Home > Trip Reports > March 13-14, 2004, Bullion Basin - Crystal

March 13-14, 2004, Bullion Basin - Crystal

3/13/04
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
4579
9
Posted by ron j on 3/14/04 7:03pm
Under the fine organizational, administrative, political and leadership skills of Ken Madden, a gaggle of freshly trained ski mountaineers, were spirited  off to Bullion Basin by Gerry H, Jerry W, Jeanette M, Rick P, Brenda B, and yours truly for their overnight field trip to top off Seattle Mountaineers annual Ski and Snowboard Mountaineering Course.

While the students dug their snow caves to sleep in for the night, us common laborers dug enough holes for avy beacons to bury a small sized semi truck.
Home construction was followed by beacon practice, with single and multiple beacons at various depths and orientations.  Dinner followed in a group kitchen with the chatter diffused amidst the roar of a couple of XKG's in the group.

Sunday morning found the students in the midst of mock avalanche disaster scenarios, with multiple victims, with and without beacons.  If you haven't been through one of these, you can not even imagine what a valuable learning experience it is.

After that we broke up into smaller groups to tour and talk about safe travel techniques and practices.

Solar heating had softened the snowpack nicely for some great corn turns, maybe even a little more than we wanted.  See BLOG report at:
http://www.avalanchenw.org/blog/archives/00000001.html

For more information on Mountaineers courses see:
http://www.mountaineers.org/skiing/

Jerry White got a few pictures of the folks on the trip.  He promised to post a link for us shortly.

Holedigger Ron
It was a great field trip with a fun group of students, and leaders.  We dug deep holes, and shallow holes, and small holes, and big holes, we have dug so many holes over the last couple of weekends I'm afraid I'm going to start dreaming about them  ;D  BTW we also covered up those holes with more digging when we were done.   ;)

Looking forward to seeing the pictures and the "nifty" centerpiece on our group kitchen counter.  

Yours truly, holedigger #2  8)

A fun and rewarding weekend. Great to watch people go through those scenarios, very insightful.  My photos are @  

Great job on the photo work, Jerry.
That was a bunch of photos, which is a bunch of work.

Great photos, Jerry, but I admit a certain bewilderment at #2.  It appears to depict a group of four big and burly Mountaineers trip leaders, all grinning happily, carrying great big and burly backpacks....and Ron Jarvis with his own wee little snippet of a pack.  This begs the question: why does everyone but Ron seem to be carrying their fair share?  And further: why is it that Ron, with that tiny little insignificant wisp of a backpack, always seems to have something more pressing to do than to break trail?

Yours in the spirit of straightforward, unbiased inquiry,

Mark

Ya know something Mark, it's been a bit of a bewilderment to me too.  I have been watching Ron for the past umpteen years and never quite figured out where he hides all that overnight stuff.  When we get to camp his pack is like the endless cavern of cool stuff.  Just a little secret, don't ever offer to trade packs with him cause when you pick up that little snippit of a pack, you'll soon discover that looks can be deceiving.   ;D

Did everybody bring a personal keg or something? My overnight pack is half the size of those monsters!

I like the shot of the snow bunny...

Mark - I was starting to think that it was about time for you to take your turn at the roasting podium.
Possibly the reason my pack looks smaller is that it is the only one sitting on the ground.  Maybe they look bigger way up on someone's back... how 'bout that?  Yeah, that's the ticket.
And as far as breaking trail goes, I break trail; why I just broke trail back in, uh, I think it was 1976.

This is a response to Paul, and nothing more:

Your overnight pack is NOT an overnight pack.  

Thank you, I have nothing else to say.


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2004-03-15 03:03:52