TR Replies
One should be careful about 11-year-old memories. I went back to my old trip report and decided I should be careful about overselling the Indian Creek exit. Travelling was great from White Pass to Reflection Lake, but we didn't enjoy the rest of the PCT to Indian Creek, or even the Indian Creek trail:
"This was the least fun section of the trip. It was steep tra...
You missed the trail after you crossed Thunder Cr. Where did you find that bear spray ? I had been through there a couple times and couldn't find it.
The snow has cleared out as of today to about the Mt Catherine trail head.
Hi Alisse , we though to tour from Silver Peak TH (road NF-9070 from Snoqualmie pass ) but we had infos from a local that was closed at about 3000` so we switched for Alpental. But it was one week ago......
do you have an elevation for where snow started on the road to Silver Peak??
Thanks for the report & pictures, coverage looks great. Are you sure that's an avy crown, Tim? I recall a crevasse in that location under Anvil rock in the past.
Corn! So jealous.
My one time on Lassen we had similar snowpack on the S. We took Amar's suggestion and skied the West face, which had more continuous snow than the S. The tortoiseshell butterfly swarms on the summit were memorable.
Thanks for the TR
Oh no! I hope you can get your poles back! That's a bummer...
Were you trying to approach Silver via the Annette Lake trail?
Thanks for the report, good corn has been scarce so far. Now feeling very lucky to have found one good day on this route in May. But also looking forward to the rest of this long season.
Old school TR! - loved the write up and pics.
Thanks for the great TR Tim. It was nice chatting with you on the road during our stroll after our less successful outing.
@scottk, we looked at your old TR before going, thanks for sharing! We definitely had a much deeper snowpack that it sounds like your team did, but it sounds like you won the game on the snow/ski quality. I thought about exiting Indian creek when we hit the bush, but at that point the detour would have added an extra day to our trip as well. I also thought about trying to backtrack to the north fork of the Sauk (which is how I've entered the zone before), but we committed to the bush in white...
@danthemtn-man its the hyperlite mid, using an old BD megamid carbon pole. Worked well!
One of my favorite trips. However, we exited via Indian Creek which was relatively brush free about 10 years ago. This exit takes you through the White Chuck Glacier basin, over the ridge to White Pass, and then follows the PCT to Indian Creek.
Wow, it's crazy how different the bottom looks in just two weeks! Nice trees in the fog pic. Hope the ride down on bike was fun!
Thanks for the memories of that section of the White River "trail". Glad you made it and thanks for sharing the words and images!
Rad, nice to see people sneaking a larger trip in a spring with so few windows.
Yep, we climbed Kangaroo Temple. I think we were just barely within ear-shot of each other, we noticed you because every now and then we'd hear a voice in the distance.
Yes, pretty sure that's us! Thanks! Where were you? Were you part of the climbing party that we occasionally heard over the day?
Before you do something on steep snow again, please practice how to self arrest on a small, steep slope with a good runout. First without crampons, then with. It is also a good idea to practice crampon techniques on a safe slope too- it is pretty easy to screw up in that middle ground between French and frontpointing. That particular slope on Hood (your last photo) has killed and maimed many with your experience level, in the exact conditions that you found it. Just be...
Nice!! Maybe this was you? I got a photo of a pair of skiers chugging on up the south side of Wallaby around 12:30 on Sunday.
Full size images:
Not looking at TAY as much as usual so I'm late to this but I saw "Buckner" in the title and had to take a look. Nice TR, great pics and well done! I've skied Buckner from two different approaches. First time was in early June- I think, circa 2005 ish, and we approached and skied as you did. The second time was in late July, 2011. We climbed Sahale arm above the entrance into Horseshoe Basin and traversed the south face of Boston to get to Boston Glacier. Climbed and skied the north face of B...
It's been a spring without corn on Stu, at least the top half. Tough conditions for skiing that line. Pretty sure I saw the other trip report you mentioned (somebody's insta post?), and they skied the W Ridge couloir, which is the approach for the W Ridge climb, as opposed to W R. Notch that you skied. I'm jealous of you both, nice work!
Thanks. Yea, will be headed there. Looks like higher up is doing well, mid-elevation not so with all the rain
Wish they would reconsider the gate policy for Pilchuck to get it open earlier. Believe the reason they are so strict on this one is the high traffic and amount of rescues performed early season? Pollen is out in force around the Mtn loop
Glad you made it happen Kam!
"Nootka Cypress", good to know what they are, amazing trees. I always love seeing them on the way in or out of that basin.
A surprisingly wonderful day on the skis! Happy to get out there.
Thanks for the report!
I thought at first that this TR was for Snowfield Peak...
Re: skiing from true summit, I won't say never but it's hard to imagine. The final 50-100' is basically a bunch of boulders stuck together on a steep slope that faces directly into prevailing winds.
Way to get out still given the marginal forecast! Weird looking squirrel
Thanks for the report and doing the hard work for us. Sounds like the road up to Silver basin might need another few weeks?
Thanks Tim. I mis-recalled where they cached their skis. Haven't heard of any other attempts, fwiw. Hope I didn't come across as that cranky guy, "it's all been skied before on three pins and leather boots"...
Do you think the last upper bit could ever get enough snow to begin sliding off the summit? Cool spot with that giant cairn.
Neat tour, would like to repeat someday.
During the big snow year of 1999, Garth Ferber and I skied the SW Face of Buckner as a loop. At that time you could still drive to the Cascade Pass trailhead. We bivied at the Boston Basin trailhead and climbed over Sharkfin Col to the Boston Glacier. We climbed the N Face of Buckner and skied the SW flank, returning to the car via Cascade Pass. We were able to ski most of the way down the North Fork Cascade River basin to the road, rather than walking the trail. The trip was done on July 20,...
Wow, those views - couldn't agree more. A sunny and clear day in the Sahale Arm area is just amazing. Congrats.
@hedonaut, I found this report from Oyvind but it sounds like they left skis at the bottom of the W Face:
https://turns-all-year.com/trip-reports/may-1-2009-golden-horn-and-tower-mountain
Camping on Sahale arm or the Boston would make it more reasonable.
Thanks Kam for the great day and planning and executing that route!
My favorite part of the day was skating around the corner on the Sisters glacier and coming up on the top of that line at the end of Mythic ridge with the whole Green Creek glacier below.
@hedonaut - thanks! Who doesn't love a good entrance exam?!
@ajscott - no shenanigans getting into Horseshoe Basin.
@kamtron - we could have easily dropped into the N Face from the summit, although that would mean reascending it afterwards, pushing the total vert for the day up to something like 12K.
Nice looking ski, Tim.
Do you think you could have just dropped into the N face from your position atop Buckner? In that case, approaching as you did makes sense, although it prevents you from scoping conditions on the gnarly line.
Awesome! Was it easy to get into horseshoe basin? I always assumed there was some kinda shenanigans getting over there. I have a funny relationship with Buckner! Ive prolly been into the area to ski Buckner over 5 times and have yet to step foot on that mountain!! Maybe its time to give up on the north face and give the sw face a go, looks like a longer ski run anyways!
Second photo shows steep but doable approach slope:
https://skisickness.com/post/vt545-31-may-1-jun-nf-buckner-plus-forbidden-loop-tour
Looks like good clean no-stress fun. Nice timing.
I'll send some info your way. The short version: we took a higher-than-standard --climber's right -- col/notch near Sharkfin to ski down to the Boston Gl. No rap required. It would have been possible to climb back out that way, but we carried on the Forbidden circuit after skiing N face Buckner. I'll try to find my June? tr...