Home > Trip Reports > May 29, 2006, Cascadian Couloir, Mount Stuart

May 29, 2006, Cascadian Couloir, Mount Stuart

5/29/06
WA Cascades East Slopes Central
5943
5
Posted by JoeE on 5/31/06 1:40am
Oyvind, Monika and I left Seattle at 3am and thanks to the tracks put in by a Ford Ranger and a couple of TAY guys with shovels, my Dodge 1500 4X4 had no problem clearing the snow pile and driving to within 0.13 miles of the TH.  We started hiking at 5:30 shortly behind the guys that helped the Ford bust the trail up the road.  Clear skies made for a firm snow surface that we found easier to boot up then skin.  Upon reaching Longs pass we discovered a group camped there, one of them Michael is also a TAY member.

With the sun starting to warm the N-NE side of longs pass we quickly skied to about 5200€™ where we found some large exposed rocks and decided to boot it.  Ingalls Creek was wide open, Monica decided to use a log to cross while Oyvind and I chose to leap frog across a few large rocks.  Holding a high traverse on dirt we connected up with the Cascadian near 5200€™ and climbed to about 5400€™ before running into good snow.  After dropping our skis at the false summit we continued to the true summit arriving at noon. 

By the time we returned to the false summit the TECATE crew, Michael and one of his partners had arrived.  After discussing the snow conditions and intermittent dirt and rock crossings experienced on our climbers right up route and reviewing pictures taken from longs pass we decided not to retrace our up track.  Instead we stayed skier€™s right, which had better snow coverage down to 5200€™.  The snow was sweet butter corn and even the debris near the false summit was fun to ski in.  I like to describe the debris as lumpy mash potatoes with a creamy feel.  Back at longs pass shortly before 4:00 and following a fairly direct fall line path through the trees we had the Black Butte porters cracked open by 4:30.

The only downer was sitting in 15mph traffic on I-90 for 30 miles.



More pics here

New link to more pics coming soon!

Sorry everyone Seems as though my free web hosting site can not keep up with the data transfer that has been requested.  Give a chance to work this out....

Thanks Joe for the report,  an awesome trip and  blazing through with your "real" truck to cut those 2 miles off the road! :D
And my big thanks to Oyvind for all the steps you set up those final steep sections to the false and true summits.  Joe and I appreciated it and so did the rest of the groups behind us.


as you can see kitty had a good time too

Great pictures Joe and Monica! Looks like you had a great descent in the main couloir.
It was really a great surprise to see you guys show up as we about to leave the camp. Thanks a lot for kicking these steps!

Monika, my 7 year-old daughter is quite impressed by Kitty on Broken Top and Longs Pass! She said,
" Hey, that's just like my kitty." You are inspiring the next generation. So far my little blond girl skis a little on lifts and a little cross country. Randonnee skiing will have to be a few years down the road.

author=Randonnee link=topic=4833.msg20496#msg20496 date=1149259459]
my 7 year-old daughter is quite impressed by Kitty...



7 years old and already having fun Nordic and Alpine skiing?  Tell your sweetheart that Kitty is very impressed with her! :)

I started out the same at 5 with my red mini skis down the hill in the front yard.  It's about being outside in the beautifully snowy mountains, you don't have to be one of the guys (whatever that may or may not mean), just out there your own way.

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may-29-2006-cascadian-couloir-mount-stuart
JoeE
2006-05-31 08:40:55