Mt. St. Helens 1 June
6/15/08
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
4050
8
Drove as far up the Marble Mtn. road as we could (~1 mile from intersection) late Sat. night and slept by the cars. Started hiking by 7 am Sun. morning. After hiking about 1 mile up the patchy snow-covered road we turned off on the Swift Creek ski trail, which eventually joined up with the regular Marble Mt. climbing route (Worm Flows). Most of the way up we were skinning up through the clouds with an occasional light mist. We broke through the cloud layer about 1000' below the summit. After basking in the sun for a while and taking in the views at the rim we headed down about 1:30 pm. The snow was super mushy, but not really too sticky. We set off a number of small sloughs. It was a great ski all the way back to the road at 2400'! With a little creative skiing we were able to keep our skis on probably within half a mile of our cars. Amazing how much low elevation snow is still up there.
Hey way to go...nice LONG RUN! So can a person these slip up there onto them mountain without a permit? (Not that I would ever do such a thing) nor a NW Pass?
I would never condone breaking the rules, but fortunately we did not see any rangers on patrol.
I'm not one to say break the rules either. But I bought a sno-park permit this year but the state could not let me use it where I wanted because they wouldn't plow the roads. As far as I'm concerned I've already paid my fee. Marble Mtn is a sno-park for cry'n out loud.
author=skierguitarist link=topic=10242.msg41242#msg41242 date=1212703206]
Hey way to go...nice LONG RUN! So can a person these slip up there onto them mountain without a permit? (Not that I would ever do such a thing) nor a NW Pass?
I am feeling the same way these days, esp. with all the passes being hard to get, etc. I also plan on making it out there in the next two weeks and hope the snow holds up well in the lower elevations.
UncleBen- How much snow would you say still sits in the woods on the trail outside of the marblemount parking area?
Chris
There was easily 3-4' of snow in the trees at 2700'
On the active.com website where you register for your permit, if it says (not available) next to the date, as it does for all weekends in the forseeable future, I assume this means they are sold out? And theoretically, the odds/financial damage of forgetting this and skiing anyway would be....?
This is a bit of a dilemma - Personally, I feel that MSH doesn't use their money very wisely. But putting money towards a permit that one has issues with is your own choice.
Since the summer climbing season is the most popular, they limit the number of people on the mountain to 100 (between I believe Memorial Day and Labor Day). I never hit MSH during this season, but have a week before the limit went into effect. We ran into a climbing ranger, and so did a number of others on the mountain. They asked for the permit and luckily I was carrying it (as the other 2 members of my party didn't have them). I'm guessing the frequency of this type of occurance increases quite a bit during the busier climbing season.
I'm not sure what the cost of a fine would be. If it was outside of the above period of time, I'm guessing they would probably just ask for the fee of the climbing permit...if that. However, because they have set limits for the summer climbing season, I'm guessing the fine for "forgetting" or "sneaking" up, if caught, would be a bit steeper.
One MIGHT evade these circumstances by 1) Climbing at night 2) Not camping, especially below 4500' 3) Climbing an obscure route up 4) Not registering with MSH (but definitely leaving an itinerary with friends/family)
Since the summer climbing season is the most popular, they limit the number of people on the mountain to 100 (between I believe Memorial Day and Labor Day). I never hit MSH during this season, but have a week before the limit went into effect. We ran into a climbing ranger, and so did a number of others on the mountain. They asked for the permit and luckily I was carrying it (as the other 2 members of my party didn't have them). I'm guessing the frequency of this type of occurance increases quite a bit during the busier climbing season.
I'm not sure what the cost of a fine would be. If it was outside of the above period of time, I'm guessing they would probably just ask for the fee of the climbing permit...if that. However, because they have set limits for the summer climbing season, I'm guessing the fine for "forgetting" or "sneaking" up, if caught, would be a bit steeper.
One MIGHT evade these circumstances by 1) Climbing at night 2) Not camping, especially below 4500' 3) Climbing an obscure route up 4) Not registering with MSH (but definitely leaving an itinerary with friends/family)
Someone wrote in another thread that the fine was $100 for climbing above 4800' without a permit.
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