Home > Trip Reports > Resurrection of the Tempest - 3.22-23.08

Resurrection of the Tempest - 3.22-23.08

3/15/08
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Posted by Stugie on 3/23/08 3:37pm
We referred to it as Valley of the Titans.  It's in the Crystal backcountry.

Photo by Stugie

We decided that Saturday would be an optimal day to try for this endurance race.  Setting off early Saturday morning we tried to make haste in order to set up camp and ditch some weight.  Snow pack all aroud seemed stable, and N to E aspects held well bonded, lightly coated, ready to shred pow.

Photo by Stugie

We set up camp and set off on our quest for amazing lines.  We climbed over saddles and dropped basins until we reached our destination - the Valley of the Titans.  With a perfect N aspect the couloirs offered in this basin were of the sacrificial kind.  Deep and fresh, we had our choice.

Photo by Stugie

Photo by Stugie

We managed a few laps and got some good runs on our journey back to camp and managed to see Rainier in some fantastic evening wear...


However, overnight came one howling storm and with that Easter's tempest was resurrected.  The wind howling over the ridges and rushing with gale force towards the side of our tent interrupted our sleep only a bit.  For picking a relatively protected area, we still felt the storms backhand.  After a long and cold process of preparing for the day, tearing down camp, and packing up we managed to barely catch up with our tent that was almost carried from kansas by one of the 60-70 mph gusts sweeping in with the front.

As we skinned out, we noticed that this extremely wind loaded, N facing area that we were next to looked prime for spraying some excellent face shots.  Cons were time, storm, wind-loaded N aspect very prone to slide.  Pros were faceshots.  So, after almost skinning all the way up to the ridge we turned and hastily dug a pit.  GOOD pow for a foot, then it condensed.  3' under was a cumbling crust, not great, but we were to find out.  After the first foot failing during swings from the elbow, it took a few good swings from the shoulder to loosen the slide layer 3' down.  We depoted unwanted weight and skied a fun couloir that doglegged E.  After getting some of the best turns of the season, we turned to skin up in a hurry...it was starting to puke. 
(Kyle close to our depot area...)

Photo by Stugie

After skinning up a ways, we found a ourselves a dilemma.  Opt for the time consuming and safer 2 mile round about way of meandering through the valley up to gain access to our ridge, or cut it short up the steep face and shallow short gully to cut significant time and milage?  Although we had reservations we went for the second option.  Kyle was caught in a slide that carried him about 150'.  The soft slab was about 50' wide with a 1' crown on a ENE 45 degree slope.  Kyle was fine and we had some nervous chuckles, but we also knew we had overstayed our welcome and needed to get the hell outta dodge.  After battling winds on a grueling ridge hike, we managed to finish with the goods of east peak.  All in all, a great trip.
Nobody in the "hood" Saturday back there & the skiing was excellent. That was you guys setting a tent on the flat below the first drop I presume? We took the center lines & dropped the sweet little (kinda hidden) bowl on skiers left looking down. Got another couple of runs & called it good. Back to the car at just about 3:00. Pic's coming. Very surprising how few folks were in the East Peak / Cement Basin / & Beyond  on Saturday.

author=Stugie link=topic=9555.msg38546#msg38546 date=1206340633]
After skinning up a ways, we found a ourselves a dilemma.  Opt for the time consuming and safer 2 mile round about way of meandering through the valley up to gain access to our ridge, or cut it short up the steep face and shallow short gully to cut significant time and milage?  Although we had reservations we went for the second option.  Kyle was caught in a slide that carried him about 150'.  The soft slab was about 50' wide with a 1' crown on a ENE 45 degree slope.  Kyle was fine and we had some nervous chuckles, but we also knew we had overstayed our welcome and needed to get the hell outta dodge.  After battling winds on a grueling ridge hike, we managed to finish with the goods of east peak.  All in all, a great trip.

I find that as I get older at this touring thing, the longer safer routes are faster than shorter steeper dangerous routes that I used to take. For me, it takes more time and energy to pull an injured climber out than what is worth the risk. I'll take the lesser of the two risks. Although it looked like a great trip, thanks for the pictures, looks like the terrain has really filled in out there.
On Friday the NWAC called for some pretty serious weather/wind with precip at relatively higher snow levels to come in on Sat eve-Sun all day. We were touring on Sat, well South of your location and came upon variable snow conditions of wind effected snow and slabs. Seemed like there were only a couple locations where we could avoid the gusty winds. Some of the slopes broke a couple times in minor slabs, but any loading on that would have been a recipe for disaster. It reminded me of the conditions that came before the 3 snowboarders went missing. But different in the case that this was slabbing on nearly all aspects,  but only surface, what would happen if this gets loaded before it settles? I was standing on a summit Sat and mentioned to the tour group that it would be a bad day to spend the night if the weather they predicted rolls in, even mentioned the three snowboarders event. Glad that the outcome of the slide for Kyle was OK. I have taken several rides and numerous near calls and every time I wonder what could I have done to avoid that in the future?
Thanks for the report and lesson!
Happy trails!
Joe

I was out in this "area" on friday. Stability wasn't bad but I could see how things could have worsened with more snow and warmer temps. Glad y'all are ok...thanks for the report Stugie

rippy - I have some pics of you guys dropping into the smaller bowl N of cement (that was us hooting and hollering at your lines!) and yeah, that was us setting up camp in the basin.  I also have a cool panoramic of you guys skinning back up that saddle.  Sunday we dropped the same lines that you guys did on Saturday.  Some sweet lines for sure!  We ended up travelling 3 basins N from our camp for turns on Sat.  I'll try to post those pics...

Here's a few more pics,

Avy debris

Photo by Kyle Miller

Pit

Photo by Kyle Miller

Start of a good day...

Photo by Kyle Miller

The Weather was a huge factor when choosing a basecamp. At first we were going to camp up on the ridge but the wind was way to strong. We decided on going into the valley both for wind protection and also because the skin out was on rather flat slopes. If the conditions got any worse I was prepared to stay another night to let the storm calm down.
Thanks for the input nothing can beat years of experience..

I bet Saturday was good out there.  Is that Goat Basin?  I have only been there once, but we approached from the Crystal access road and roughly followed the summer trail - pretty amazing terrain in there.  Did you approach from the East Peak ridge and follow the ridge over Norse Peak, or did you take Lake and Crow Basin Runs?  If you followed the ridge, how was that?  Did you lose much elevation following the ridge?

Orion

We decided not to post pics that were TOO revealing as most people probably wouldn't recognize it, but yeah, that's goat lake basin aka "valley of the titans".  We made our way up east peak and then dropped into lake basin.  From there we traversed N over the ridge E of norse peak which is an incredibly easy saddle.  We then traveled over to the little crow basin to access the ridge at an easier grade and shorter climb.  This set us up for great access to goat lake basin with some incredible views.  The only problem is finding the "easiest" way back up to the ridge as that area is very steep and doesn't allow much to choose from.  Any suggestions?  We found a chute N of the basin that we used, but the same chute would have made an excellent run.  We opted not to use the summer trail due to possibilities of slides.  Time-wise we were able to set our camp up in lake basin, head out at around noon, and still manage to get a few runs in goat lake basin, one in big crow, and one down norse peak.  We talked about following the ridge, but with the howling winds and the long skin over, we both agreed that dropping the basins was a much preferred route.

sounds like a close call, glad you guys made it out ok.

Ha ha, I wouldn't worry too much about letting the secret out.  The majority of people rarely seem to get past East Peak for most of the year.

As far as skinning out of goat basin, it sounds like you chose the same route we did.  The gully on the North end of the basing that gained the saddle on the ridge.  The summer trail gains the same saddle from the West side of the ridge.  We thought the summer trail looked like the most direct route and the day we did it, had plenty of safe routes.  But the route through all of the Basins I'm sure was pretty cool.

Were you guys out there on Sunday too?  I bet that lead to a few puckered runs getting out.  We ended up bailing from Pickhandle early because of avy danger that day - stooormy.

lol...true that about East Peak!  Yeah, the gully on the north end sure is steep though!  Saturday held for good turns, and we got back to our camp (lake basin) by Sat. night.  Late Saturday night though and into Sunday the storm picked up and we found ourselves needing to access a ridge via a loaded slope and continually getting worse.  Our decision to ski the one line we did during the short sun break we got on Sunday was questionable, and the av on the skin up kind of put things into a bit of perspective.  I think we had wind gusts on the ridge going back towards east peak at near gale force.

here is a link to the trip with way more photos

http://splitboard.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=4829

enjoy

After scoping your other pics, I see we used a shallower and shorter gully further north to skin out of the basin; it starts north of the flats.  We then followed the ridge to the top of the bowls and chutes.

Orion- Do happen to have a picture of the shallow gully that you used to access the ridge?

Sorry, no picture.  But the gully climbs from just south of the lake to the obvious saddle SE of pt 6304.  I say obvious, but it is out of sight from the bottom of the 'main' bowl.  We happen to approach that way, so we knew it was there.


map

(fixed link)

I'm a topozone fan myself! ;)  Copy and paste in Word, then print and laminate = waterproof mapping.

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resurrection-of-the-tempest-3-22-23-08
Stugie
2008-03-23 22:37:13