Skiing Mt Lassen

We visited the Miller’s with the plan to go out on the houseboat and for me to ski Shasta, but the weather was pretty uncooperative, with thunderstorms in the afternoons. We arrived Thursday (we had planned on going over Wednesday, but Truckee died Wednesday morning) and I was going to ski Lassen Friday but when I got up all groggy at 6 it was still cloudy so I went back to bed. By 8 it was sunny and remained sunny most of the day so I sulked and grumbled, wishing I had skied.

I was not going to repeat my mistake on Saturday and I left the house shortly after six.

Planning on coming back early so we could go out on the houseboat, I didn’t bring lunch. I was hungry the whole time! I reached the summit ridge around 10 and skied a nice run down the south face and then skinned back up and dropped down the NE face, which didn’t seem as steep as I remembered.

I then skinned back up to the East ridge and after some unnecessary rock climbing and scrambling I skinned up the ridge and then skied across the NE face to the Northwest ridge and as the clouds and hail came on I skied over to the summit ridge.

After chatting with a climber in a hail storm I descended the West face on some perfectly smooth corn. As I came out of the clouds I worried that I was way to far north and started a useless and dangerous scramble across and down the slope, knocking rocks lose with almost every step. I had my skis in my pack and although I didn’t recognize the sound at the time, they were buzzing from the static electricity! I eventually made it back to snow and skied down to where I could have skied to in the first place and traversed back to the car.

When I got back to Redding the sun was out and the boys had just gotten out of the pool (and eventually joined me back in it).

Boy Scout Trip to the South Fork American River

Over the Father's Day (and Summer Solstice, and Darius' Birthday) Weekend I went with Darius an the Scouts to the South Fork of the American River. We got down there Friday evening and enjoyed the pool at the American River Campground before letting the boys serve us dinner. Saturday we got up early and got on the bus to Chili Bar. American River Expeditions (the raft company) was great about shuttling my kayak and letting me join the fun. We did the whole 20+ mile stretch in one day! It was a blast for me to get back on the South Fork after many years. At first I was just a tad nervous, but after running Meatgrinder and then Trouble Maker, I realized it was just all "read and run" fun.

I was able to get a few videos with my helmet cam and they can be checked out here:

American River Rafting

Great Way to Celebrate Dina's Birthday!

Dina's Birthday was yesterday (5/22) and I had the day off. She was kind enough to let me "go play" for the day. And play I did!

I started out the day by meeting Steve up at Alpine Meadows at 7:30, which closed weeks ago, and we skinned up to the top of Ward Peak and then dropped over the back side towards the the Sherwood Bowl chair for two nice, steep corn runs. Then we climbed back up to the top of the peak and skied down to the cars.

Here's Steve heading up:


Here I am up on top of the ridge:


Here's a short run:


After skiing, I drove up over Donner Summit and met Chad, his friend Mike and another kayaker they bumped in to, Buddy, for kayaking the "Summit Run" of the upper South Yuba River (aka Rainbow Lodge run). It's one of my favorite runs, but since I haven't been kayaking much in years, I was a bit nervous. I remember the run pretty well and Buddy knew it cold. It was at a perfect level (bout 650cfs) and dropping in that first rapid from "Hansel and Gretel" bridge was a blast!
Here's a picture of the first rapid from above:



I was concerned about the second big rapid b/c I've seen people get worked in the hole at the bottom, but it went fine. We enjoyed working our way down thsi wonderful "pool and drop" river and I really enjoyed the new line on the big ledge drop that Buddy showed me. Here's the approach and drop:

Chad and I hiked the cascaded above Rainbow Lodge, but Buddy and Mike ran part of it. Impressive! Below Rainbow Lodge, "Double Drop" or "Z Drop" was next. Chad and I had really clean lines on it, and everyone did fine. The whole time I've got the final big drop, "Tombstone", in my mind. Will I run it or not? I've run it every other time I did the river, but... Well, we got down there, I looked at it and I knew my line. What a rush and what a fun rapid!

Here's the drop from below after I ran it:


Here's my run. Unfortunately a big drop of water got on the lens after the first drop.


Now we just had a few little rapids to bop down to the take-out. But lo and behold, Chad and I decide to run a narrow entrance together and we knock each other over. After getting banged up a bit and missing a role I pull the sprayskirt and bail! Oh, the shame of it all. Oh well. Maybe it's just rationalization, but it felt good to "swim" and realize that it's not so bad.

We were famished by the end of the run and enjoyed a beer and sandwhiches. I got home with just enough time to shower, change and go out to a lovely dinner at Lexie's overlooking the Truckee River in downtown Reno with my lovely Birthday Girl.

Getting Warm - harvesting corn before it's too late!

The temps were predicted to hit the nineties here in Reno today and tomorrow (I don't think it quite made it today), but I was determined to get some corn harvesting in. Jon Tay was game as well, so we headed up to the Rose BC with Yuki. We skinned up to the ridge between Incline Lake Peak and Rose Knob Peak and had a great run down towards Third Cr and Tahoe. Then we climbed up to Rose Knob Peak and took a short run down, one more run like the first and then down the other side back to the car. The only time we hit "mank" was getting to the car.

From David's Skiing, Kayaking, Mtn Biking and All Round "Fun Hog" Report

From David's Skiing, Kayaking, Mtn Biking and All Round "Fun Hog" Report

From David's Skiing, Kayaking, Mtn Biking and All Round "Fun Hog" Report

I got home around noon and Dina took off for a "girls weekend" at Northstar. After some yard work, the boys (and Treyson's friend Jayden) had a blast playing in the sprinklers.

Squaw Valley 5-7-09

We finally got some nice weather and I was itching to ski. I had hoped on doing a big back-country day, but it just didn't fall in to place. Luckily I was able to hook up with Justin and comp a ticket for Squaw Valley. We got a bit of a late start but I figured the elevation we gained from the cable car made up for it. After one run down from the lift, we put the skins on and headed up to the summit of Granite Chief.

From May09

We then continued out and down the ridge to the next peak over. There was in incredible cornice and huge slide below it. Just so impressive to look at.

From May09

From May09

The snow was getting very soft, so we skied down the ridge and then carefully dropped down and skied to the bottom of an incredible bowl. An hour climb and were were ready to drop back down to the Shirley Lake lift and ski out.

We finished the afternoon off with a fun little mountain bike ride on Loyd's Loop.

Floriston to Verdi - 5-6-09

The weather is improving, but it's still very windy, so it seemed like kayaking would be a better option than skiing. Luckily Chad and Craig were already planning on boating the Truckee, so I hooked up with them for the run from the top of Floriston to Crystal Peak park. The flows have come down a bit and it was running about 1400cfs at Farad. I took my bigger boat, the Kix, partly b/c I wanted to try it out and partly b/c I wanted to be more stable for "Deadmans" and if we ran "Stateline Dam". The only problem is that a the darn boat leaks, I don't know if it's from the sprayskirt, which fits loosely, or somewhere else, but I had to keep emptying it. Anway, we had a fun run: Floriston was fine, even if I did get turned around in the eddy at the top of Jaws; Deadmans was an easy line, and we walked Stateline. The howling wind and whitecaps just made it more interesting.

May Backcountry with Treyson

I bought Treyson a pair of Alpine Trekkers for his Birthday and we got to try them out today. Unfortunately the weather is rather inclement; we’re having a series of storms come in with pretty high snow levels (~8,000’). It was a mixture of rain, sleet and snow at the parking lot, but we gave it a go anyway. Once we got moving it wasn’t bad. Treyson did well on the climb.

From May09

From May09

It didn't hurt to have Yuki pulling on some of the climbs. We made it about 1,000 feet up and then he was done. The ski down was okay – about 3 – 4 inches of wet snow on a firm base. the views of the valley were interesting, with the clouds and all.

From May09

Trey really started getting the hang of it near the bottom, but then took a nasty fall that hurt his knees. I was worried he blew an ACL, but he’s running around now.

Running Floriston Rapid May 2nd 2009

Last night Dina threw me a surprise birthday party at Silver Peak (I was very surprised) and I got talking to Eric Frudden, Charles and Eric Lovejoy about boating – how I really stopped kayaking. Well, today I noticed the river was brown and fast and when I checked the flow it was 1900 at Farad. So I called Frudden and we drove up there to run it. We were both a tad tense about running it at the higher flow, given neither of us has boated much in the past few years (although Eric did do the Grand last summer!). In any case, we pretty much just ran it without much playing. It took all of ~30 mins! Jaws had a big line down the right and I pretty much nailed it (always anticlimactic when you hit the line). Eric went too far left and had an exciting run, hitting the bottom hole. After Jaws I felt much looser and had more fun. I did drop in to one hole unintentionally, but stayed cool and enjoyed pulling to get out. We were both so glad we did the run. For me at least, it made me feel like I can still kayak!

Here's what the run looked like from the bridge as we drove up:

From Drop Box

Mt Lamarck and Mt Darwin Tour, April 17 - 19, 2009

I finally got down to the Sierra High Peaks for another ski tour, and it turned out we picked a great weekend. After a wonderful two days in Disneyland with the family, Dina dropped me off in Bishop where I meet Eric Martin. After eating dinner in the Chinese restaurant (there's only one), we drove out of town to camp at the "Pit" campground where we were invited to hang out at the campfire by some college climber babes. We enjoyed the evening's fireside chatting and "butt name spelling", but the big action was waiting for us the next day.

We fueled up with the Denney's Grand Slam and then drove up to North Lake. Unfortunately the road was closed at Alpendale, about 2 miles shy of North Lake. It was doubly frustrating because the road crew came by and opened the gate (a repeat of our Gilcrest luck!?) but wouldn't let us through. They were "working" on the road. Well, an hour later and a thousand feet higher we finally reached snow near North Lake and started skinning. We had some skin tracks to follow, but somehow got slightly off course and had to do a traverse that only cost us about 30 minutes. Eventually we got above tree-line and as we looked up there appeared to be someone on the ridge above us. Down came a snowboarder who just shouted hello at us as he went by and wished us well.

Finally, at 5pm, we reached the top of Lamarck Col at approximately 13,000. That made the day's elevation gain almost 5,000'! Needless to say, we were delighted to reach the high point of the day. From there we had to down climb through some rocks to get to consistent snow and then ski down to the Darwin Lakes where we saw evidence of the mystery split boarder's camp. After looking around a bit, we elected to camp along a moraine separating the first two lakes because Eric found a trickle of water we could use. He made a little dam and reservoir to collect water and then we used the hose from my Camelback to fill bottles. Later I found a more convenient spot in the ice that pooled nice fresh water. We were beat by the time we finished setting up camp and the Megamid, but enjoyed dinner time as the sun started to go down and enjoyed some Thai food and a sauvignon blanc.

Saturday we decided to give Mt Darwin a shot. We headed up to the snowboarder's old camp and then followed his tracks up the North Couloir of Darwin using our ski crampons until it got too steep and narrow and then we followed his boot track. Luckily it wasn't icy so even without boot crampons were were okay (I had a Whippet and Eric had an ice ax). It got really narrow and steep at the top, plus there were two sets of tracks and one of the sliders just side-slipped down, making it very unpleasant looking for the descent. Anyway, we got to the top (13,831'), which is a broad plateau with a gendarme sticking up and enjoyed the views, great weather (no wind) and lunch. We decided we were men enough to downclimb the upper section of the couloir, which was scary enough, and then skied the lower 2/3 and on to the apron. I was pooped when we got back to camp (my allergies were kicking in, surprisingly enough way up there!) but we went out for an afternoon "corn harvest" before dinner.

Sunday was our "easy day". We broke camp and shouldered the packs, now a bit ligther than on the in, and headed up for the summit of Mt. Lamarck (13,417'). It was a fairly easy skin up almost to the summit (especially compared to Mt. Darwin) and some great views. It was really nice to realize that we were basically done with climbing and could now enjoy the ski down to North Lake. The corn off the summit was spectatular and held up great until around 10,000', then it got mushy. Eric led us on an interesting line down the steep section above the lake and then we "enjoyed" the walk back on the road to the car.

The fun wasn't over yet; we stopped in Walker at Mountainview BBQ and had some incredible BBQ. It's my new favorite!

It was a great trip and with the heat wave we're now having, I think the timing was just about right.

Videos

Here's a slideshow:

Houghton Tour - 4-11-09

We got some good rain down in Reno, so Eric Martin and I decided to check out the north bowls off of Houghton. Since we only expected a few inches of new snow on a firm base, I decided to take Yuki. There was just some "dust on crust" at the trailhead, but once we got to Broken Glass, we were surprised to find five or more inches on a soft base.
Top of Galena Peak:

Rather than ski down Broken Glass as usual, we headed out to the end of the ridge allowing us to ski the steep north facing couloir. To my surprise, Eric had never skied it before! (I didn't think there was any line in the Rose BC that Eric hasn't skied.) While I climbed up to the top Eric cut in from the side so that he could take some pictures:

Standing up top:

Taking some turns:

Looking back at the Chute:


Then we climbed up to the top of Houghton and were again pleasantly surprised to find some sweet boot top powder. We did two runs down the north bowls/chutes before splitting up. Eric couldn't pull himself away and had to do another run, but Yuki (and I) were getting tired.

Eric making turns:
A set of tracks and the uptrack:


From the top of Houghton we skied a steep line between the rocks and had a little excitement. It was just steep enough and had gotten just enough sun that it started a slow slide which knocked me off my feet. I was slowly going down the chute and found it quite difficult to get back on my feet. Then I saw a little tree off to my left and I was able to angle over to it and use it to stop.

Looking back at the sluff:

Lesson learned, my next line was much more mellow. I came off Houghton down some nice soft snow and then had a 30 minute mellow ski (kick skins) to the ridge above the road and a few minute ski out. Yuki was really beat by the time we got to the Truck and I have to admit that I was pretty tired too.

Gilcrest Couloir - A Nine Year Wait Ends!

I have been eying this particular couloir for nine years, ever since I climbed Gilcrest Peak "accidentally" with Truckee on a return trip from skiing Elderberry Canyon on Mt. Tom with Eric Wood when he was one of our residents. Looking for an easy ski on the drive home I drove up the road to Lundy Lake thinking I'd find something. Well, there was a nice peak with a broad ramp on the lower section, so off we went. One thing led to another and a few hours later we were on top of Gilcrest Peak at 11,575 feet. Looking down to the lake I noticed what looked like a couloir going all the way, but from up top I couldn't see it all so I skied down the east face, the way we came up. When I got to the car I looked back and saw "the line". It's the one on the "looker's" right that goes all the way to the (false) summit (picture taken April 2008):


So, after thinking and dreaming about it for these past NINE YEARS, I finally decided that the time and conditions were right. I was able to get Jon and Scott to join me. Jon saw the line last year on the way back from a Tioga Pass ski trip and Scott was just game for what I described as an unknown epic line. (Unknown is a bit of an exaggeration, but I've not seen it written up anywhere.)

We got to the Lundy Lake road a little later than planned (don't you always) and found that the gate was locked! What a shock! We really didn't want to hike the four miles to the lake, and we definitely didn't like the idea of hiking four miles out AFTER a big climb and ski. Just as we were getting in the car to find something else to ski, up comes the county road guy in one of those big snowblowers. He opens the gate and tells us to have at it!

We went up approximately the route I took nine years ago, around to the east side of then mountain and then up. It was surprisingly steep, enough to make me wonder what I was doing climbing it by myself that first time. Of course, I didn't intend to climb it that time, I just kept going "a little bit higher". Anyway, we reached the summit ridge around 2:15 and then continued up to he rocky summit before wondering where the entrance to the couloir was. We eventually figured out it was back down a few hundred feet f the summit plateau. The big rock buttresses that seemed to mark the entrance when we were looking up were actually about 1000' below us! It also turned out we had to ski one couloir for about 1,000' and then walk a hundred feet or less over to the next one that took us to the bottom.

We started our descent at 3:00 and found variable, but decent conditions. It was a mixture of firm windbuff, windblown powder and the occasional slick patch. Of course nothing like the ice ice I "enjoyed" for 3500' down Mt Marcy in NY. There were a couple of tight chokes which were a bit icy, but mostly the couloir was plenty wide and we could enjoy the turns. About half way down I realized I lost a basket on one of my poles (I was feeling off balance turning to my left). I have carried a spare basket in my repair kit for years, but of course it wasn't there when I needed it. But I was able to make a basket with a plastic lid to my "Zardoz Not Wax" container and duct tape. It worked pretty well! Between taking turns, the repair, enjoying the views and letting Scott take some pictures, it took us about an hour to reach the bottom and ski out the apron to the car.

It was a great ski and I felt great having the monkey off my back after all these years. Now I can't wait to go back and ski it with some fresh powder on it.

A picture of our route:


Here are some pictures that Scott and I took. His work can be found at TahoeLight.com.

Skiing Mt Marcy

My weekend partners (both "established" and online) all fell through, but I was not to be deterred and drove up to the Adirondack Loj to ski Mt. Marcy (New York's highest peak). The worker at the Loj excitedly told me it would be a great day to ski Marcy so I was stoked and tried not to be worried when I saw this at the trailhead.

Okay, maybe it was a little icy here, but surely it won't be like that for long! After carefully walking this section of road for ~1/2 mile, I turned off on to another access road that I could actually ski. Mostly. There were quite a few bare spots that I either walked across with my skis (and kick skins) or took off my skis. I finally got to Marcy Dam around 11:30. It took me over an hour to go just under 3 miles and 200' gain. Not good.

A guide at the dam warned me that I should reassess at Indian Falls, as it was getting late. I should have also picked up on the fact that he was taking his client in the other direction to find some corn in one of the slides.

But the day was beautiful and long, so off I went. There were a ton of people at the Dam, most seeming to head up to Marcy, but once on the trail I only saw 2 or 3 groups going up and a few more coming down. I started to wonder what I was getting myself in to, especially since the trail was narrow and icy. Oh well, it will soften up for the ski down.

The summit cone had a nice coat of snow on it, but unfortunately a not so nice coat of ice on top of the snow. Oh, back East when they say ice, they mean ice.
Summit cone:

But the view on the summit was wonderful. You can see some slides on Wright's Peak in the distance.

To my surprise there were three snowboarders and one other skier up there. The snowboarders and I did find some decent snow off the SE aspect of the summit, but only about 500' vertical. Then I cut over to the north face to see if there was any good snow there. All ice. When I say "ice", it was so slick that traversing across a moderate pitch my skis just shot out from under me and I quickly started sliding down the mountain. "Luckily" some rocks and shrubs were there to break my fall!

Here's what skiing off the summit was like:


The rest of the decent to Marcy Dam was mostly a scary snowplow down an icy trail.

A little ways above the dam the snow finally softened and I was able to enjoy the winding trail. I did try to go off trail once, but quickly found myself ensnared by trees and branches. Not like Tahoe, I mean REALLY dense trees and branches!
Here's the opening into the trees, it gets MUCH denser:


All in all, I'm glad I climbed the peak. I had climbed it one summer with my brother and father when I was 11, and since I'm out here to help my father recovery from surgery, it seemed a good tribute.

But I will be VERY happy to return home and ski some fine Tahoe and Sierra snow!

Night Skiing in NY

Bridger and I went night skiing the other day! We got up to West Mountain around six and met Robbie, his brother Will and their cousin, plus Dad's. We skied until around eight, then had dinner (second dinner for Bridger) in the nice restaurant in the lodge. It was pretty darn icy, but Bridger didn't seem to care.

S***y Mountain, NY

I got a "free day" while up in Saratoga helping my Dad recover from his eye surgery (still not sure how successful it was), so after emailing back and forth with "Freedan" from T-tips and doing some research, I headed up towards Indian Lake to ski the Slides . Dan gave me great directions, so I only drove past the trailhead a couple of times before pulling over and getting going. I started up around 10:30 and reached the bottom of the slides by 11:15, another 45 min's and I was up on top of S***y Mtn looking for a vantage for a good photo of the High Peaks to the north. Unfortunately all I could see was more trees all around me. So I made my way back to the slide, which wasn't easy to find from above, and enjoyed the corn. I did two runs on the main slide and one on a slightly smaller slide, but which was much less skied from yesterday. Each time I went above the slide and was amazed at how hard they are to see from above or the side. On my last climb I found an interesting frozen waterfall that I had to take a few picgtures of. After three runs and lunch I skied back out the the car thoroughly happy with my day.

Here is the slideshow:


And a short video of my skiing. First, skiing the trees to get to the Slide:



Here I am skiing the Slide, notice how well hidden it is:


(NB - edited to remove the name of the mtn since learning that one doesn't reveal "secret" slides when back East)

Skiing West Mountain in New York with Bridger 3-13-09

Bridger and I went up to West Mountain with his friend Robbie and Robbie's Dad Kurt. We had a delightful day. It was cold, but sunny and the snow was pretty good. Almost like cold corn. We skied from 1:30 until 5:30 with a nice break for hot chocolate (and beer).

Here is a little slideshow:


And here's a little video of Bridger skiing:

Donner to Donner March 6th 2009

I hooked up with Dave Sartoni, Kiwi Lynn ad four of Dave’s friends for the Donner to Donner (summit to lake) ski. Dave never skied with two of the guys and at the trailhead we found out they didn’t have beacons, which caused us some consternation. But we decided to go on anyway and to put them in the middle of us. The wind was pretty hard out of the west and at the top of Judah we discussed routes, eventually deciding that Eric and Paul would ski the mellower line below us and the rest of us headed out the ridge past the big bowl and cornices. The line I thought I saw down a “rib” didn’t look as safe as I had thought so after more discussion we eventually picked a line off the rib in to the next bowl. We hit some mild crust but it was a decent run (the snow was better were Eric and Paul skied). While we were skiing we heard and then saw a bit of the cornice ahead of us break off but it only triggered a little sluff.

From there we went back up and skied down along Eric and Paul’s first run and then cut over to the ridge to drop down to Donner Lake. There was a well worn track over there with plenty of skiers and boarders cutting over from the top of the Judah lift. We had a pleasant run down to the tracks, followed them to the right/east to the next tunnel and then decided to climb up to the ridge for one more short run. It was the best snow of the day, so I suggested that one group run the car shuttle while another (Me, Lynn and Scotty) do another lap. We skied further to the east, coming out on the east end of the tunnel before joining most of the other tracks. We only waited about 15 min’s to be picked up by Dave.

On the way home we had an interesting discussion about the decisions we made (not knowing ahead of time that Eric and Paul didn’t have beacons, continuing anyway, splitting up, the line we chose off Judah, splitting up skiing down Donner and climbing back up, then three of us squeezing in a last lap).

Some pictures courtesy of Davide.

Hiking along Mt Judah's Summit Ridge:

Looking at the cornice and an older fracture line (scary!):

Josh getting turns:
Back up at the summit



Eric checks out the snow:
A map of our route:


Helmet cam:

March Enters with a DUMP! 3-5- 09

Thursday March 5th - Bridger turns 5 - I've got the day off and we've had TONS of snow recently. I've been battling the crud that's going around, so I decided to take it easy and head to Mt Rose. Actually, I didn't think I'd get to ski at all because Dina was so sick last night I considered taking her to the ER. But a little Phenergan and Vicodin and she slept like a babe and felt much better this morning and gave me the green light. I made the boys' lunches and got them off to school before heading up. After just 2 runs in the Chutes I realized that I was going to get bored at the resort, so I took on last run down Ramsey's (to get to the car easier) and heaed up to Big Springs and skinned up to Hourglass. I hooked up with another solo skier I meet at the summit (Julius) and we skied two fun runs together before I realized I was feeling fatigued and headed over to proletariat for a run out to the car. Even though I tired quickly, it was great to be out in the BC again.

Here's my second run down "El Cap"



Skiing next to Hourglass

Bye Bye February

I guess this was a special weekend - it's the first time in a while that I haven't skied at least one day on the weekend. The conditions didn't look very enticing and I'm fighting a cold, so I just hung out around the house. I got some yard work done yesterday, it's feeling like spring. Today I wen to the St Mary's Health Center and spun a bit on a stationary bike and then swam for 30 minutes (and then steamed). It felt good to get some exercise, but an hour later I was wiped and took a nap. Now it looks like a nice storm pattern is setting up for the next few days. Hopefully I'll be able to take advantage of it Thursday and Friday (taking them off before going to Oakland for "camping" on the USS Hornet with Darius and the Boy Scouts and then heading to NY a week from Monday).

Sunshine Ridge 2-24-09

I took the day off today and thought I had picked a great ski day since it rained like crazy down here last night. I was hoping to go to Sugar Bowl or Squaw, but unfortunately the storm was very warm and windy so by the time I left the house, my expectations were low. I planned to go to Mt Rose Ski Resort, but when I got there (~9:00) the Quad lifts and Chuter were still not running due to wind. So I headed up to the Big Springs parking area since I knew Ed was heading out to Sunshine Ridge at 9:00. I met two split-boarders in the lot and we headed up to the ridge and took our first run together. While they set up their boards I went down a little bit and dug a pit. The snow was pretty uniform and I didn't find a layer in the pit wall, but when I did the shovel compression test it failed at 28 on two tests with a pretty clean shear (but didn't pop). We stuck to mellow, treed lines, but the snow was pretty worked by the wind everywhere we went. I caught Ed and two friends, Chris and Ranbir, and skied the next run with them. We looked at skiing Benoit's Chute, but decided to stay safe and stick with the mellower terrain. Although the snow wasn't great (interesting is what Treyson, my 8yo, calls it now) it was a fun morning. We had beautiful blue skies and it was a very social ski; quite different from my last time in the same area where I didn't see a single other person.

Another Early Morning, 2-21-09

It looks like a storm in coming in tonight so I wanted to get some BC skiing in today (Saturday). I had a problem though, Dina had plans with "the girls" starting at 11:00. Not really a problem; I just got up at 5:30 and loaded my gear and my partner (Yuki) in the truck for an early morning ski. After grabbing my usual bagel on the way we were skinning around 7:00. I initially parked at the maintenance station across the road and just below Sky Tavern, but got "shoo'ed" away by a guy in a big snowplow (I don't argue with snowplows) so we went up to the parking lot just past Mt Rose Ski area on the right (before Sunshine Knob). From there we skinned up Sunshine and skied three great powder(ish) runs on the north side. It's funny how one day you can feel like a stud and the next time out like a wimp. I was definitely the wimp today. I'm recovering from a GI bug ( I left a "deposit" to prove it) and it's amazing how much that can sap you. My legs just didn't have it on the climb. But it was really beautiful and I'm glad we got out there.

After getting home and eating lunch I had a little time to relax before heading back up to Mt Rose with all three boys where we skied with the Livingston boys while the moms were enjoying the warm afternoon downtown (biked there) on the "wine walk".

The only picture I took was of the mountain on the way up (batteries died):

The Glades - Valentine's Day 2009

More snow and more on the way! Joe, Pierre and I met at the Galena Starbucks at 7 (after I got my traditional bagel and cream cheese from Truckee Bagel). We dropped Pierre's car off at Galena Park (South Entrance) and then drove up the hill. We thought about starting from near Sky Tavern, but weren't sure where we could park without worrying about a ticket, so we went up to Big Springs. There was a LOT more snow than we anticipated, but there was a nice skin track already set, so we just followed it. We soon noticed that it was heading up to Sunshine Knob, not Hourglass as we had intended, but we decided to follow it and then ski down to Galena Creek from there. There were already a few tracks in Dean's Dive and we followed them down and then continued on to the creek. From Galena Creek we took about 30 minutes to work our way over to the ridge to start the climb up the Glades. We reached the top in 1 1/2 hours and were excited to for our run. We weren't disappointed. The skiing was superb! Good enough that we took advantage of our skin track and took a second run. We then traversed along the ridge to the run down to Galena Park, we could just barely make out the track set Thursday by Dick, Eric, Jeff and Hans. There was good snow most of the way down to the flats, but we had to be careful because it was on the rain crust and didn't bond well at all. Plus there are still a lot of obstacles that need more snow to be covered (I snagged a branch). We made it to the car just after 3:30 and rushed up to get Joe's car so he could get home in time to shower and change for the Tahoe Yacht Club Valentine Ball.

I tried something new with the helmet cam: setting it to automatically take a picture every five seconds. I've deleted a lot of the pictures, but here's a slideshow:


These videos may capture some of our fun. I had a problem with the housing, so there's a lot of wind noise (you may want to turn the volume down).

Dawn(ish) Patrol - 2/12/09

We've gotten a few small storms recently and since I had the morning free, I thought it would be an excellent opportunity to do a "Dawn Patrol". I met Hans, Eric, Dick and Jeff at the Galena Starbucks at 6:00 and after dropping Eric's car at Galena Cr Park we met at the north end of the Mt Rose parking lot. From there we crossed the road and dropped down to Galena Cr in about 5" of pretty nice powder on a soft base.

From Feb09

Eric took us up a nice route to the main face of the Glades and was we climbed higher we eventually joined another group's tracks.

From Feb09

From Feb09

We reached the top of the ridge, where we found Tim Farrar and his friend Rob who were heading up to the summit. It was glorious, but windy, so we didn't linger up there too long.

From Feb09

The skiing was about as good as it gets. Eight to twelve inches of really light powder on a soft base. It was the first time this season that I felt I could just let my skis fly. And I did! (gotta love those Insanes). I was in a bit of a hurry because I had to be back at work for an 11:00 meeting, so I dropped the 2,000 feet more quickly than usual in the backcountry and then quickly turned around and climbed up about 1500 feet for a second run. It as a tad challenging finding a good route down to the creek (we boot packed part of the way up), but I made it down there by ~9:50 and was back at the car, heading out by 10:15. I walked in to the office with a couple of minutes to spare!

(9:15pm) I just got this update from Dick:
"Eric made 5 runs today for over 10,000' getting out to his car about dark. The run down to Galena Creek was actually pretty good too." 10,000 feet in a day - a new goal!

Winter Wilderness Medicine - Lost Trail Lodge, February 6 - 8, 2009

This weekend was the fifth annual Winter Wilderness Medicine Conference and the third at Lost Trail Lodge. We lucked out big time with a little storming coming in Thursday and lasting in to Friday. There were nineteen of us (two canceled the night before) and I think everyone had a great time. We had six students who did a great job cooking and were STOKED for the skiing. Dave Sartoni, who teaches avy courses and guides for ASI and UNR, came to do our Saturday snow safety and extrication workshop. Most of us met at my house at 8:00 on Friday and we met Dave from Lost Trail at 9 to load the food and extra bags on his snowmobiles. We got in to the Lodge in time for lunch (soup, crackers, cheeses) and then Dave led a great beacon rescue session out in the meadow. After that, about half the group skied Friday afternoon, hitting the slopes to the SW of the Lodge. The snow was decent, but it was easy to hit the crust below the new snow. The slightest change in aspect to the south made huge difference. Friday evening we relaxed and socialized (enjoyed the wine we had hauled in).

Dan, Dave , Justin, me and two students (Mike and John) did a “dawn patrol” and skied the steep north aspect of the ridge in front of the lodge. We headed further up it than usual, trying to stay out of the snowcat’s area. It was great! Up top there was a good 7 - 10 inches of great powder. After breakfast, lectures and lunch, we all went out and hiked/skied up the Cat road about a mile. We then split in to three teams and built sleds and splints for our victims (who had to be hauled a distance). Every team did great. Then all the students and a few of the docs went up to the top of the ridge where we skied down the north side again. One of the students was a little winded, so we short-roped her with Yuki who had no problem helping her summit the ridge! We broke in to three groups and everyone found great snow and had huge smiles! Dan and I dropped in to a steep couloir (45’ish degrees), which was a blast. When we returned we had phenomenal appetizers, more talks and then a huge beef roast and apple and pear pudding with whipped cream. Nobody went hungry!

Sunday morning Dan, Dave and I got up with four students and skied another great run in the same area, finally under blue skies. I was on Justin’s skis (I had my “boundless”) and they rocked! We had a great breakfast, covered a couple more topics, I gave out first aid medicine kits, and then packed up and headed out as the skies clouded over again and the wind picked up. Yuki, how had been great the whole trip, helped again by pulling Dan and Karel each part way out - plus a sled!

A slideshow:

Some short videos:

Sled Building and Pulling:

Skiing under the clouds Saturday morning:

Skiing early Sunday morning:

Price Ridge 1/30/2009

The high pressure has returned, making for some great weather, but the powder is going to go fast! So I decided to go out to my old standby for retaining powder: Price Peak off the Tahoe Meadows. I was supposed to meet John Swanson(ER doc) and Janet (ER nurse) around 9:00 up at the Meadows, but I woke before 6:00 and decided to head up early and meet them out there. Yuki and I got one run in and a partial run off Chickadee Ridge before meeting them. We took one run together, straight down the ridge, earlier than usual and had great snow. Unfortunately Yuki disappeared on the way back up, just before he got to the top. I skied down and eventually found him (he found me). Then he refused to go up again so we skied down and toured out. I’m going to have to chose his ski days carefully.

Some photos (a slide show):

Waterhouse Peak 1-28-09

The sky cleared up yesterday and we're back to our lovely blue sky California (and Nevada) weather. It sure is beautiful, but we really need MORE STORMS!

Tuesday Justin Winter and I led a mid-day workshop on Wilderness Medicine and had a lot of fun building sleds and splints with about 25 participants. After demonstrating in the classroom we went outside and the participants built three sleds and "raced" each other. It was great fun!
Starting off inside:

Then building sleds outside and testing them:
We finished up around 2:00, not enough time to ski Heavenly (and use a lift ticket), so I went out to a the High Meadows Trailhead for a tour on my fishscale pattern skis. After touring out the snow covered fire road a ways I couldn't resist climbing up Trimmer Peak at least part way. The views were great, but since I started at 6500 feet, the snow was a few inches of "dust on crust". So I carefully skied back to the trail and then back to the truck.


Wednesday was another blue sky day and my workshop (critically reading the medical literature) didn't start until 2:15, so I left Harrah's around 7:00 and headed out to a "local's favorite" Waterhouse Peak. I've heard it holds great powder, but have never skied it before.

Looking across "Grass Lake" as I started out:

There was an obvious and well used skin track heading out from the parking area, but as I climbed I was getting concerned about how cut up and heavily skied the slope was. Up top I had great views all around: north to Lake Tahoe, west and south to Red Lake Peak, northeast to the Desolation Wilderness.

I decided to follow some tracks south, to the skier's right. They led to a less heavily skied area and I was able to then cut under a rock band (didn't want to ski above it!) to an incredible untracked paradise. The rock pillows were so numerous and inviting that I even jumped a few of them.

Looking back at the bowl:


I headed back up and after chatting with a couple, Jay and Christine, I skied through the glades to the left (west) of the heavily tracked out area. I didn't have to go far to get some untracked snow.
Here's a dead tree I thought looked interesting:
It was so good that I went back up for a final lap. I was warned that staying left would lead me away from the truck and make for a slog back. So about 400 vertical feet above the truck I contoured over and was able to easily ski right to the parking area.

I'd say it was one of the best days I've had out there!

These two short videos really don't do justice to the quality of the snow.