Mid-winter break ice climbing, skiing, and Biking

 Over winter break I got up to a little ice climbing, skiing, and biking. On 2/13, Me and Asher headed up to Franklin falls via the sno-park but got stopped short due to a road closure from forest service staffing issues. We hiked for a bit but realizing it would be faster to turn around and drive to the summer trailhead, we got back to the car. However due to traffic we weren’t able to hop on i90 EB so we turned around and drove to Wayne's world. There was a small ice pitch formed on the dark side which we lapped a few times before heading back to seattle. That afternoon my dad and I drove out to Mt Bachelor where we skied from Monday-Thursday. Fun little resort but pretty low angle. The day after getting back, me and Asher made a second attempt on Franklin Falls, where we were able to go to the winter trailhead and great some great climbing. Well, great-ish. The ice was getting pretty wet but me and Asher still got 4 laps in each. On Saturday and Sunday the snow conditions were worrisome so I decided to make it a productive study weekend. I got in a lap on predator on saturday where it was in surprisingly good condition. On Sunday I rode NOTG, OTG, and Atlas in the pouring rain where I crashed on the blue trail “Inside passage” on my way to Atlas. Sometimes you let your guard down I suppose, and the slippery roots didn’t help. While I didn’t get up to anything extremely rad, I’m pretty proud of my break. Here's a few fun photos.

Snoqualmie Mountain: Snot and Slot Couloirs

The Snoqualmie Mountain couloirs are classics and have always been on my mind. With a great weather window Sunday it seemed like a good enough time to go for them. The plan was the trifecta so we met at the trailhead at 6:00 and were moving by 6:15. We made it to the top of the snot by 8:30 and started trying to set up the rappels. With a 30 meter rope, we extended the top with some cordelette and slings. The rope still didn’t reach and Emily climbed back out at 10:30 after a lot of shenanagins. We then figured we’d try the other rap station. This didn’t reach either but with a little hop over a small cliff band, I was in the couloir. Emily and Andrew watched from above and decided they’d rather go for the slot. While they did that, I went for a quick lap up at the exit col. By 12:30 we were all skinning back out of the basin and topped out on Snoqualmie mountain at around 2. We chilled at the summit for a little bit and saw some of Emily's co-workers on the east summit before deciding to avoid the crooked due to windslab concerns. The slot was skied out but still a good time. We made quick time back out and after an easy ski through phantom, we were at the car by 4. All in all a great day out in Snoqualmonix.

Zipper Couloir

 With nothing to do, decided to go for a “quick” little afternoon mission up roaring ridge and scope out the entrance to the zipper couloir with Emily and Andrew. After dealing with Snoqualmie parking insanity, we got going around 11:15. Going was slow with a little wallowing and breaking trail most of the way but we made it to the entrance around 3:15. After cutting a cornice, we watched a nice big sluff run down. We belayed ski cuts to Emily and Andrew before skiing down. After them, I followed. It was great blower pow and my best line of the year so far. At the bottom we quickly found the XC road and skinned out in the dark.

Turned out to be a surprisingly fun day with a rad couloir in rad snow

Lincoln peak winter ascent

 Well it wasn't the radness that took place on Sloan Peak that weekend but with the great high pressure, Cole reached out to me about climbing Lincoln. It's been on his mind for a while and given that he was willing to do Nooksack with me over the summer, I figured I'd take him up on the offer. A flu and vacation had also meant I hadn't done something hard for a while so with a lot of stress from highschool, I decided I needed to get a little scared. I skipped the afternoon on Friday to beat the traffic up to B-ham and enjoyed a nice afternoon of trying to get caught up on schoolwork at Coles place while he was working. Once Cole was done, we did a little last minute supply-grabbing and packing before we met up with Fletcher to get a little beta. Assuming it would be a quick approach to camp, we decided on leaving Bellingham at 7:30 to be at camp early afternoon.

Saturday morning we leisurely took our time getting out of Bellingham. We passed the turnoff for FS 38 but eventually found our way back and made our way along the road. The road was bad but easily subaruable until the 3rd switchback, where large ruts made us park our car and start walking at 10am. I was still in a poor mood but forced myself to shut up and walk, knowing this was what I needed. The road eventually got bush-wacky but soon enough we were climbing a dense forest. Instead of going into the basin, we climbed up to the ridge along the Deming glacier and booted to around 5800' where it opened up to great views of Lincoln. From here we skinned to 6050' and set up camp by a stand of trees with a great view of Lincoln

The night was rather uneventful other than Cole spilling his pasta bolognese in his sleeping bag. Luckily we both brought an extra meal so instead we just enjoyed what warmth there was to our sleeping bags(my MYOG one did surprisingly well) and thought about the next day. A decent 3:50 wakeup got us out of our bags and we traversed over to the base of Lincoln on our flotation devices(hardboot splitboard for me, ski's for Cole). From here we did about 1500' of booting before stashing our skis a little before the bergschrund. Unroped, I lead the bootpack up to the the mostly filled schrund. Feeling in my element, I tried to cross, watching my foot punch through. I tried to go to the left with the same result before finding a small little step that I climbed over to the right. From on top of this packed snow step, a trusty big step got me across the schrund and onto a steep snow ramp. I was confident on the terrain(or in a weird state of mind) so I kept moving up.

I continued most of the way up the steep snow/ice ramp before Cole called for me to rope up. I waited for him, realizing maybe my mind maybe was a little fucked. From here we simuled with me in the lead, trying to have 2 of our 8 pickets between us at all times. One simul block brought us to the base of the X couloir where we took a break before I set off on a second lead. The X couloir was much chiller than expected, possibly due to the snowy winter conditions. From the hogsback at the top of this, I lead a 3rd simul-pitch to the summit. The snow on the climb was wallowy but not horrible. Pickets went in easily with a hand however, so I viewed them more as mental pro. After running out the last 60meters, we hit the top at noon. views were great but with these D10 peaks, we knew we were only halfway done. 

Though I opted to down-climb, Cole was pretty tired and unsure of his condition to down-climb so we dug a deadman on the summit, pulled out the tagline, and left the first of our pickets. We found 3 sling-able rock anchors in the X couloir and by 3:30 we were on top of the waterfall with our final picket. By now the sun was on the face and with small ice chunks coming down, we just wanted flat ground. We were only able to pound in the picket halfway and mid-clip it so after backing it up with a marginal ice screw, I very nervously set off over the edge, extremely relieved to see that the ropes reached. From here it was a mediocre snowboard down the bottom half before a quick slog to camp, arriving at around 4:30 right before sunset. Realizing our two-day itinerary wasn't happening we settled in for the night. 

My MSR reactor burst into flames but after warming it in my bag for a little bit, it started working again and after a night of shivering, we were moving around 9 the next morning. 2.5hrs of skiing, survival skiing, and cutting through the forest to avoid the mess of slide alder later, we were back at the car. It was a rad yet expensive peak. I'm glad to never have to do it again but I truly did need it and am feeling much better now. I guess somehow I got what I came for.

Enchantments Ski Traverse

A ski traverse in november? It’s a pretty bold idea but with La Nina blessing the cascades with a great start to the season, it started sounding reasonable. After some pow days at baker and in the north cascades, I was stoked to continue getting out. Emily was in between jobs with the forest service and ski patrol, and I had an upcoming fall break so we made plans to get some shredding in during thanksgiving week. And luckily enough, the weather gods blessed us. As my break began, a high pressure window came over the cascades.

After persuading Emily that repeating volcanoes was lame, I convinced her on an stuart range ski traverse. It would ideally link up lil Annapurna, Dtail, Argonaut, and Stuart. Emily was told that the south faces wouldn’t go but we had a stoke. Emily dragged along her friend Silvian and we made plans to drop off a car as close to Esmeralda TH Tuesday morning and set off. I didn’t have a 0 degree bag so I resolved to sew one in time. After a busy weekend, I got out for a quick source lake scouting mission on Monday. I got back at 4pm with all my sleeping bag materials delivered. Needless to say it was a long night and at 1am on Tuesday, I was power-resting for the coming trip. 

4am came quickly and I drove over the pass to meet Emily and Silvian where we dropped her car off 6 miles from esmeralda TH. By 08:30, we were walking out of Snow creek. There was a decent amount of snow on the ground but there were still a fair amount of rocks poking through so we kept skis on our backs for an hour. Once we reached the top of the switchbacks, we put skins on and started our journey. Prior, me and Emily had only been as far as the snow-creek wall so from here out it was new terrain to me.

Snow creek was a beautiful endless valley with peaks towering on each side. As we cruised up the valley, the snow depth kept increasing and skiable couloirs caught the eye on each side. Travel was easy with an obvious trail through the woods and a minimal slide alder or bushwack. Benefits of one of the most well traveled trails in the state I guess. The skinning was spiced up every once in a while by random bare spots. By the time we got into the woods, most of the animal tracks had disappeared.

The first lake we hit was Nada Lake, at about 1:30. The lake was all frozen over so we enjoyed our first bits of sunshine as we skinned across it. We joined back along the trail to skin up to lower snow lake, where we finally got our first views of the enchantments at 2:30. Surprisingly, lower snow lake was completely frozen over while the upper snow-lake was snow-free. From here it was only 2.5 miles and 1500’ of gain to lake Vivian so we assumed we’d arrive at camp right at sunset.

Well we didn’t arrive at camp at sunset and it ended up being quite a night. Skinning around upper snow lake was fine- though obviously not as fast as just cutting across the lake. The true challenge came once we started up the forest towards lake Vivian. From here, the summer trail was impossible to follow and we gave into a life of steep, bushwack skinning. Progress was extremely slow and by sunset at 4:30, we were only 500’ up. Given it was still early, we decided to continue on, hoping conditions would improve. Sadly they didn’t. By 6:30, we were 300’ from the lake. We continued but ended up too far right. We found ourselves on top of a steep face so instead of trying to navigate it in the dark, we set up our tent on the knoll between Lake Vivian and Temple Lake at 7:00.

For the trip, we brought along Silvians new MSR Front Range. It was our first time pitching a pyramid tent so the first night was, well... rough. Firstly we made the mistake of not digging the tent below snowline which let tons of wind and snow in. We also didn’t dig in the inside, meaning the edges were unusable since they were too low. And most importantly, we fucked up the side where our heads lied, meaning a lot of snow came in from that side. A lot. The night was rough, with me and emily booting up at 1 am to add snow to cover the edges. After this the wind picked up and though our efforts worked on some sides, the side with our head was still messed up. And thus began the 7 hours of suffering.

We were in and out all night. Whenever I looked up, I felt snow sprinkling onto my face. I conceded to using a jacket hood to cover my head as I slept since my sleeping bag was hoodless. At 7am when I woke up, there was a solid inch or two of snow on my pad around my face and on my hood. We were happy to get going and by 7:45 we were moving, quickly getting down to the lake. From here we skinned across the core zone, strong gusts blasting us. As we neared little annapurna, the wind at the summit was obvious but we decided to just keep going. Skinning up it was efficient until about 100’ below the summit where we decided to transition behind some rocks. A little booting later and we were at the top at 11:15. 

From the top, we quickly started our way down to escape the winds. We skied strong windboard but it turned into powder as we neared Isolation lake, arriving at 11:30. From here it was our plan to climb the summer route up dragontail peak, only 1000’ of vertical away. Me and Silvian both believed we could climb through the cornice but with Emily wary, we couldn’t convince her and decided to ski down asgard pass. The snow was beautiful down to the lake and from here we decided to skin up to colchuck col to at least have a look at the south side. 2.5 hours later we were at banshee pass, but the sun was going down.

Deciding that the traverse was out of question, we decided to ski down to the lake and set up a nice camp. We triggered a small wind slab at the top of the colchuck glacier but other than that, the skiing was amazing. This time we digged out a great campsite by the lake and the only issue we faced was the wet sleeping bags from the night before.

The next morning, we chose against another lap of the colchuck glacier and made our way out. Everything was pretty straightforward and we were in leavenworth by 2pm to learn of all the restaurants being closed for thanksgiving. It was a great ski traverse and I hope to come back in spring. Next time I'll start from stuart lake and hopefully be much more successful.

MYOG #2 - 20/40 sleeping bag

   After modding that sleeping pad, I was feeling inspired to do more make your own gear projects. I had been looking into an ultralight summer-weight sleep system for a while already and it was obvious what to make; a sleeping bag. Out of the gate I set my values of weight, warmth, and efficiency. From these three principles I set about designing the lightest summer-weight bag possible. During my research I came across the Feathered Friends Vireo UL, and thats where I took a lot of my inspiration.

To save weight on my bag, I removed the zipper and taking inspiration from the patagonia hybrid half-bag, I designed the bottom to be warmer so that the top could be used with a jacket. This intentional layering inside the bag meant I also gave it a slightly wide shoulder. Since my jackets have hoods, I also used this as an opportunity to remove the hood of the bag, especially since the bag is only designed for relatively mild temperatures. There are a lot of features one can add to a bag but I forgo most. After I use the bag for a few nights, I’ll decide if I want to add a draft collar.

As far as materials, I used a 7 denier calendered nylon inner fabric and a 10 denier outer. I used 850 fill power water resistant down and 0.5oz/yard noseeum mesh for my baffles. I think I sewed the fabrics inside out but given that I’ll be wearing layers inside the bag, I’m not too worried.

The most radical feature of the bag is the false bottom. Since compressed down doesn’t insulate, I opted to just place a piece of fabric to trap warm air instead of the weight of baffles. This also solves the issue of temperature control without a zipper. Instead of unzipping, I can just rotate the false bottom to face the air. People worry about the bottom being cold, but there is also my sleeping pad to insulate me. So far, I’m still very happy with my decision.

After hours of design, I finally got to sewing, cutting out the fabric went smoothly until the noseeum. Given it’s stretch, its really hard to mark or cut. Eventually, I figured out that I could just tape a straight line while it was slack. In the future, I highly highly recommend just purchasing the pre-cut mesh. It will make your life a lot easier.

After cutting everything out, I sewed the baffles on. This is where I started to notice the failures of my noseeum cutting, with lots of variation in the baffle. However, I just kept rolling with it. Next I hemmed all the edges with heat. I might have failed somehow though since my edges are still fraying in sections. 

After that, I sewed on the other side and filled it with down. It’s a tedious process but it’s fun to finally be giving the bag it’s form. I made the footbox too small and suffered the consequences but it didn’t end up too bad. In the end, while the build quality was definitely objectionable, I’m still happy with the bag. It contains 8.5oz of 850FP down and comes in at a weight of only 12.9oz. I had a great time building it and highly recommend others do so too.