Eastside Conditions Thread

[AKbruin]

I ran into 2 Australian women in Reno who had just driven up from Tioga pass. They were going on and on about how they met these studly BC skiers schralping the gnar. You guys made quite an impression.

We talked a big game and carried pretty big whippets, so . . . .

[406]

Sunday 5/15, we wanted to get an early start and have a shorter day with the hope of making it back to San Diego and avoid baby's momma drama, so did the finger off Sherwin Ridge.

Coverage on the crest looked really good:


Best snow of the trip:


Didn't see anyone else out there:


Awesome 3 day weekend, perfect snow conditions. Also got some hotspring and creek dips in. Planning to go up over Memorial Day weekend if conditions look good, drop me a pm if interested in heading up from San Diego.

[AKbruin]

Nice job, 406! We had the same problems with Wine Glass. We initially went too far up the trail and then struggled to find a reasonable creek crossing. If you look at my photos a couple pages ago, you'll see a photo I took of my buddy crossing in the same place you did. It was a super fun descent though.

[skier666]

[golf clap]Well done people, well done...[/golf clap]

[somethingclever...]

I'm glad you like all of that! First time anything I have ever been associated with has been called "Steeze". I'll take it even if it is in jest!

JESUS HOW HAS NOBODY COMMENTED YET ON THIS AMAZING HANDWEAR STEEZE? Well done sir, those gloves are top notch!

[~mikey b]

Tons of good shit here. Thanks for the steezy stoke y'all!

[sfskier]

Spent a couple nights up Horse Creek this past weekend, introducing my bro-in-law to the Eastern Sierras magic. Snowline in Horse Creek hanging out around 8,600' or so at the bottom of the bowl that separates lower from upper Horse Creek canyons. Warm temps and still air Friday afternoon and evening begat jet force winds Friday night into Saturday all day. Our camp in Horse Creek canyon was in a veritable wind tunnel. No overnight refreeze Friday night all the way to top of the mountain, despite high winds. Snow was thick mush with plenty o' wet slides all day Saturday. We skied Ski Dreams at mid-day Saturday, then after a mid-afternoon nap I made a little late afternoon solo lap up to one of the little Horse Creek Peak couloirs before dinner, at which point the temps actually dropped and snow surface quickly hardened to breakable crust over mush. Lovely. Winds finally died down sometime Saturday night after nightfall and it was still and clear when we awoke Sun morning. Would have been a better day to ski more ambitiously, but after a quick lap on a sunny face above camp, we headed down the hill to get back to the Bay before dinner. Tons of folks heading up toward the Matterhorn Sunday as we were heading out. A few pics:

[~mikey b]

Tioga Pass is opening through the park tomorrow at noon.

[Jack Burton]

More Tioga

Thanks for shoveling out cornice on Solstice to whomever did the job - Markham was happy to give it a go


Conditions at the top were pretty nice in the sun on skiers left then turned to refreeze just below, all good though, just glad it's filled with snow (tilted photo, looks steeper than actually is)


From below solstice you can see two easier options between Unknown and Solstice, not totally sure how easy they would be to find from the ridge but I think you could see down either of them from the ridge, here is the one closer to Unknown, it still went on Sunday but probably wont last too long


Monday we went over to False White and White Mountain, it's not super rad :-) but is damn fun, VTWoods or some such handle jumping into the corn harvest


perfect corn IMHO is when the skin just peels off


the (unpictured) shot from White Mtn to the South East into the drainage was really fun, sorry no pictures on that

[bennerlur]

sweet day on Dana! Unfortunately I dropped my blue arcteryx jacket off my pack after skiing Dana couloir on the way home. Doubled back but looks like someone had already picked it up. Anyone find it by chance?

[mcski]

Question - what's the consensus ski width for chutes / conditions off tioga? 85? 100? Who cares I snowboard ? What you holding?

[1000-oaks]

Is it okay to sleep in your truck at the trailheads or pullouts along Highway 120 as long as you're outside of the park? Any recommendations for a Lee Vining area first-timer? (Ellery Bowl, Gaylor and False White look like good choices in the Mingori/Greenberg book.)

[gimpy]

Yes plenty of free camping

[w j b]

I thought I heard Saddlebag Lake road was opening Wednesday. Any Beta?

[~mikey b]

Website says the resort is for sale.

[AKbruin]

Question - what's the consensus ski width for chutes / conditions off tioga? 85? 100? Who cares I snowboard ? What you holding?

I think 95-105 is the general sweet spot for spring conditions. I've got the Zero G 95, and it's pretty sweet.

Is it okay to sleep in your truck at the trailheads or pullouts along Highway 120 as long as you're outside of the park? Any recommendations for a Lee Vining area first-timer? (Ellery Bowl, Gaylor and False White look like good choices in the Mingori/Greenberg book.)

All of those are good. Ellery Bowl will be the steepest. False White is pretty much an Eastern Sierra classic. And Gaylor seems really straight-forward.

[mcski]

Thx AK. Crampons required or just a good idea?

[AKbruin]

Thx AK. Crampons required or just a good idea?

I'd want boot crampons for Ellery. I'm sure there'll be a good existing bootpack that you can use, but if it gets windy/cold, the top portion could be sketchy without crampons for added security. You shouldn't need them for Gaylor or False White.

[chill winston]

Is it okay to sleep in your truck at the trailheads or pullouts along Highway 120 as long as you're outside of the park? Any recommendations for a Lee Vining area first-timer? (Ellery Bowl, Gaylor and False White look like good choices in the Mingori/Greenberg book.)

I usually bandit camp at Warren Fork, just down the big long switchback below Ellery Lake. If SBag road is open, i've also just bandit camped up in the parking lot up there.

[TEXASS]

Plenty of camp spots on that area 1000 oaks. You may have to come back down towards 395 maybe even 120 east depending on crowds if you want free camping. That place in Lee Vining isn't bad if you want a hot shower at night

McSki - you will want crampons and some type of arresting device. Ice axe or whippet

[mcski]

Thx. I figured but started to wonder as I haven't seen many pics w either over the years and started second guessing their need

[TEXASS]

Springtime in the Sierra is so variable I always bring bot crampons. Ski crampons. Ice axe and whippet. I decided what to carry based on the day's weather and what my partners are bringing.
If my partners don't have crampons we just tone it down a hit

[jimw]

This time of year you're usually climbing up when things are frozen solid, so pointy things are good. If you see pics of people without them it's just because they're super badasses. But seriously, this time of year I'm usually carrying an axe, 2 whippets, and either boot or ski crampons, sometimes both. 95% of the time I don't use the axe, but when I need it, I'm glad I have it. Side bonus is you look hardcore with all that pointy stuff on your pack so you impress female Australian visitors.

Saw this posted over on the earnyourturns forum, has some great pics of Saddlebag/20 Lakes Basin area from Monday. Those skate skiers are an interesting bunch... but gotta say, in the right conditions, it looks like you can cover some serious ground with those. Could be an interesting way to approach certain out-there ski objectives in the right conditions.

http://www.backcountrytalk.earnyourt...7661#post37661

https://macbethgraphics.smugmug.com/...BC-SKATE-2016/

Replying to some earlier posts:

Went up Dana today and 'twas interesting. Watched a girl rag doll down solstice after trying to drop it with skins on to control speed. I questioned it but didn't push it. I should have. Fortunately She was fine
Then skied off summit down to the Dana and it was rock hard scary. Big test rock bounced all the way. Taking the gf down it wasn't an option so we skied down into the Gibbs/Dana drainage and skinned back up n around n back to start car top of pass. I thought I'd skied every line off Dana but alas today was a new one I'd never even considered

That is crazy! I can't believe she did that and didn't get hurt. I thought I'd seen it all out there...

About the route you ended up skiing, Dan at the Mo-mart has told me about that route several times now, I think it's one of his favorites. Only not starting from Dana like you did, but rather the real Mt. Gibbs north face which that gully leads right up to. Looks like some interesting lines off there, then you ride that gully all the way back to 120 for a nice long descent. Maybe nicer when the road is open through the park, or plowed where you could ride a bike in there. Or an electric skateboard! Hmm...

I suspect we dropped the same chute you did. It wasn't that steep--maybe 40 degrees--and we're no heroes.

Nice job on your Tioga Peak expedition. That, and Mt. Warren, are on my list simply because they're so visible in the area. Incidentally, my friend dropped his whippet in McGee creek a couple weeks ago. It totally flowed down stream about 50' and we were only able to rescue it with my whippet. Meta-whippet!

Don't sell yourself short, that line is totally at least 65 degrees!!

It's interesting how the same lines can fill in totally differently each year. For example the entrance on Unknown seemed a lot mellower this year for whatever reason (BTW there is another entrance which is skiers right of the cornice, where your buddy took the pic of you - this has been done, but you'd pretty much have to have perfect conditions and a death wish for that one!). And I've seen that line you guys rode on Ellery when it probably *is* 65 deg! I once watched my a friend ski that line, who is a really good skier, and it looked like he was barely pasting turns on it like some extreme Chamonix run. Therefore I never bothered to check it out after that. The line I like to do hooks into the same run that you did but about 200 ft down or so. In that cornice line where you were, there are generally tracks rolling in to skiers right of the cornice, which is a mellow entry that slides in under the cornice. Well if you go in there but then turn right over this little ridge, you end up in a sweet short steep dogleg line, that then hooks into the main cornice line. It doesn't always fill in, and when it does it usually only has enough snow for a couple folks to slide through before it gets scraped enough to be un-fun.

Awesome story about the whippet whippet rescue. Whippets are so useful!

Tioga Peak is totally worthy, for the views alone. Will post some pics later.

[AKbruin]

Alright snow-experts, how do you think conditions will be this Sunday? The weather itself looks fine, but I'm not sure what to make of the 2-3 days of wind and very minor snow accumulation. Is it going to be firm and/or crusty shit? After five years of crap, I'm eager to make the most of our half-way decent snow pack.

[whatsupdoc]

I'm in the same boat as far as Sunday. In fact I've got this whole week off and weather looks kinda spotty. I imagine sunny aspects will be the way to go on Sunday. Anyone partnerless Sunday (and going forward this week for that matter)? I was thinking Rock Creek Sunday.