Home > Trip Reports > Crystal Southback 11.18.07

Crystal Southback 11.18.07

11/15/07
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
5151
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Posted by Joedabaker on 11/18/07 10:05am
Went up to Chinook Pass at the breakable crust of dawn, looked ugly, but it was snowing.
Got back in the car went home, surfed the world wide waste of time and took a hot tub.
6 hours later got a call from a friend at Crystal that it was dumping and the snow was accumulating fast.
Drove up to Crystal quick skin up to the South, met up with my friend skinned up a west facing slope that had 6 plus inches of new on a firm pack, some tough skinning.
The slope angle up top was about 35 degrees and the new snow bond was not so good.
We skied down and got some good size sloughs to FLY down after us, it would EASILY knock an unsuspecting person off their feet and give them a little ride, so be aware.
Skinned from the car and skied to the car, only a couple scrapes on the boards near the bottom of the hill.
video Here Click Southback Dave picture.
Given the forecast, I don't think that Crystal will open for Thanksgiving, that said maybe it will?
Not sure when the new snow is going to adhere/settle to the crust layer. Watch for sloughs that have not adhered to the old hard snow base on steeper slopes.
They may knock the unsuspecting into a terrain trap.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Joe
Here's some pics taken from Chinook Pass today:






Looks like you got a later start than me, at 7am at Chinook, I walked out on the snowpack, looked pretty thin and felt frozen and breakable, nothing as your nice pics represent. Way to go! Guess the early bird does not always get the worm.

Ya, we didn't get up there until noon and left at 4.

author=Joedabaker link=topic=8191.msg32769#msg32769 date=1195437919">...
Video Here Click Southback Dave picture....


When I navigate to this page -- it  doesn't play the video -- but displays a message "You must have QuickTime 7.2 to play this video" -- I have QuickTime 7.3 installed -- so it appears that is somesort of script error on the page eh?

Running IE 7 on Vista

What-I was told all browsers work equally ::)
I'll have to check into that error-
Thanks for the heads up Randy!
Joe

Write Once, Test Many

author=Randy link=topic=8191.msg32816#msg32816 date=1195502462]
Write Once, Test Many

Ahh yes, well put. I was a little quick on the release of this viddy.
I have Quicktime 7.2 on OS Mac/intel and it plays fine, also plays on my Powermac Quicktime 7.2. Any others with issues and what is your OS and browser that is having difficulty?
Browsers checked, Firefox/Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X; en-U,
Safari 2.0.4, I don't have IE(Mac does not support IE anymore), but heard from a guy I skied with today that they were able to view it on IE, did not know the OS or IE version.
Still looking into it.

I also have a mac/intel and it is not working for me It only says that I need the new version of quicktime to play it, then once I click ignore, I get two pictures, one of the snow (which I think is supposed to be a video) and you with your nice hat :)

Good for you getting out there and having some of that before it is all over. I will be weeping on opening day now that the northback will be lift accessed, thank god the southback still requires some work (or is it the other way around?)

Chris

the video works fine for me. the only problem i could tell was that i wasnt in it.

Hey joe, IE 6.0 and I am having the same issues with "my" video.  Maybe you can email it to me, or bring a disc next time I see you.  Had another sweet day yesterday with Kira & Dan in GV.  Just as good as the day before but more sun. ;D

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crystal-southback-11-18-07
Joedabaker
2007-11-18 18:05:19