May 5, Silver Star, May 6 towards Cuththroat
5/15/07
WA Cascades East Slopes North
5185
15
We headed up Friday night to sleep in a pal's cabin in Mazama. We got up at the leisurely hour of 6 and were off on the snow (right at the road) at a little after 8. Paul fell on his pole handle and cut open a half inch gash above his eyebrow w/in 10 minutes. With some ice on the cut and a makeshift butterfly and some gauze taped on top he was on his way again and so were we.
We ran into a few other parties on the mountain, but not as crowded as I expected. It was a beautiful day for the climb.
'
The snow got more powdery toward the top. After a nice break at the col (two waited below a bit, the rest except for me went up a short ways toward the summit from the col for a little more view), we started down. I was surprised at how softly and sweetly the pitch below the col skied - no bottom to speak of even though it was wind packed powder. The bumps that looked like death cookies all over the pitch were inconsequential - you could go right through them w/o really feeling them.
(tried Yahoo photo hosting for this posting - I'm not happy with the artifacts their added compression introduced! [edited to change to photos hosted at Yahoo's other photo site - FlickR, hopefully this works better all around)
We started hitting firmer snow at the gully below the glacier, but still with a packed powder consistency sort of like skiing a New England ski area - again pretty nice! A strong party of four women caught up with us on our way below the gully, where we stuck to skiers right of the valley until we got to the lower meadowy basin area. It was fun to share the joy of the fantastic corn we were hitting at this point.
A period of frozen black chicken heads ensued for about 600vf of forest, then the steeper forest down to the road got smoother and became quite fun again. All in all, a very high fun-turns:technical-descending ratio for Silver Star!
Today, we slept in, lounged around, helped our pal clean the cabin a bit, and headed up from the cuthroat lookout up partway toward Cuthroat peak, and skied a very nice corn pitch back down to the highway (about 2K give or take in 2.5 hours round trip with no one in a particular rush). What a great less-than-half day tour!! There were lots of people up skiing various lines all over the general Washington Pass area today. We could see the clouds had touched down on Silver Star - I'm glad we hit it yesterday!
We ran into a few other parties on the mountain, but not as crowded as I expected. It was a beautiful day for the climb.
'The snow got more powdery toward the top. After a nice break at the col (two waited below a bit, the rest except for me went up a short ways toward the summit from the col for a little more view), we started down. I was surprised at how softly and sweetly the pitch below the col skied - no bottom to speak of even though it was wind packed powder. The bumps that looked like death cookies all over the pitch were inconsequential - you could go right through them w/o really feeling them.
(tried Yahoo photo hosting for this posting - I'm not happy with the artifacts their added compression introduced! [edited to change to photos hosted at Yahoo's other photo site - FlickR, hopefully this works better all around)
We started hitting firmer snow at the gully below the glacier, but still with a packed powder consistency sort of like skiing a New England ski area - again pretty nice! A strong party of four women caught up with us on our way below the gully, where we stuck to skiers right of the valley until we got to the lower meadowy basin area. It was fun to share the joy of the fantastic corn we were hitting at this point.
A period of frozen black chicken heads ensued for about 600vf of forest, then the steeper forest down to the road got smoother and became quite fun again. All in all, a very high fun-turns:technical-descending ratio for Silver Star!
Today, we slept in, lounged around, helped our pal clean the cabin a bit, and headed up from the cuthroat lookout up partway toward Cuthroat peak, and skied a very nice corn pitch back down to the highway (about 2K give or take in 2.5 hours round trip with no one in a particular rush). What a great less-than-half day tour!! There were lots of people up skiing various lines all over the general Washington Pass area today. We could see the clouds had touched down on Silver Star - I'm glad we hit it yesterday!
haha, logged in to write a TR, and it was already written for me :) jim, i was in the party of four, what a small world...
It was fun watching you guys gain on us through the day - it made us feel just slightly geriatric to realize that you would inexorably catch and pass us (which you indeed did!). Were you the telemarker who commented that she was mostly doing parallel turns (where I was the last few seasons before finally giving in and switching to AT gear)?
Sorry if our dog barked at you, she was just a little over excited ;D. We'll have to work on that.
I can't see your pictures :'(.
I can't see your pictures :'(.
After skinning up to a camp just below the glacier on Saturday we went for a short ski on the lower part of the glacier. Skied skier's left but it already had a bit of frozen crust. Sunday morning was promising and we skinned up to the col under partly sunny skies, alas once in the col the clouds moved in. We made the summit to see exciting variations of Grey on White in all directions. Mark Rothko would love the views!
Sunday seemed to be a bit busier than Saturday. At one point there were at least 20 people at the col including our BCMC (British Columbia Mountaineering Club) party. Saw another 8 people going up while we skied increasingly stickier snow. The best skiing was on the West facing slope above the bowl.
Skiing through the trees was fun, the "black chicken snow" softened and there was a white sideslipped highway from the previous parties. Thanks guys! If temperatures holds above freezing this might be the last weekend that allowed for skiing all the way to the road.
I will post more pictures on my Flickr site later today:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/runningclouds/sets/
[Edit: deleted the three displayed photos in this post as the thread is already at three photo limit. The link provided will allow viewers to look at more photos if desired. --Charles]
Sunday seemed to be a bit busier than Saturday. At one point there were at least 20 people at the col including our BCMC (British Columbia Mountaineering Club) party. Saw another 8 people going up while we skied increasingly stickier snow. The best skiing was on the West facing slope above the bowl.
Skiing through the trees was fun, the "black chicken snow" softened and there was a white sideslipped highway from the previous parties. Thanks guys! If temperatures holds above freezing this might be the last weekend that allowed for skiing all the way to the road.
I will post more pictures on my Flickr site later today:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/runningclouds/sets/
[Edit: deleted the three displayed photos in this post as the thread is already at three photo limit. The link provided will allow viewers to look at more photos if desired. --Charles]
author=prestonf link=topic=7026.msg28151#msg28151 date=1178577080]
Sorry if our dog barked at you, she was just a little over excited ;D. We'll have to work on that.
I can't see your pictures :'(.
I was the guy with the camera who she ran up to and barked at on the headwall. I think she may have thought I was you and then when she saw I wasn't, she was startled. No worries from me, but I have dogs so am used to a little barking now and then (they're no longer able to do tours like Silver Star though).
I'll have to check the photos and possibly re-post to another site from home - one more reason to avoid Yahoo photos I guess..
Runninclouds - thanks to you and the rest of the 20 folks to wait until Sunday to head up the mountain ;)! It was nice to have a relatively quiet day up there. After the recent reports on the tour here, we thought we might be facing a little Camp-Muir-ish environment up there byt this past weekend...
jim, ay that was me; i do see AT gear in my future...
prestonf, your dog was very civil to me!
prestonf, your dog was very civil to me!
reposted the photos and edited the links - hopefully they work for folks now...
ema - fun to sort of almost ski with you guys, your crew had good energy! And if it's worth anything, I was a dedicated telemarking fiend but really haven't been missing it much except on rolly-polly teeny uphill-on-the-downhill bits. I love AT especially for the uphill!!
ema - fun to sort of almost ski with you guys, your crew had good energy! And if it's worth anything, I was a dedicated telemarking fiend but really haven't been missing it much except on rolly-polly teeny uphill-on-the-downhill bits. I love AT especially for the uphill!!
Randonee- French for can't, or never could, tele.
AT - after tele. ::)
(Shouldn't this all be on that other board?)
(Shouldn't this all be on that other board?)
Certainly feels like it Tim!
I'll probably be borrowing my wife's AT rig for the rando rallies next year... Damn you Dynafit! You and your "lightness"!
Free the heel, free the mind. Fix the heel, fix the problem. If it were easy, etc. etc...
I'll probably be borrowing my wife's AT rig for the rando rallies next year... Damn you Dynafit! You and your "lightness"!
Free the heel, free the mind. Fix the heel, fix the problem. If it were easy, etc. etc...
AT = Aging Telemarker
Yup, Already - that's me!
Lahar - funny how there's this tendency for folks to poke at the people who are on slightly different gear (skiers to boarders, AT:Tele:AT...). Let's hook up sometime and I'll bring my tele gear and you can let me know if I can tele! :) As my friend Dave is fond of saying, It's all good!
Lahar - funny how there's this tendency for folks to poke at the people who are on slightly different gear (skiers to boarders, AT:Tele:AT...). Let's hook up sometime and I'll bring my tele gear and you can let me know if I can tele! :) As my friend Dave is fond of saying, It's all good!
Got the x's before your edit Jim. Now all is fine. Thanks.
Already Tired? I don't AT but that's what doing squats down a mountain would seem to feel like! Gotta respect it. GREAT day on Silver Star - it was fun meeting & doing some skiing w/Jim & gang on Saturday.
not enough coffee this morning - I meant to say that I don't tele.... Rhymes with AT though. ;)
Pray for similar stellar weather next weekend for more of the same!
Pray for similar stellar weather next weekend for more of the same!
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