Time to build Noah's Ark?

Yep, you'll certainly need something other than a car to get to Muir in the near future. And maybe Baker as well. And who knows where else. Yet another hike up Tiger anyone?

Yet another hike up Tiger anyone?

See you on the trail, Anita...

With water....

10,000 ft or higher snow level Monday, so all this rain translates too....all this rain.

From a distance, Baker looks like it picked up substantial snow, at least above about about 8000 feet—certainly enough to fill in a puny schoolbus-sized shrund. I'll try to get a better view tomorrow.

From a distance, Baker looks like it picked up substantial snow, at least above about about 8000 feet—certainly enough to fill in a puny schoolbus-sized shrund.  I'll try to get a better view tomorrow. 

The sensing data showed that temps at the lodge were running near 49 degrees for much of the precip. Typically, if temps are in the low 40's, it'd be freezing at about 7000 - 7500'. So this time I'd say that the bulk of the precip fell with a freezing level of around 9000-9500'. Now the temps were colder in advance of the major rain train, so probably there was snow a couple thousand feet lower early on - the first couple of days of the 5 day event. Usually snow falls about 800' below the freezing level. At the end of these Pineapple expresses, like the one last night there is usually very little new snow - from an inch or two- two half a foot.

Well, I never did manage a closer look (clouds moved in more quickly than I'd hoped), but what I saw was more than just a few inches or a foot of snow. Above about 8000 feet the whole mountain was covered with a heavy layer of white, and all the monstrous crevasses previously visible from 30 miles away had vanished. This doesn't mean conditions were safe, or that critical information might not have been visible had I been, say, 28 miles closer. I was just reporting what I saw with my own eyes during the brief interval between storms.

Next Week, December 10,11,12

...MODELS CONSOLIDATE THE FLOW SOMEWHAT SUN NIGHT THRU TUE AND EVEN HINT AT
A BRIEF SUBTROPICAL CONNECTION FOR POTENTIALLY HEAVY...THOUGH NOT
FLOODING...RAINFALL AMOUNTS. WILL GENERALLY BROADBRUSH THIS PERIOD
WITH LIKELY POPS AND TEMPERATURES A LITTLE ABOVE NORMAL...

I've decided my happiness fluctuates not LIKE the snow level, but actually AS the snow level.

Ha.

-Matt