Home > Trip Reports > December 26, 2011, Crystal bc, Cement Basin

December 26, 2011, Crystal bc, Cement Basin

12/26/11
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
6364
10
Posted by Pete A on 12/26/11 10:58pm
Telemetry showed that Crystal picked up more snow out of the storm on the 25th than most other spots, so Andy, Mica, Becky, and I headed up towards Bullion Basin.  Windward aspects had 3-5 inches of snow on a crust that varied between being breakable & rotten to firm & icy.   Hopped over the divide and found a foot if not more of wind transported powder on the Cement basin side, so we stuck to short yoyos on the east side to harvest the best snow.

New snow seemed fairly well bonded to the crust, but our pit on an east aspect in Cement Basin, 35 degrees, about 6000ft, failed at seven wrist taps, slid fast failing on the rotten snow immediately under crust that the new snow had fallen on.   Probably/hopefully will be less of an issue with this warm storm thats on its way...maybe help fuse together the rotten facets sitting under the crust? 

Skiing back to the car, the thinner layer of fresh on the old crust in Bullion skied better than expected and all in all the day was welcome relief from just skinning laps at Summit West for exercise. 

pics here:  https://picasaweb.google.com/petealderson/CementBasin?authuser=0&feat=directlink







Looks fantastic when compared to the skiing I have been doing, thanks for the pictures.

Snow seems to have returned just in time for the departure of the in-laws... nice.

Nice call, Pete.

WOW, powder and sunshine. Nice terrain, Pete.

Nice pictures Pete. I'd forgotten what powdery conditions look like

Those are some fantastic photos!!

*** EDIT 1/2/2012 ***

If you want to continue the discussion that was in this post, please follow the link below:

Weak Layers post

***

This discussion is a great example of why the new forum was created.  

There's a lot of good information exchange going on here, but trip reports are always going to be what people make them (i.e. what they want to say about the day).  

If folks become less likely to share their trip reports because they expect their decision making will be scrutinized, we lose out on any opportunity to learn, be it solely a conditions report or a "near miss" analysis.  Or a "full hit" analysis like last year's Phantom thread.  We also lose out on folks just sharing their good times.

I guess this is one that Ron, Jim or I may have diverted over to "Weak Layers" a bit earlier on -- still figuring out how to handle these when they come up, because they are good opportunities if everyone is a willing participant.  Pete was happy to provide additional info, which is great, but not everyone will be willing to "step onto the stage", so to speak.

Hadn't noticed this split until now. Not sure where the best place to comment about it is, so I'll do it here.

It seems like it would have been much better to split the topic starting with Gerry's reply #6 above, which began the diversion into an avy decision-making discussion. Not with my post which was made in reply to that diversion, and lacks context as it stands now -- it is clearly a reply to the discussion which was already initiated in this thread.

Overall, it seems that splitting such topics off just does not work properly. The whole discussion (including the avy-related portion) is now split into two threads, but how does that help anything? The split thread lacks context, and can not be viewed without first looking at this thread. Leaving it all in one place (given that it had already started and progressed to near-conclusion) seems better in my opinion.


I would have taken care of it sooner had I been in town.  Splitting out this kind of discussion is a new process, but I think it's something that has a place, for the reasons I described above.

You're probably right about the split at Gerry's original post -- I've amended the topics accordingly.  I'd be happy to discuss it more via PM, or in a separate post in Random Tracks, if anyone would like. 

author=Marcus link=topic=22997.msg97706#msg97706 date=1325215254]
If folks become less likely to share their trip reports because they expect their decision making will be scrutinized, we lose out


Ding!

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december-26-2011-crystal-bc-cement-basin
Pete A
2011-12-27 06:58:08