june 16, 2012, shasta trinity road trip TR

my friend ken invited me down to CA to try out his new Triad splitboard bindings and get some promotional footage on shasta.  i hadn't seen him all winter, so i was happy to make the trip (plus i needed to restock on whiskey and i hate paying the WA liquor taxes).

first stop was the primus show in redmond... yep, it rocked.  les has still got it!


loaded the family up to hit the road after the show and were climbing at broughton bluff by portland the next morning.


later that day we got our first look at the objective... even after seeing rainier on every clear day, shasta still looks big!


after not much sleep the night before, i crashed pretty early, before the film crew showed up.  the alarm went off at 0230 and i got my first introduction.... damn, have you guys ever even seen a mountain before??


by daybreak, ken, justin, and i had left the los angeles menagerie behind, and i was wondering if we'd ever see them again.


justin was smart and hiked his custom split up the mountain while ken and i wasted time messing around with skins.


we stopped at helen lake and tried to raise the film crew on the radio.  one had already dropped out.  most of the rest were struggling.  we continued on.


ken skins under our destination, the trinity chutes.  so many lines!


ken climbs through the red bank cliffs.  i'd never been on this side of shasta before and was surprised at how straightforward the climb up avy gulch was.


with the film crew still hours behind and our line only a few hundred feet above us, we stopped for a rest near thumb rock.


damn those are some sexy bindings!


we looked around for a bit and then decided to finish our climb and go do the rest of our waiting at 13,300 feet.


time to pick out a line!


i voted for this one...


but we eventually agreed this one would make for better filming vantages.


at last, the crew started to arrive at the top of the chutes.


ken shares his vision for the shot.


but what's this... oh no! one of the hired film students refuses to ride into the chutes, stating them "too steep".  somehow, downclimbing is determined as a "solution".


by the time the fiasco was over, hours had gone by and a cloud was covering the sun.  so much for video.  at least we still get to ride a cool line!!




and soon enough, we are back at camp, enjoying a beer and a sunset.


i never thought my board would look so cool with white bindings!


the next morning, we headed back north after a quick jump into siskiyou lake.


...and made it back up to oregon in time for a quick twilight climb.


on our final day of driving north, it was too rainy to climb...


so we did some hiking and still returned home tired.


it was a lot of driving for one day of riding, but completely worth it to do some exploring with good friends and family.  and who wants to be in a video, anyway?!