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Jan 19, Columbia Crest

1/19/13
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Posted by CascadeClimber on 1/20/13 1:13am
While we missed out on what appeared to have been a bountiful corn harvest down low, we did manage 9000 vert of skiing from Columbia Crest on Saturday. We had the upper mountain to ourselves.

Unfortunately, we had to downclimb some of the Ingraham Icefall- it wasn't as filled in at the bottom as I thought it would be. It was probably skiable at its very south edge, along Gib Rock, but the consequences of a fall there would have been severe. Since we weren't angling to become statistics, we played it safe and put the pons back on for a bit.

Conditions: Wind-packed powder with a few pockets of that bubbly blue ice above Muir. Below Muir we were treated to several thousand feet of sastrugi (oh yippee), refrozen snow from about 7500 down to Pan Face, a thankfully skied out and smooth Pan Face (we hit it as the sun set), and some surprising pockets of powder here and there in the flats above Paradise.
...was there a Frenchman involved in this trip....?

Yes.  Gerard Depardieu.  He built a stone hut under the Nisqually Bridge to avoid paying Russian Taxes.  That's the buzz anyway...

Cool descent CC.  Glad you got after it!

His nose is too big to fit under the Nisqually bridge. I suspect.........another.

author=Jake the Brit link=topic=27095.msg114160#msg114160 date=1358733082]
...was there a Frenchman involved in this trip....?


Can you say "chocolate-covered ginger"?

Une aventure magnifique, des moments superbes, seuls en montagne.  La vie est belle  :)

Quelques autres photos pour le plaisir.

author=jwplotz link=topic=27095.msg114162#msg114162 date=1358733643]
Yes.  Gerard Depardieu.  He built a stone hut under the Nisqually Bridge to avoid paying Russian Taxes.  That's the buzz anyway...

Cool descent CC.  Glad you got after it!


"Paisible ? À la fraîche ? Décontracté du gland ?" - Les Valseuses.  Good description of the day.

That shot of you guys downclimbing the ID route is pretty spot on, it was pretty puckering with that crevasse down below that few hundred feet of front-pointing.

Was nice meeting you up there on your way down as we were headed up.

More pictures at
https://picasaweb.google.com/104952785231857279993/MtRainierSkiingGibLedgesID

author=dahu link=topic=27095.msg114184#msg114184 date=1358754759]
"Paisible ? À la fraîche ? Décontracté du gland ?" - Les Valseuses.  Good description of the day.


Okay, google translate says thus:  "Peaceful? In fresh? Casual glans?"

What's a casual glan?

If 'Decontracte' means 'I am relaxed from....'
...and  the gland is one of 2 which hang between your (knees in your case) nether regions.

Then I think that pieces together nicely...

This trip report has taken an odd turn, and it's probably Victor's fault!

He sure takes stunning photos though.

Hey, it was cold. Don't you people know about shrinkage??

;)

author=jwplotz link=topic=27095.msg114278#msg114278 date=1358877728]
This trip report has taken an odd turn, and it's probably Victor's fault! .


Correction... It all started when Gerard Depardieu was brought into the post.  The perfect description of the day is a quote from "Les Valseuses" a classic/cult 70's French movie that revealed Gerard Depardieu and a couple of other actors.

Finally finished up my typically wordy TR last night. Lots of pics, too.

http://www.cascadeclimber.com/blog/2013/01/28/mt-rainier-gibraltar-ledges-january-18-19-2013/

Spoiler alert: The TR does not contain a translation of the enigmatic French phrase...


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jan-19-columbia-crest
CascadeClimber
2013-01-20 09:13:12