Luethold's or Reid Conditions for tonight?

[ryland_moore]

A buddy of mine climbed Hood this weekend but stayed off Leuthold's and other Reid Glacier climbs to avoid avi conditions. Now wondering how the snow has settled, what people saw up there yesterday or today. ANy thoughts would be appreciated, especially snow/crust conditions in the couloir. Thanks.

[swaterfall]

I was heading for Leutholds on Sunday but decided against it as there were numerous avys on that side as well as on the west crater on Sat. I topped out via the South side and skiied about 1/2 of the hogback and the slopes to skiers left of crater rock before traversing over to illumination saddle to check out the condidtions on the west side. Every gully had avy debris at the bottom so I felt better about skipping Leutholds. Probably could have done it at night and been OK, but I was solo.

[cluck]

Ryland,

 

Good to see you the other night at the film fest.

 

My guess is that LC would suck major given today's super high temps and photos I saw of numerous crowns and avis on the South side slope below the old chute.

 

With such high temps, particularly after about a foot of mid week snow, LC would probably be a bowling alley for rime funneling on you from everywhere.

 

I've only climbed LC once (this Spring) but from everything I have heard, it is key to get this route when it is cold or suffer the consequences.

[flatnose]

A friend and I camped at the saddle on saturday night planning to do the sandy but bailed after encountering knee-deep snow on the descent from the saddle to reid. You might be alright tonite if it gets cold enough, plus ther'll be a nice boot path all the way to the top courtesy of the poor souls who who postholed all the way up the coulouir on sunday morning.

[sketchfest]

Ry,

Funguy and I were the “poor souls” that headed up “L” on Sunday morning and conditions were really great considering how warm it was. We left T-line at 2:15am and skinned up to the top of Palmer were we switched to crampons due to crusty ice conditions. Ironically a short distance above the lifts we began to encounter a thin breakable crust that varied from ankle to shin deep, but we continued to the saddle sans skis. Conditions down to the Reid were indeed soft, with sections of knee deep sugar, but two groups ahead of us kindly blazed a trail for us to follow. One of the groups (2) headed up one of the Reid variations and the other (1) looked like he was going to “L”. We crossed two old avi paths, one at the base of the Reid and the other at the base of “L”, but nothing was really coming down on us as we passed beneath, probably because there was no and I mean 0 wind.

 

We followed the solo guys tracks for about 200feet up towards “L”, but he wasn’t headed into the couloir, his tracks continued up to the Reid. The snow conditions up and through the couloir varied between Styrofoam, short sections of bullet proof ice, to soft sugar, back to Styrofoam, but nothing felt unstable and both ice ax and crampon placements were solid. Like I said there was no wind, so nothing came down on us, I got whacked once on the knuckle and that was it, if it had been windy with those warm conditions the route would probably have been very dangerous. So unless it’s gotten windy since Sunday you might be able to follow our tracks all the way to the summit.

 

Leave as early as you can, it would have been nice if the snow was a bit firmer when we went because it really slowed us down with the snow as soft as it was, but still a great day in the mountains. Have a good trip.

[rbw1966]

Sweet, you got the redpoint Paul! Way to go!

[sketchfest]

seemed more like a brownpoint to me!!

[MtnHigh]

Paul/David, good to hear that you got the L-Monkey off of your back.

Nice