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April 5 Yawning Glacier

4/5/15
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Posted by Jake the Brit on 4/6/15 12:58pm
The approach to the Yawning took 8 months. The short (ish) time that had elapsed since FrankFrank & I eyed it up had filled up the mountains in the most desirable possible way: The roads are open & a recent dump brought promise.
Ari, Victor & I slid north from a 5AM Seattle on a gust of caffeine & parked at milepost 21! What a treat, what more gifts could we curry?

We skinned happily from the bushes by the parking lot, gliding, actually gliding on an increasingly deepening dusting of real powder snow. Weird stuff, light and fluffy, provoking the backcountry gene into rabid expression. We threw ourselves at the steep section & found the crust lying dormant, strong & evil below da fluff. That was a battle that I won€™t do again without crampons.

The Yawning looked formidable, but the mouth looked shut.
Last June the crevasses on the lookers-left side were offering to eat a guy whole, like Moby Dick but without the satisfactory regurgitation. We slid down from the Pass on good snow, crusted on the valley floor & tooled up, because it looked formidable & the top was difficult to read & crevasses give me the fear.

The snow got better & better, and deeper & deeper & the rabid stoke was on.
The glacier is not really steep, it just manages to look that way. We skinned up to the top, sucked in the views, drank a pot of mint tea, vented some spleen & debated dropping down to the lake, but the clouds were piling up & to fully fire the rabid-stoke-o-matic, visibility would be required, so we peeled off & slashed the crap out of the slope. What a laugh that was.

Down in the Pelton basin (I think that€™s what it€™s called) it was sunny & warm, still & windless. Victor took an hour & dug a snow profile for his upcoming Avi 17 training, Ari & I bobbed up the Ptarmigan Traverse bypass gully & slashed the bejeezus out of that too, on even better north facing alpine super-powder.
Notably we didn€™t go onto the Cache glacier, the snow had an odd bouncing effect towards the top of the gully. Wind loaded perhaps.

Heading home we had the usual mini epic getting down the steep step from the Cascade Pass, but all told we had a ball. I welcome the return of spring into its normal place.

pics:
http://jakeevans.smugmug.com/Washington/Yawning/48462425_dnqDK5
Fantastic!!  How did the other side look?

Une journée superbe, un silence immense.

A couple more.

author=Kenji link=topic=34065.msg140608#msg140608 date=1428380444]
Fantastic!!  How did the other side look?

Like this: The S is a go for sure.
I reckon at the Pelton-Magic col there was about 12" +  of fresh on top of a rock solid crust.

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april-5-yawning-glacier
Jake the Brit
2015-04-06 19:58:38