proably 2-3 hundred ft from the top of of the chute, thats just the last upper part of the chute on the pic. Getting to the to of the chute was preety narrow and steep. About 5ft across through most of the last part of the chute, thats the main reason why I left my skis, only 5ft across. I had originally thought it might have been a little wider towards the top, but thanks to mother nature she kept the chute pretty tight and not to much snow as compared to past seasons. I finally reached the top, I took in the view and headed off down climbing to the rock climbing sec., I tide a pieace of webbing between two rocks that were pinched together. The pieace of webbing was only 3ft long so I tied a few loops in to help me lower myself through the rock sec. Once I was down and at my skis, I felt pretty good, but I knew I still had to ski down plus deal with the ice sec, which I couldn't down climb without having two ice tools. So, I clicked in and tied everthing down nice and tight on the pack. I said a quick prayer and then I was off making hope turns with only a few ft to spare on each side of the skis. So the hops where super snappy and the snow was awesome, my skies bit in perfectly. There was about 3-5 inches of new sluff on top of the consolidated stuff, so that ment I couldn't ski to fast because I would get cought in my sluff. Especially once I entered the wider tear drop sec. I made some sweet GS turns in that sec., the sluff was the worst in this part. I was now at the top of the ice sec, which was a 5-6ft drop with plenty of acceleration to go with it. From the begining I planned on taking the drop, because the landing looked good even though it was sort of tight, but not to bad if you hit it right. After the drop it then fans out very nice into sweet glad skiing. I stood there for a while getting my head together and planning my line and the landing, plus where I needed to have my weight positioned so I would land on my feet balanced. Finnaly I counted my self down like I was used to in my ski racing days. 3..2..1, I pointed the sticx down the line I wanted, got some good speed which came real fast, I launched off postiooned my weight according to the slope angle and land it on my feet, however I was accelterating super fast through the fan, and I didn't want to waste the good turns so I skidded a little ways to bring myself to a stop. I made some nice last turns to the base. I stood back and looked up in excitment and joy. I looked at the line I skied and critequed it, humed and hawed untill I decided it was time to get back to the car. I skined back to the car around 6pm with a sweet sunset on my back. It was now time for the drive down off of Mt. Rainier and of course I got stuck behind slow traffic comming from Paridise. Well, this line I skied has been eating at me for a little while now, so I am glad I finally taged it. I know that it has been climbed in the winter before, back in january I think, but does anybody know if this route Lovers lane has been skied before? I love to know if someone has, plus to see if I snagged it before anyone else did. ThanX

 

Johnathan Kurth

 

 

 

 

145307-Lovers Lane.doc

Edited March 2, 2003 by Johnathan_K.

[gapertimmy]

Nice. Can you upload your picture to the photogallery for all to see?

[yngeagle]

I tried too, I am not sure how. It says the picture can't be uploaded because its not in the right kind of format. Could you tell me how to put my attachment into a file that is acceptable for uploading to the Gallery? Plus I was woundering how can I forward this thread to someones email? ThanX

[slaphappy]

Well done Jonathan! After climbing it a few winters back, I wanted to return with my snowboard but have not yet done so. Maybe someday.

[philfort]

Your attachment is a Word document (.doc) with the picture embedded in it. That's probably why you can't upload it to the photo gallery. You need to save the picture as a .jpg or something. I don't know how you do that once it's in a Word document.

 

btw, the photo is mine, but I don't mind if you post it to the gallery (just credit me please)

[yngeagle]

Ya no proablem Phil I will surly credit you as soon as I can figure out how to save it as a J-peg or something like that. Oh ya nice pic. unfortunatly I didn't get a chance to snap any new ones. JK

[Crackbolter]

Nice report.

Helping someone move was way more fun though.

 

Just kidding.

 

Next time, I am coming with. You even offered to pay for the gas.

[shuksan]

Way to go Jonathan!

 

The attachment shows Jonathan on-route at about 3pm. The pic was taken from the Narada parking lot; he is just approaching the chockstone which constricts the couloir. Jonathan skinned up to Nelly and I soon after we had decided against giving the Zipper a go due to more than expected new snow and softening conditions w/ the sun cooking whatever was hanging around the top of the route. Since I'm too much of a gumby for the more sun-sheltered LL, we had to satisfy ourselves with ogling some nice looking potential ice routes next to Lane as we headed back to the road.

 

[philfort]

Damn, that looks like some tight skiing! Good job

[yngeagle]

Thanks guys for the nice comments!

 

Thanks for taking that picture- shuksan. Am I the little blob about 5/7 the way up the route on your attachment, where I ran into the rock climbing sec? Were you the two snowshoers that I ran into at the base of Lane Peak?