Eastside Conditions Thread

[406]

Awesome photo's guys!

[bodywhomper]

winning. lots and lots of winning!!!

thanks for sharing all the picts!

[BGnight]

beta expiration

[UPGRAYEDD_2505]

Nice work. Snow in emerson looked great.

[Jack Burton]

Heading that way now, we be me and my better half with the pup checking if bgnights tracks are covered on Gilbert ;

[gimpy]

Awesome brooks!!!!
Crushing it

[TEXASS]

Dave would be proud BG. East side Taliban

[AKbruin]

Awesome stuff, BG.

I did a couple more days Friday and Saturday with Dhelihiker and Gerome.

My lesson from this last week has been to take risks with weather and conditions expectations (but, of course, not avalanche conditions). From the forecasts (cloudy with a chance of rain/snow nearly every day), I mostly expected crap conditions for the past week, and was a bit bummed that the weather window didn't align with my vacation window. But every day I scored boot-to-knee deep powder or fun, transitional corn. Only maybe 5% of the skiing was on crappy snow (gloop or frozen).

On Friday, we rode the looker's right chute from the summit. Had to take off the skis twice: (1) once to cross from the summit line to the chute line and (2) to downclimb about 200' of shallow rock just above the couloir. Only the very last 300' or so was crappy snow. The top half was boot-deep powder and then mostly corn in the couloir portion of the line.













The only way I can do several consecutive days in the Eastern Sierra is to hot spring often. It looked like this pretty much every evening. The second photo is from a friend's iPhone.





Yesterday, after some confusion about whether any of us had a vehicle fit for a Buttermilks expedition (we did not), we headed to South Lake. It was skinable all the way in the morning. But without fresh snow, it'll require a dry hike to the southern edge of the lake. It was warm and overcast and started snowing heavily as we were booting the couloir. We had wanted to ski from the summit if possible, but had to turn around quickly from the top of the couloir because of avy concerns. I couldn't see much in the white light, but the turns in the couloir and its apron were deep and amazing. We had fun hippy turns in 6" the rest of the way.


The Eastern Sierra: Where you can boot in short-sleeves and ski powder in May.






I love the Eastern Sierra!

[mmmm...pow!]

^^^Score!

[AKbruin]

So . . . now that the weather has passed, it would make sense for Tioga open this week, right?

[SD16]

Greetings! If anybody is interested in carpooling I'm planning on driving from San Diego to Tioga Friday night through Sunday and have room. Would also be interested in shuttling Powerhouse if it looks good which...I doubt. Feel free to PM

[meter-man]

I love the Eastern Sierra!

You won last week. Well done!

[Jack Burton]

We found similar conditions up Buttermilk road over the weekend, Wahoo gullies on Saturday after a college start of 11:30. Great skiing with pea soup for vis on Saturday. Woke up bright and early on Sunday to clear skies so started over to Emerson, got to the base ~ 10:30 and headed up, pea soup rolled in by 10:45, we talked then got funky pit results and eventually pulled the plug. There's 10" to a foot of goodness in north and Zebra, someone is going to have a blast. The combo of rapid warming, fresh snow, small wet slides and the pea soup was enough for us to pull the plug and follow our tracks back with our collective tail between our legs.

Snow quality was really good, Road wise we parked just above the little structure and with ~ 20 minutes of digging could have made it up the next two switchbacks to what I think would be a preferred start for Humphreys or Peaklett?

[BGnight]

Thanks for the beta^^
Doing a solo overnighter tomorrow to go up really high and hit north faces for the next couple days. I'll have some pics/beta for the coming weekend.

[bobz]

Fine shot of the hot spring there, in particular, AKB.

[zackw]

Fellow Eastside lovers,

I am headed down to the east side this weekend and looking for some partners. I have asked 6 or 7 buddies, but they're all too responsible :-)

I would like to ski some beautiful lines like north or zebra on Emerson, but will probably do more of tour if I end up solo. Leaving Grass Valley around 5pm tomorrow, headed through Tahoe and will check out the high trailheads (Virginia Lks & Tioga Pass) if I don't find anyone to head to South Lake area with.

Anybody interested?

[gimpy]

Sooooooo where the fuck are the reports from you know where??
Im prolly there sunday

[BGnight]

Sooooooo where the fuck are the reports from you know where??
Im prolly there sunday

Steep, true north facing above 13k feet was phenomenal Tuesday, but that doesn't say anything for the plateau. I'm sure all steep, north faces will hold and be some sort of transitional goodness. I'll probably ride my 6th Tuesday in a row coming up (just worked out that way), but I think I'm gonna stick to high, random north faces down south. I'm sure the plateau is gonna be a tracked out shit show. Some dry hiking and adventure sounds more fun, and all that late weather has kept what snow there is on the approaches from melting out.

[BGnight]

What is going on with the internet this season? I never see any trip reports (except from AKBruin and a couple others). Splitboard.com is 99% defunct and there's no traffic on backcountry.net even though it's totally fixed (the best resource for eastside beta ever). Did instagram really kill the trip report??? Pretentious skiers/boarders post one vague picture on intsagram then won't tell you where it is or how it was (but the douches sure want attention and followers!) There's twice as many people in the backcountry than just a few years ago yet there's far less trip reports. I'm paranoid this place is just filled with lurkers vulturing beta (primarily why I signed up for instagay haha) so I'm not sure I want to post pics anymore but if you PM me I'd be happy to give you any beta/pics I have.

[gimpy]

I think yer spot on with the beta vultures assessment here
I know of a few myself
In tahoe it has an effect but down the 395 not so much. Most people are too lazy to bother. And the ones that do are mostly good folk of which many I'll look forward to seeing this festive weekend. It ain't pow so some tracks don't bother me
Happy hunting!

[somethingclever...]

I hear Whatsupdoc is working on one for you as I type this......

What is going on with the internet this season? I never see any trip reports (except from AKBruin and a couple others). Splitboard.com is 99% defunct and there's no traffic on backcountry.net even though it's totally fixed (the best resource for eastside beta ever). Did instagram really kill the trip report??? Pretentious skiers/boarders post one vague picture on intsagram then won't tell you where it is or how it was (but the douches sure want attention and followers!) There's twice as many people in the backcountry than just a few years ago yet there's far less trip reports. I'm paranoid this place is just filled with lurkers vulturing beta (primarily why I signed up for instagay haha) so I'm not sure I want to post pics anymore but if you PM me I'd be happy to give you any beta/pics I have.

[BGnight]

Tracked corn is the worst!
I'd be at the plateau this weekend if I could. Shit's gonna be good.

[BGnight]

Ok fine. Here's a pic cuz I ain't going back there anytime soon.
It rhymes with beyotch and shmalisades. Good coverage still above triple pond and none really below that (all dry trail). It's a goddamn slog up there.

[tone capone]

I was just reading this and thinking about how much I love this thread, and how I hope you guys keep it going at least for my entertainment's sake. Very much appreciate the stories, the sharing, the stoke, and the pics! It's fucking rad, and I will make it out there to partake someday!

[jimw]

Sooooooo where the fuck are the reports from you know where??

I'll take that as my cue. Here's your Friday the 13th Tioga update, coming to you live from the Mo-mart parking lot!

So yeah, they opened the road to the park entrance yesterday. I took a sampling today. It was great. Warm weather, hardly any wind until late afternoon, good snow. Mostly porn type snow on E and N lines from what I could tell. That stuff hasn't gone through a real corn cycle yet. Other areas have, like the backside approach up Dana which was perfect corn when I was skinning up at it at, oh, like noon.

Supposed to be a little cooler and breezy tomorrow and Sun. Hopefully not too windy because wind blowing you over on the plateau can suck your will to live.

Rode Unknown chute today, and 3 skiers had already tracked it out. But it was still soft, easy turning porn even in their chunder. The entrance was less steep than usual. Overall, probably one of the easiest and fun runs I've had in that line. Wish I would have gotten up there earlier and gotten first tracks, it would have been epic. Lots of folks hitting Dana couloir. Some tracks in Solstice but less than Dana, and it looked good.

Took a nap and headed up to Ellery dragging ass (that happens when you leave Santa Cruz at 9 PM, crash for a couple hours, drive the rest of the way to 10k and start skinning). I figured since Unknown had already been tracked, and seeing everyone in the other usual spots on Dana, and all the cars at Ellery, that every line there was tracked out. There were multiple skin tracks going to the line I wanted to hit... but it was untouched! WTF?? At this point it was like 4:30 PM. Hey, I'll take it. I did one of the S-shaped chutes next to Chute out. Chute out was also untracked and looks like it goes. Great soft snow all the way to the dam.

I figured I was for sure the last guy out there, but then a few minutes after I got down I saw a couple skiers coming down a chute next to the one I rode. Turns out they had started early and first hit Solstice. They were the first ones in and had to shovel out an entrance at the side of the cornice. They said the snow was great. Then they went over to the plateau and rode 3rd Pillar. Said it was good snow but the chockstone is exposed. Then they went over to climb back up Ripper... but then the chute ended because it turned out they climbed the wrong one! So they had to drop that and then climb the real Ripper... then across the plateau to the Ellery chutes. Long day.

On the way down I took a look at Powerhouse through the binoculars. On the way up it looked to thin down low to really be worth it, but on the way down I saw 4 tracks in it. There are definitely spots where you have to hike to connect the dots. None of the other plateau lines go anywhere close to running all the way to the canyon.

Oh yeah, I tried a cool self-shuttle for the first time today. I parked at Ellery, then rode this awesome electric skateboard up 120 to Tioga lake! It was freakin' awesome. I was carving turns the whole way UP 120 with my split on my pack. Passed several people who stood there with mouths agape. Just when I was thinking how awesome this was, and how many other approaches I could use it for, it started slowing down and then stopped. I tried to start it again but the motor started making a horrendous noise. I touched it and almost burned my hand it was so hot. Guess I burnt out the frickin' motor. Well it was a cool thought...

Picture dump to follow.