Oakes gulf again? No? ok, then what? … Rock climbing! 4/29/07

We forgot the camera, so check out my gear

Skiing wasn’t in the books for last weekend, due to rain, so Chicks Rip Too and I went rock climbing. (I don’t know how I feel about posting non skiing related trips here but if I hear complaints or am so moved I’ll steal someone else’s creative/gory title for another blog. While I’m explaining, this was my first post-puberty rock climbing trip and really don’t know what to write about, so… anyone who wants to take pity on me and take me climbing should feel free, I’m sure it will help my writing which in turn will brighten your day!)

We had stayed at casa de Hochberg in Richmond, MA (look it up, it’s a real place, I swear) on Saturday night, hoping that the rain would stop and the sun would come out strong Sunday morning. It didn’t so we gave up hope for climbing the Berkshires and headed to Northampton MA, the closest rock gym around.

and my room

Not thinking to get directions to this gym, we drove to Northampton and stopped at the first outdoorsy esq. shop we could find, the Mountain Goat, where CRT asked the clerk, “where can we climb around here?” with a puzzled look he asked, “outside or inside?” I had been hoping for outside, myself when he said, “cause I climbed outside this morning...” CRT wanted to know if it was dry, it was and we took his handwritten map and found our way to the trailhead.

Finding the trailhead does not mean we found the rock! An hour or two later, we found the rock. First we found a dead snow mobile, then we found a sweet cliff band to drop (sadly I was sans skis), then a stream and a water tower but still no rock climbing route. Finally we went back to the car and tried the other trail and 5 minutes down the trail, there it was. And as soon as we got there it started to rain.

hot, right?

The rain wasn’t strong enough to keep us off the rock and we were able to top rope 3 climbs (see I’m making terms up). More importantly than the climbing I belayed for the first time and learned the basics of rock climbing safety.

Chris, you missing something?

Killer was there with us and did a great job as a watch dog and even tried to climb the wall a few times as his mom, sent it. (can I say that?)

I didn’t get to ski but I had a lot of fun and I even got to stop by my friend from study abroad, Lo’s place, in South Hadley for dinner.

it was 'skate to' access

Take me climbing!

Little Alaska; from Dusk 'til Dawn 4/21/07

ski-dorphins in full effect

I sent out the e-mail on Thursday, "anybody feel like sending it? Anybody think it will be safe?" No one thought it would be safe but 5 of us wanted to give it a shot. We decided that if we were going to try we were really going to go for it; we planned to leave Boston at 4am.

I left my friends party at 1am slept until 3:20 I don't remember what I did until 3:40 when I found myself in my driveway grabbing my helmet from my sister's car and Huckleberry pulling in so he could drive me to meet up with the rest of the crew at MIT. 4am on the dot, Toma, Igor, Ali (formerly Jose) where loading up Toma's Honda.
Good morning beautiful “Photo: Patrick Allen”

When I woke up again around, 7 we were almost there. Huck, Ali and I were lucky enough to sit in the back and sleep most of the ride up (thanks Toma, he drove from DC to Boston on Friday slept for about 4 hours and drove us all up to NH.) while Igor kept Toma awake until we reached Lincoln where we stopped for coffee. With a good 2 extra hours of sleep and a cup of coffee in me the ski-dorphins kicked in as soon as I saw how much coverage the backside of Mt. Washington had on it!

get ready “Photo: Patrick Allen”

The week before had brought an opposite storm to Mt. Washington, which meant that the backside which is usually wind-blown bare to the rocks was well covered with snow. So much snow in fact that Igor declared "this looks like Alsaka!"

We pulled into the parking lot at about 7:30 and we were a bit disappointed to see that 2 other cars were already there. "I bet they didn't drive from Boston." Igor suggested but as we got closer I saw that they had Wyoming plates which inspired me to get out of the car and taunt them immediately, "not enough snow in Jackson for you, huh?" It turned out that they were headed for a different aspect than us anyway and it would be ok if they got first tracks because we wouldn't have to ski over them (for that matter we wouldn't have to ski over anybody else's tracks all day!) 7:45 and we were on the trail checking beacons. The approach trail was short and by 8 we were boot packing up the Monroe Brooke trail (I am not going to verify these names – in the hope that they are wrong and no one else ever goes where we went – it is ours! All ours!). The snow was still hard and the pitch was, well, steep.
Huck bootin “Photo: Patrick Allen”

Luckily our only fall on this ascent was me very close to the bottom. I pushed myself to skin up as high as I could before moving onto boot packing. This was a bad decision because not only do my hands have a host of new scabs on them but I ended up boot packing from further down than anyone else.
Ali owning it “Photo: Patrick Allen”

Around 10 we reached the summit house at Lake of the Clouds, where we decided to take a break and try gain back a few of the calories we had just lost. We also figured that if we waited a little bit; Oakes would soften up.

We were right! After skinning over the peak past the frozen lake, that I hear is home to the MITOC annual hockey game, we pulled our skins off for the first of many times. The avalanche danger was forecasted as low and all signs pointed towards a consolidated snow pack so we decided to dig a pit anyway. The pit proved us right and we were off!
Huck slayin; first run (yeah those are my tracks he's crossin!) “Photo: Patrick Allen”

No one else was anywhere around and our first descent granted us some of THE BEST snow you never skied (because you weren't there:) This first run was about 700 vft at a good pitch and made us all feel like pros as we bagged our first run at Oakes!
Toma, first run, dropin knees

At the bottom of the first run we had some decisions to make. Do we head backup the same aspect we just skied and drop the huge boulder? Do we go a bit to the skiers left and shralp some steeper stuff? Should we go way skiers right and ski Double Barrel, a steep and narrow chute that just looked epic? Or should we head way skiers left and ski some Alaska style chutes with three rocky spines to choose from?
me leadin up the right barrel (look at the mank) “Photo: Patrick Allen”

"Double Barrel first," Toma decided. As the name implies there are 2 chutes right next to each other, both very, very steep. Skinning up was not an option so we took turns leading, slowly making our way through, some extremely sun affected snow. We made our way past the crux of the skiers' right chute and decided skiing the top would not be worth it and decided to drop in from the there. The crux was also where the Barrels met giving us 2 options for a descent. Igor, Toma and Ali went left, Huck and I went right.

I ruined Huck's run. We had decided that to get past the crux (in this case it was a large bush that made for a small drop but required taking some speed into it and making a few quick turns to avoid the rock walls on either side) by sending it. I went first; I made my hop turn, headed over the vegetation, spotted my landing, dug my tips into the super sun affected man eating snow, rag dolled 20 feet, caught one ski and took a bow. Sadly I had left the other ski right under the vegetation where it had dug in. Huck was nice enough to grab my ski for me which meant he wasn't able to huck crux.

All of us seemed to agree that we would be better off skiing a different aspect so we strapped on skins on and made our way to skiers left of our first run. After my fall my cotton shirt was soaked and I decided I'd strap it to my pack to dry. This meant that I skinned up shirtless. But that was cool because I got this sweet match.com photo out of it!
pack/ clothes line “Photo: Patrick Allen”

On our way up we noticed about 5 other people skiing our first run but once again it didn't matter because we were headed away from them to some more untouched snow. We ended up on top of the Alaskan style chutes.

These chutes are steep. Igor decided to ski chute 1 and the rest of us pushed over one more to grab chute 2. Once again everyone laid down some silly sick lines and at the bottom we decided, 3 runs usually meant a good day so it would be ok to stop for lunch before we bagged 3 more.
Chute 2

Huck made a bench for us and Toma told some war stories about his brother while the rest of us soaked up some sun (I currently look like a cross between a raccoon and a lobster) and enjoyed the sensation of not pushing our bodies to their limits for a while. After I finished my lunch I walked over the ledge we were above and commented, "this would be a great place for hang-gliding." "really Josh, really?" Ali asked, "well, I guess I don't know." "That's obvious because I hang-glide and this would be a horrible place for it!" As I was about to walk off the 80 foot cliff to end the embarrassment Ali gave in, "I'm kidding I don't hang-glide, don't jump!" I didn't and a good thing because our next run was epic!
helicopter heading for Tuck's “Photo: Patrick Allen”

Skins on, coats off and we were back into action just in time to see 4 new people getting sloppy seconds on the chute we had just skied. They were a nice (given, they are BC skiers) group of middle aged skiers who thanked us for laying down skin tracks for them. As we set some more track for them to follow we ran into the first group of 5 we had seen. They were skinning up our original track that we re-joined. This group decided to try to make us feel jealous by letting us know that they took a cat to the summit while we had to boot pack in. (We weren't jealous because we actually had a helicopter ride in - not actually sure why the helicopter was there but I doubt it was good news) This group was led by an employee of the Mt. Washington Observatory (who hooked up the cat ride) who talked some pretty good back-country game along with the rest of his crew. We talked about trips we had taken and trips they had taken, discussed lines and offered up trip ideas until Igor was fed up and took off leaving the group in our tracks. "Thanks for laying down the super highway for us" was the last we heard as we pushed on and made our way to the top of the "steep run".

Huck ontop of "the steep run"

Double Barrel and chute 2 were steep, no doubt about it, but chute 3 was so steep that when Huck took out his steep-omoter (you know the devise with the little arrow that moves back and forth to tell you whether the slope is 1. Not steep you sally put the steep-omoter away. 2. This isn't steep but it could slide. 3. This is steep, well done sir. Or 4. Snow shouldn't stick to stuff, this is steep! And you can find these on my website, givemeyourmoneyyouidiot.com) the arrow broke off!
Is that a cliff?

Toma thought someone should guinea-pig the run for the rest of us because we couldn't see over the first roll and we weren't sure whether it was a cliff or the chute. Toma chose me and as much as I wanted to lay first tracks, I knew Huck wanted the same and I had ruined his run at Double Barrel and owed him as much. After he broke his steep-omoter he laid down one of the nicest runs I have ever seen. He cut right swung left just in time to setup for a narrow passage between a bush and a cliff, after fluidly passing through that gate he banked around a boulder curved off a snow bank and shot down the final pitch. I was so impressed with the run I turned creativity off and followed his line all the way down! Sick bird "Kaw-Kaw"!!!!!
Igor enjoying the bottom of "the steep run"

The next trip up consisted of the super stoke that can only be found in the backcountry. "That was sick," "yeah" "true" "sick" "love it" "live for it" "better than crack" "I hear crack is back" "sick" "amazing line" "gnar" "dude, that was sick" "yeah, super sick" …
if you've never seen the super stoke, there it is

The next run we decided to step it down a notch and if the steep-omoter was still working it would have come up as a level 2 or there about. This doesn't mean it wasn't fun. Ali and Toma laid down some beautiful tele turns down the center and Huck, Igor and I boosted our confidence by dropping a small cornice with great snow underneath it. Igor made it look classy by adding, his favorite, iron cross! (I love it when he does that!)
signature Igor

That was it for Oakes but we still had to cross over the top and ski down the Monroe Brooke. On our way back up we looked back on what we skied and decided that if we burned down the trees covering the cliff I wanted to hang-glide off we could have an amazing big mountain competition venue (don't worry hippies, we decided that it would be better to keep it for ourselves and use trees as shelter for a base camp for a multi day trip to Oakes). Up and over past the Lake of the Clouds and summit hut I didn't expect much out of our last run but boy o boy (yeah, I wrote boy o boy!) was I wrong.
Super final venue for the comp

The snow was great the pitch was level 3 steep and once again we got first tracks! Huge turns, 1 more cliff, a tree laden half-pipe and an easy run out and we were back at the car!
first ascent last descent, Monroe Brooke “Photo: Patrick Allen”

I'd never been to Alaska but we made a full day of it, (climbing about 9000vft and skiing the same) leaving the lot around 6pm, and it was everything I could have imagined!

In Bounds But NOT Lift Service!!!!! 4/14/07

lock “Photo: Patrick Allen”

Cannon Ski Area is in a part of NH that is still getting pooped on! After a week of traveling to Ohio, [which according to Doogie, is round on the edges and high in the middle (see his jokes aren’t always funny)], and New York, [which according to everyone and their mothers and for that matter, my Mother, say is very far from back country skiing], so that I could look at law schools. (I decided on Hofstra in New York FYI) I was stoked to be on the hill again! When I got back to Boston on Friday the 13th I hadn’t been on top of my emails and didn’t know what the MIT kids were planning.
and pop “Photo: Patrick Allen”

It turned out that the fresh snow had once again made Mt. Washington super avy prone but made Cannon ski area prime for slaying the white stuff! Buffalo Killer and his pack, Chicks Rip Too, Doogie and I took one car up and were planning on meeting Ernesto, Igor and Irish at the base. The four us drove up, obeying all posted speed limits and had planned on calling the other car when we were within a half hour of the hill. However, Irish called Doogie well before we had expected (about an hour and a half into the 3 hour drive) to let us know that they were still at MIT and wanted to know if we were still planning on going skiing?!!!!!!!!!!!? Doogie told Irish that, yes, we were still going skiing and they could call us when they got there.

The ride was not promising in that it was raining almost the whole way up and when I felt lost and asked Doogie for directions he responded with a variation of one of his funniest most annoying lines; “Just because it seems like I have the world on my shoulders, doesn’t mean I’m an Atlas!”
tramline and base “Photo: Patrick Allen”

Regardless of the shenanigans, when we reached the base, the rain stopped and we were stoked to go tap the new snow! Chicks Rip Too was especially stoked to see some fellow hippies protesting the Tyrants in DC who are doing nothing to combat global warming! (If you want to fight the power, put a lot of bumper stickers on your car!) It turned out that there were about 1500, small (like this one) and large organized events across the country on Saturday where activist were taking pics and signatures of supporters to show congress that we want to save the planet. (I felt really bad about wasting the extra gas pulling donuts in the parking lot!)

After posing for the photo opp with the Step It Up Crew (yes I’m wearing a Paul Pierce Jersey, GO Cs!!!!!!!!) we were able to get a quick run in before the other three slackers who had slept in (Irish and Igor, not Ernesto, to be fair) reached the parking lot. Killer’s crew enjoyed some untouched, wide open turns to warm us up for the real deal with the others.

I felt that trekking in bounds on a closed ski area was a special occasion and thought I should dress like I was skiing in bounds; baggy pants, worn around my knees, hand knit ear flap hat, aviator sunglasses and of course, a Paul Pierce jersey.
Ballin “Photo: Patrick Allen”

This outfit was good for the first quick run and part of the second skin up. As we passed the spot were we had turned around to meet the rest of the crew, I was getting extremely overheated or Doogie bet me to skin up in just my jersey, either one I forget? So I did for a while and it felt great, my body temp was low, keeping my energy stored up and my team pride was off the chain which was great for trying to keep up with Irish and Igor, 2 very fast skinners. Eventually I put some clothes back on as we got closer to the summit and some great views (I imagine they would have been great views if we hadn’t been socked in, crazy weather!).
getting dressed “Photo: Patrick Allen”

We reached the summit ate some lunch met a MIT graduate from 1965 who talked our ears off about the crazy life he leads and then we turned around to ski some lush ski resort trails! Igor and Ernesto had been skiing Cannon since they were Killers age (4) and decided that today was the day to ski Tramline, an epic black diamond that was rarely skiable due to lack of coverage. Doogie, Chicks Rip Too, Irish and Killer were smarter than to follow these 2 onto the boulder laden trail but I of course was not.

The run, while covered with exposed rock and plenty of branches sticking through the snow had tons of fresh snow to rip and plenty of big and small rocks to drop. While Greeley Ponds Slide was a hucking clinic, according to Toma, this run was a combination of great powder skiing and plenty of extra curricular options. We were having too much fun for pictures which you my not appreciate but left more time for us to enjoy the playground we were on.
looking back “Photo: Patrick Allen”

At the bottom we all met up at the tram house where we had started that morning. One by one we got back to bottom so we could look back and enjoy the others turns!
The Hurricane “Photo: Patrick Allen”

From the base we could see a large cliff band that Ernesto, Igor and I were feigning over! As we marched back for our third run I commented to Enresto, “I don’t think it’s as big as we were saying at the bottom, it looks more like 20 or 30.” “yeah, that’s nothing , you send it first!” “fine, I just need to borrow a helmet.” CRT piped up first “If you want a helmet, you shouldn’t do it.” And the Irish put me in my place! “I’d give you mine but your ego wouldn’t fit inside!!!!!!!!!”

After the ego deflator, Killers crew turned around and the other three headed back to the summit. It was a sick bird day, KAW-KAW!

Back to the Gulf 4/6/07

HOT

Doogie, Chicks Rip Too, The Buffalo Killer and I went back to Mt. Washington and the Gulf of Slides trail on Friday. We watched the weather all week, hoping that we would be able to make an attempt on the slides themselves but all the freshies that made for the great skiing we got, also created high avy danger.
Is that a Buffalo over there?

We were ok with this and knew what we were getting into before we left Boston, CCC trail skiing! This was my third trip up to Mt. Washington and while we had started early the parking lot was getting full by the time we had arrived. Spring time at Mt. Washington is suppose to be a mess and even though you have to be an idiot to have attempted Tuck’s on this day I imagine that a good deal of the people there were about to tempt fate that day.
CCC

We laughed about the scores of people marching to their deaths, calmed Killer down and made him follow us up the trail. On the way up this beautiful trail that had just received a sugar coating of about 3-4” we came across two sets of father son pairs. The first set we saw was at the top of the first steep shot, that would eventually cause Doogie and Chicks Rip Too (to a greater extent) more trouble than it had the father and son, who were taking a rest and catching their breath from the workout. This set, consisted of a 20 something son, who was acting as the sherpa to his old father (I’d guess 100 but I would be wrong?). Sherpa had his Pop’s alpine skis and boots strapped to his pack and if that is not enough to impress you he also was skinning up on Salomon 1080’s with a converter binding and alpine boots (non skier note - all this means is that he was carrying a LOT of weight). As we left the friendly set behind we wished them luck but never believed we would see them at the top.
earning it

yes, that is as far as we got

Further up the trail we caught the second set that consisted of a much younger looking father and an older looking son (teen pregnancy I assume) who were game for keeping up with us as we went by. They were, of course, nice people, (let me reiterate, backcountry skiers are never bad people) who were set on attempting to ski the slides themselves. As I’ve mentioned, we thought they were nice people and didn’t want to see them skin into an avalanche, so we tried to dissuade them, to no avail. We had lunch at the top of the trail, not far from set 2 and headed back down the trail, after saying our final farewells to the doomed pair (I don’t think the Gulf of Slides slid [avalanched] so don’t worry I’m just being dramatic).
lunch

We decided to keep our skins on for the flat/up and down top section which lasted about a quarter of mile. As we were pulling our skins off, set 1, Sherpa and Pop showed up! I couldn’t believe it but there they were, Sherpa leading the way and Pop not far behind. Once again we talked for a few minutes, Sherpa asking about our gear and all of us replying that, yes, absolutely; he should purchase some of it.

After they left and we had set ourselves up for ski mode, boots and everything, we took off and enjoyed about 2 miles of fresh snow! I’ve described this trail before and the only difference this time was that the new snow had covered up all the small tree tops that I had hoped over the time before. This time it was just good snow!
CRT shralping

Well thank you for waiting, I will now tell you the tale of how Chicks Rip Too, ate shit! (Sorry Mom, she said I should write about it) I have become relatively familiar with the Gulf of Slides trail and I stopped the group at the top of the last steep pitch, which happened to be the same as the first pitch (weird I know) where we met Sherpa and Pop, and I suggested that we try to carry some speed from this steep to get us through the flat section that leads to the parking lot. Doogie went first and while we couldn’t see from where we were standing Chicks Rip Too and I figured we had given him enough time to clear out and CRT took off down the trail. While I hate to say goodbye I love to watch her go, but I only saw her go around he corner. It turns out that she reached the bottom of the bottom steep pitch carrying the speed I had advised, but didn’t notice the dip in the trail that sent her face first into her ski. I waited a bit to give her room but as I started down, I noticed that something wasn’t right. I didn’t see CRT but I saw her pack and dog down near the stream. My first selfish thought was, I told them to carry speed and now I have to stop and hike out of here! My attitude quickly changed as I noticed the little bunny rabbits had taken their retribution on CRT and her blood was all over the snow. Doogie commented that. “The snow makes blood look a hundred times worse.” While I trust him, CRT didn’t help me believe him when she said, “how do I know if I’m ok?” This first sign she was not ok, was that she was asking me, I had no idea! While Chicks Rip Too did leave Mt. Washington a sacrifice of blood and teeth fragments, she was able to ski out and I bet she’ll show up in my next post!

Doogie Shralping

Doogie fell too (this is why no one is allowed to take pics of me!)