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.