Summited and skied Snow Mountain today. Left sort of late and got to the trailhead at 10 am to find 1 inch of snow at 5200'. Packed up the skis and boots and found a wonderful use for my old Asolo leather boots. I hiked up to Cedar Camp at 6200'. There was about 6-8 inches at Cedar Camp. Started skinning from there and summited by 1 pm. I think I can shave at least 30 minutes off next time. The summit, at 7056'(Snow Mountain East), had 2-3 feet in protected areas. I searched for the summit register for about twenty minutes. The ice was pretty solid. Had alternating sun and snow storms all day from Cedar Camp to the summit.
Headed out the north ridge of Snow Mountain East and scoped out the SWEET! bowl that drops off the west side of the ridge. Ten to thirty foot cliffs start off just below the summit and wrap around the ridge to the north. Chutes and couloirs thread down between the towering rock and into the trees.
Just north of there is what I'm going to call Red Rocks Peak - for all the bright red rocks I saw there this last summer. An unnamed (until now) peak (6994') with a rock strewn west side that falls 700 feet to the valley below.
Found the deepest snow from this first storm to be just west of the summit into a tree chute. It was definately deep enough. Never hit bottom as I cranked out the first turns of the season. Big roller balls following me down into the woods. What a day!
This mountain goes on forever. I think that the bowl just west of the summit is the best. For now. The interior of the summit plateu contains many peaks, many different bowls. Besides the true summit, Snow Mountain East(7056'), there are five other peaks - all over 6500'. Snow Mountain West is the other named summit. I stands at 7038'. The third highest peak is unnamed at 6963'.
The exterior of the mountain is shrouded with long slopes. Runs as long as 2000' exist on the north side.
More on this place in the near future...

<img src="http://mapserver.maptech.com/api/GetImage.asp?fname=119112&local_server_ip=234" border=0>

<img src="http://www.boof.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1053&sid=b0b4741f33002a2024a2f348570d67b6" border=0>

Summited and skied Snow Mountain East and Snow Mountain West today. Drove right to the trailhead. Not much snow at the trailhead, but within half-an-hour I was skinning. Started skinning at 5600'. Got to the top of Snow Mountain East and found the summit register right away. The top was wind scoured and bare. The sun was shinning and there was good coverage on the west side. In spots. Some of the chutes were pretty filled in. I summited Red Rocks Peak and scoped out some more lines. I headed back to the saddle and dropped this sweet chute that went for about 700' down to the valley below. I skinned up the ridge to Signal Peak and took the ridge out to Snow Mountain West. From there I dropped the north side of SMW and headed back. Excellent snow. Very dry. The Volkl Explosivs worked great. Thanx the_eleven! Had a dry chalky powder base with some super dry pow on top.
I beat the afternoon buildup in the morning, but by early afternoon it started to snow heavily. No wind. It's just so awesome up there. Completely different than Hull Mountain. Lots of trees. I think storm skiing is a good possibility up there. Miles and miles of bowls, ridges and trees. Lots of steeps with cliffs. I've been scoping out some drops for later in the winter.
The little tour I did took 8 hours. Summited in three hours again. I think that is going to be the norm. Lots of change-outs takes up time. I need to get up earlier!

<img src="http://www.thebackcountry.net/store/graphics/00000002/IMG_0080.jpg" border=0>

This chute will be known from now on as Sacrifice

<img src="http://www.thebackcountry.net/store/graphics/00000002/IMG_0091.jpg" border=0>

My turns down the upper part of Sacrifice
<img src="http://www.thebackcountry.net/store/graphics/00000002/IMG_0094.jpg" border=0>

More Sacrifice
<img src="http://www.thebackcountry.net/store/graphics/00000002/IMG_0095.jpg" border=0>

jibM, could you post a TOPOZONE map of your trailhead? can't quite figger out the best. looks good for car camp & splittin' all day. how's the drive? your pix/trax are great

Bay Area

Those are smooth tracks there Jibmaster! Looks like you and the Explosivs are getting along just fine.

Cool photo showing the blue tips with skins attatched.....

Go to Stonyford. Follow the signs past Letts Lake to the Summit Springs Trailhead on road M10. If low snowlevels keep you down, simply start your hike 2000' lower at the Deffy Glade Trailhead. With gear-add two hours to your time. Letts Lake has excellent bass fishing. The lake sits at 4000'. A one hour drive up excellent roads from Stonyford, gets you to the trailhead. It's paved almost half the way.
I will come up with a better topo soon. For now here's this...

<img src="http://www.mytopo.com/cgi-bin/mapserv_363.exe?VERSION=1.1.0&REQUEST=GetMap&layers=DRG_250,TOPO_MASK,Mapbox&map=\mapserver\ms36\nonjs\map20041030020113426.map&width=588&height=588&bbox=506112.76,4336716.76,541957.24,4372561.24&srs=EPSG:26710" border=0>

<img src="http://www.biglines.com/photos/blpic28992.jpg" border=0>

Sorry for the double post of the topo map. I uploaded my photos from my brothers PC. More pictures are on the way. This last shot is from the Summit Springs trailhead last week.

Hey I'm impressed. Looks like great terrain and great snow.
Oh yea and really nice tracks.
I saw snow mtn from the air last week. We were about 20 miles east of it at about 25,000ft still climbing off of SFO. Like you said it looks like a long summit ridge.

With massive amounts of snow in the Coast Range it was time to take the snomachine to Snow Mountain.



We left Angwin in the middle of the night and got to just below Dixie Glade at about 3000' around 2 or 3 in the morning on Sat. 1/8. We spent the night in jibC's enormous hotel tent and woke the next morning to the sound of two ABSOLUTELY HUGE Jeeps rumbling up the road. It was puking snow. There was 3-5 feet of snow on the road just above our stopping place. The jeeps were unstoppable, with door handles at head high and 42 inch tires, they laid down some impressive tracks several miles up the road heading for Letts Lake.
Sorry for only one pic, but shortly after that shot was taken the storm picked up the pace. A drenching, heavy dump that soaked you to the bone. There was no time for pictures as myself and sirjibalot were towed behind the snomachine, with jibC driving, diving from jeep rut to jeep rut and into the ditch. After getting stuck several times and yanking, digging, pulling the machine around, the jeep ruts were too much. 2 and 3 foot trenches that were hella fun to ski up in, but just swallowed the machine whole. If the jeepers hadn't of come by and we had a virgin road to deal with it would have been so much easier.
The access to the trailhead from where we parked was still another 13-15 miles. Different tactics are going to be needed in order to summit this sucker with all this low snow. Gotta love it though!

Jeepers Creepers Jib.

Jeep ruts did you in. How ironic.

so how many jib members could actually fit in that tent in the picture?

Mike Schwartz
www.thebackcountry.net
mike@thebackcountry.net

The 8-man tent had just enough room for the 3 jib members of the Coastal Crest Snow Patrol - jibmaster, sirjibalot and jibC - to hold our annual meeting in Mendocino National Forest. This gathering of backcountry jibbers pleases Old Man Winter. He sees our jib and blesses us with EXTREME WEATHER!
I think he liked our snomojibbing! <img src=icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle>

I drove up to Snow Mountain last night.
LOTS of snow up there. I drove to about 3200'. Had the Jeep going sideways through the drifts. It was raining. I did not ski.
I spoke to the Forest Service about access. They had some interesting things to say. They had seen this site and were pleasantly suprised that someone was actually skiing up there.
They also saw this quote from the 'Hullin' it' thread...

"I poached the Summit in the summer with my mtn. bike. Totally illegal with it being a designated wilderness and all. But whatever..."

This was in reference to Snow Mountain. They were not happy. They said that they would not press charges this time. A warning would be enough.
"You're lucky you weren't caught." I asked them what the charges would be if I was caught. I was told that if busted in a designated wilderness area on a mtn. bike the fine would be $100. If busted with a vehicle (snowmachine, jeep), the vehicle would be confiscated and the fine would be $250.
I was also told that they had just recieved an email that morning
(coincidence?!) that-

DUE TO AN INCREASE IN WILDERNESS BOUNDARY POACHING IN THE SIERRA

-the Forest Service is looking to increase the fine to $1000 for both mtn. bikes and vehicles.

He said that this kind of activity would not be good for our sport.

I regret that I posted such disregard for Federal Rules. I am all for even more wilderness designation. With the increase in snowmobile skiing and backcountry jibbing in general, let's be carefull out there.

<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote><font size=1 face="arial" id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>
I drove up to Snow Mountain last night.
LOTS of snow up there. I drove to about 3200'. Had the Jeep going sideways through the drifts. It was raining. I did not ski.
I spoke to the Forest Service about access. They had some interesting things to say. They had seen this site and were pleasantly suprised that someone was actually skiing up there.
They also saw this quote from the 'Hullin' it' thread...

"I poached the Summit in the summer with my mtn. bike. Totally illegal with it being a designated wilderness and all. But whatever..."

This was in reference to Snow Mountain. They were not happy. They said that they would not press charges this time. A warning would be enough.
"You're lucky you weren't caught." I asked them what the charges would be if I was caught. I was told that if busted in a designated wilderness area on a mtn. bike the fine would be $100. If busted with a vehicle (snowmachine, jeep), the vehicle would be confiscated and the fine would be $250.
I was also told that they had just recieved an email that morning
(coincidence?!) that-

DUE TO AN INCREASE IN WILDERNESS BOUNDARY POACHING IN THE SIERRA

-the Forest Service is looking to increase the fine to $1000 for both mtn. bikes and vehicles.

He said that this kind of activity would not be good for our sport.

I regret that I posted such disregard for Federal Rules. I am all for even more wilderness designation. With the increase in snowmobile skiing and backcountry jibbing in general, let's be carefull out there.







<hr height=1 noshade id=quote></BLOCKQUOTE id=quote></font id=quote><font face="arial" size=2 id=quote>

<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote><font size=1 face="arial" id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>
I drove up to Snow Mountain last night.
LOTS of snow up there. I drove to about 3200'. Had the Jeep going sideways through the drifts. It was raining. I did not ski.
I spoke to the Forest Service about access. They had some interesting things to say. They had seen this site and were pleasantly suprised that someone was actually skiing up there.
They also saw this quote from the 'Hullin' it' thread...

"I poached the Summit in the summer with my mtn. bike. Totally illegal with it being a designated wilderness and all. But whatever..."

This was in reference to Snow Mountain. They were not happy. They said that they would not press charges this time. A warning would be enough.
"You're lucky you weren't caught." I asked them what the charges would be if I was caught. I was told that if busted in a designated wilderness area on a mtn. bike the fine would be $100. If busted with a vehicle (snowmachine, jeep), the vehicle would be confiscated and the fine would be $250.
I was also told that they had just recieved an email that morning
(coincidence?!) that-

DUE TO AN INCREASE IN WILDERNESS BOUNDARY POACHING IN THE SIERRA

-the Forest Service is looking to increase the fine to $1000 for both mtn. bikes and vehicles.

He said that this kind of activity would not be good for our sport.

I regret that I posted such disregard for Federal Rules. I am all for even more wilderness designation. With the increase in snowmobile skiing and backcountry jibbing in general, let's be carefull out there.






I saw this post and checked into the fines. You are correct about the $100 and $250 fines. The Forest Service may not be the ones pushing for higher penalties. I'll check into that if it is important to anyone. The fine your refering to would be $500 for bicycle or other non-motorized and $750 for motorized. No word on when or whether these will take affect.
<hr height=1 noshade id=quote></BLOCKQUOTE id=quote></font id=quote><font face="arial" size=2 id=quote>

Skied Snow Mountain Tue. and Wed.(4/19,20). Should have been there weeks ago. The road to the Summit Springs Trailhead is open and clear of snow. Drove up Mon. and fished Letts Lake. Didn't catch anything, but had fun with my new (new to me - $75) canoe. Got to fish in a snow storm!

Packed the skis and boots up 1 hour to the top of the south side. Once on top(not really the 'top' - the summit lies 1.5 miles to the north), I found snow 5-10 feet deep. It was cold and super windy on Tue. I was in full goretex right from the Jeep. I left sort of late to compinsate for the cold temps and wind. I skinned up the west ridge and got to ski an excellent line back down to Cedar Camp.

Back at Letts Lake for more fishing. Still didn't catch anything. This is the first time I've been there and did not catch me my dinner. JibC joined me later that night. The camp fire was huge! The weather finally started to clear and the winds died down. After another cold night, we headed up on Wed.

With more time, we headed up the west ridge and took it all the way to Snow Mountain West - 7038'. Snow Mountain East is the true summit at 7056'. There is SO MUCH SNOW up there! Scoped out a nice 1000' line off of the west ridge down the west side into a north facing canyon into the Milk Ranch area. I'll have to hit that up next week. Once on the western summit, I showed JibC the north facing bowl. It stretches from the west summit across the saddle to the east summit with steep lines all around. 800' deep. The west facing is the part I skied last fall. Dropping into this bowl adds several hours to the jib. JibC had blisters and had forgotten his gortex jacket. Once again it was super windy on top, and I had not eaten much that morning. So we decided to head back.

More snow is on the way over the weekend. And I got one more three day jib coming up next week (Tue, Wed, and Thur.). I will be back to claim those lines next week. This mountain is huge - if you compare it to Hull. Lots of cross-country traveling to get from the south side up to the summits and then you are only halfway there. 800' - 1000' shots greet you from the upper ridges and you have to loop back around and go back the way you came in. One run will take anywhere from 5-9 hours round trip from the vehicle.

I will post pics hopefully soon. Anybody want to join me next week?
The snow stays good all day up there with this cool weather. There is enough snow to last many weeks. If you took 10-15 Hull Mountains and put them in a rectangle, you would begin to imagine the largness that is Snow Mountain. Even though it's not much taller than Hull, the canyons and bowls in the midst of this "island in the sky", contain much more verticle to ski.

sweet jib,
Are the lines up there as open as Hull. Since I don't come in from upper lake I don't see the west and south facing lines very often. That sounds like a long approach. May hit Hull on Sunday.

You ready for Brokeoff, yet.

Yo powderwhore - the lines on Snow are way better than Hull. The approach is not too bad. It does take 3 hours to summit with a mandatory 1 hour hike to snow line from the trailhead. Even so, the first major line is 2 hours from the trailhead. It's that north facing bowl just the other side of the summits that takes 3 hours to get to. This bowl holds most of the steepest lines on the mountain. I've skied it twice and only dropped the full 800' one time. My time that day was 8 hours door to door. I did a lot of lookin' around, waiting for some clearing from the scattered snow showers that day, and it was my first time - so I was in awe of the place and probably spent too much time taking pictures and rubber-necking...

If you are going to ski the Coast Range this weekend - I would strongly recommend Snow Mountain. It's only half-hour longer of a drive for me than Hull. The ski lines are as open as you want them. There are some steep tree runs as well as some runs that remind me of the Rock Chutes at Hull - except they are about 500'verticle longer.

It is a big mountain. Think about this. From the summit of Hull to the Rock Chutes in Hullafar Bowl is one mile as the crow flies. It's also one mile from Timberline Camp to the summit.
Snow mountain is 3 miles long (add 1.5 miles down to the car), and almost 2 miles wide. I'm just counting the top area-ie skiable terrain - not the aprons of terrain that blanket the outside of the mountain (the approach).

We got to the west summit and back in 5 hours. If we had dropped any of the lines we saw, that would have added anywhere from 1-3 hours of travel time on the mountain. And these are just the lines that are obvious.

Don't despair - the rewards are uncountable! Old growth forests to skin/ski through, Bald Eagles at Letts Lake, loooong runs, a summit register to sign, bear tracks, really cool looking rocks...Hull is a desolate wast land compared to Snow Mountain. Hull is mostly burned out. Snow mountain is so huge only parts of it has burned - yet...Many, many tall, and old trees. Cedar Camp is a trip.

As far as Brokeoff - it's gonna happen. In a few weeks after I clean all the lines on Snow Mountain and the weather calms down a bit.

I'm sold. If I go up this weekend, I wouldn't want to take my wife on a recon type day. But I really need to check it out. To Lett's Lake do I need to approach from I-5, or Hwy 20 ???. Is it fairly straight forward of a drive from the lake to where you would hike? Damn, I just need to take a day off and go up with you.

I like the idea of rock chutes with 500 more vert.

From Santa Rosa, take highway 20 towards Williams. 15 minutes past where the 53 meets the 20 is Bear Valley Road. Highway 16 is about 500 feet farther on the right. Turn left onto Bear Valley Road. The gravel starts here. Follow the signs to Lodoga/Stonyford. Turn left at Lodoga and continue on to Stonyford. 45 minutes from 20 to Stonyford. I wish I could upload pics to biglines - Bear Valley is ABSOLUTELY BREATHTAKING!!! The wildflowers are insane. Worth the drive just for that. Turn left at Stonyford and make a left just before the Forest Service on Fouts Spring Road. Stonyford is 1 hour from the trailhead. Fouts Spring Road will turn into road M10. Watch for dead coyotes hanging from the fence lines. There is also an ostrich living in a pasture on your left. You will pass Dixie Glade Trailhead and Deafy Glade Trailhead. The turn off for Letts Lake will be on your left just past Deafy Glade. It's about 4 miles to the lake. Go straight. Roughly 15 miles later on excellent dirt roads is Summit Springs Trailhead.

It's kind of hard to describe the hike from where the trail hits snow and you lose it. But I'll give it a shot.

Take the left option at the trailhead. Just past the sign to Deafy Glade, the trail cuts left across a bowl/slope. The trail then crosses a definate ridge on your right. You will know this ridge because there is a small fir tree branch across the trail. Also after this point the trail begins to get buried under snow. If you get confused, just head back to the last ridge after you lose the trail.

Take the ridge all the way until it tops out. You can start skinning from here. I'm not sure our tracks will be visible, but there are six sets of ski tracks that may be still visible by Sunday. Just before this ridge tops out you will see the top part of the mountain and it's large trees and flat ground. Just to your left is a dip in the terrain with large dark trees. If you top out on the ridge completely you will descend about 50' verticle to your left and go in at the obvious V shaped opening. The dense forest is your best chance at following our tracks.

Go into the woods and vear slightly left. You are looking for several signs on a tree that states Trout Creek to your right and Cedar Camp straight ahead. Cedar camp is about 10 minutes into the woods. Just head in and vear north(left) avoiding the large hill on your left.

Once at Cedar Camp, cross the meadow and take the obvious drainage northeast. It's across the meadow and on the right. Once you get here you can't get lost. The large slope on your left is what you want. But don't skin up it until the drainage tops out. This is the west ridge. The best line of ascent/descent is on hikers right. Don't cut up too early.

It takes 2 hours to top out on the west ridge.

To sum it up - the trail leads to an obvious ridge on your right. Once you see snow on the trail, head for the ridge and top out.
Head into the woods at the V notch on your left and head in and left.
Take the drainage on the far right of Cedar Camp and follow it to the top. Turn left and follow the ridge until you get some visuals.

you rock jib. Thanks for the beta. I'll make sure and bring my fly rod too.

Looking back through your pictures, this one really caught my eye.
<img src="http://www.thebackcountry.net/store/graphics/00000002/IMG_0095.jpg" border=0>

Just got back from Snow Mountain. I figured it would be icy, so I took my time and started hiking from the trailhead at 9am this morning. Headed on up under clear skies. Got to the flats up top and found the snow to be pretty firm. Just as I suspected. I found some tracks of a hiker in boots and a his/her dog. My tracks from last week were still visible.

Headed up the west ridge and the snow was starting to soften. By this time, afternoon buildup was starting to gather and it was getting colder. The wind had picked up and as soon as I got a visual of the summit, the clouds started to swallow it up. When I reached the top point of the west ridge (6963'), it was whiteout conditions and snowing heavily. I had layered up anticipating the onslought of weather. The visibility had dropped to pure white vertigo and I could only see about ten feet. It was looking like it was going to stick around all day. So down I went. Skiing the west ridge down to the drainage that leads to Cedar Camp is a blast.
Scattered trees with rolling terrain that drops you all of a sudden into a tight chute through more trees, only to break out into the open and carve around more trees at high speed and lay down some nice tight turns in a narrow section. Then it starts all over again.

Still plenty of snow even though I could tell that some had melted. That north facing bowl beyond the summits will hold snow for quite some time I'm sure.
By the time I got back to the Jeep, it was hailing. Half hour down to Letts Lake and I thought I was going to fish. Not. It was pouring. Oh, well. It was a great day in the mountains.

I saw a mountain lion in Bear Valley on the way in. He bounded up off the road about 100 feet in front of me. Long body, long tail. Very fast. Very cool!

Found manky conditions at Snow Mtn. today. Headed up the west ridge. The last of the trees where branchalanching onto the forest floor. The sun was shining and I was hoping to get some much needed corn. Dodging the falling ice and snow from the towering trees, I made my way to Cedar Camp and up the drainage to the base of the west ridge. The sun was winning. I was shedding layers. By the time I got to the West Summit, I was beat. It was hot! The cornices were slumping around me and pinnwheeling into the trees. The new snow was not holding up. I was bummed.

Lots of new snow up there though. I could see the south side of Hull, and it was all white. Last time I was here -2 weeks ago- the south side of Hull was bare. I picked the wrong day. The low elevation of these peaks make them hard to ski on a warm day. Especially this late in the year with the sun being so high in the sky. The cloud cover of this coming weekend should prove to be a better scenario. Still plenty of snow for anyone that ever thought of skiing this peak.

get your jib on!

2 weeks ago - taken from the west ridge. Snow Mountain East.
The north facing bowl is just beyond


the west ridge

Cedar Camp... what can I say. this place is really cool looking. This sign is head high in the summer...


More Cedar Camp


Bear tracks on the trail



Letts Lake Snow Mountain in the background






This one is my favorite


And this one really trips me out..
...don't ask - I have no idea...


This is a picture of Hull Mountain (left) and Snow Mountain (right)
from the summit of Mt. St. Helena in the Napa Valley.
About a month ago


get your jib on!

Headed up to Snow Mountain with powderwhore yesterday (1/5/06).
Had excellent driving conditions with the exception of having to remove one log in the road.
Drove up the night before and camped just below the Summit Springs TH.
Following in my tradition of always forgetting at least one piece of equipment, I spent a cold night curled up on my sleeping pads inside my bivy with no sleeping bag :lol:
At least I had all the important things like ski gear. We were hiking by 6am. One hour of booting up to snow line where changed to boards and skins. Another hour or so and we were up top of the west ridge.



The day was partly sunny/cloudy with high winds. We soon reached Snow Mountain West and headed down to the saddle and up the the true summit, Snow Mountain East. From there, we made turns down towards Red Rock Peak.

Powderwhore scoping out lines





We soon found my old favorite run - Sacrifice. I named the run Sacrifice 'cause the first time I skied it, I was taking the first run on my Volkl Explosivs in early season conditions and punched a huge hole in my base! Not much snow at the moment, but it drifts in here real nice!



powderwhore jibbing down Sacrifice



powderwhore skinning back to the Jeep through the summit flats



We got another run in on the way back and got down to the Jeep 8 hours after we started. It was a great day! The snow was perfect in Sacrifice.
Had a blast jibbing with you powderwhore! CCSP in the house! Represent!

_________________
Coastal Crest Snow Patrol
http://www.zazzle.com/jibmaster
http://www.earnyourturns.com/3878/ccsp-guide-2-mendocino/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jibmaster/

represent indeed

_________________
Mike Schwartz
www.thebackcountry.net
mike@thebackcountry.net

Good to meet up with you finally jibmaster. Maybe I should change my name to jibwhore. :lol:

sunrise
[url]

on the ridge towards the two peaks. East Snow mtn. on right.
[/url]

Jib coming down Sacrifice
[url]

[/url]

thin coverage, but good lines to be had
[url]

Headed up to Snow Mountain with Hartje from boof.com on Tue (5/9). We spent the night at Letts Lake.


We woke up at 2:30 am and drove the 30 minutes to the Summit Springs TH. Much to our dismay the road was washed out about 1.5 miles before the TH. It took us 1 hour to reach the TH by walking. :roll:
The next hour took us up the south side of the mountain to snowline.

Sunrise from 6000'


There are two ways to reach the summit. One is to skin around to the right and follow the valley north to the East summit. Or you could take the ridge on your left and head north to the West summit.
We chose the valley

Looking north to Snow Mountian East (the true summit)


After Hartje added to the summit register, we dropped the north face of the summit.


Unfortunately, my toe piece was loose and I was flat on my ass. A quick screwdriver fix took care of that problem and we toured on. We skinned out to Red Rock Peak and took a hike to view some more ski terrain and to take a look at the Middle Fork Stony Creek drainage.

Looking back to Red Rock Peak. Snow Mountain East on left.
Snow Mountain West on right.
Our first line down the north face of SME can be seen


There wasn't much snow. The meltage this year was completely different from last year. Many of the large descents were shot.
We decided to drop some steep, short lines.
Hartje dropping in to some north facing lines off the summit.
This bowl shall be called Stony Bowl from now on.



We booted back up to the saddle and dropped one more line.

Hartje looking confused


We found some HUGE drifts. They were just starting to collapse and form crevaces and burgshrund looking holes.


We topped out again on the summit saddle and skinned our way up to Snow Mountain West.
Hull Mountain as seen from SMW


We then took the ridgetop back toward Cedar Camp and the TH.
Hartje wanted one more run, so we dropped into a super steep east facing line. I knew it was too soft, but it just looked so good. I dropped in first and shortly down the second pitch, the whole slope started to go. The sluff was only boot deep but it was powerful. It took me down a ways, still on my feet and then I was able to traverse right. It caught me again and I thought I was headed for a large tree well. Finally I got out of it and watched as the sluff continued for about 30 seconds...ssssshhhhhh...on and on it went filling the tree well with heavy wet snow. Luckily for Hartje - now I know why he wanted me to drop in first! - the sluff had created a nice slide bed for him to ski.

The camera is slightly tilted, but you can still see the steepnes of the slope.


We skied our way past Cedar Camp and found the snow to be sticky enough to not need skins to get up the slight incline. The walk down from the TH was from hell.

The washout that added two hours to our jib.


The snow was good for how hot it was. The north facing lines were good.
We got back to the car 11 hours after we started. Excellent training for whats to come...

Good to finally meet you Hartje! We'll have to hook up again for more Coastal Crest jibbing. We'll bring the kayaks next time!

_________________
Coastal Crest Snow Patrol
http://www.zazzle.com/jibmaster
http://www.earnyourturns.com/3878/ccsp-guide-2-mendocino/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jibmaster/

likewise...JibM, and nice pics!

Snow Mountain is a piece of work. Definitely worth the effort--the experience of skiing an arctic island in the sky kept me cool all day while I sweated at work in Vacaville and now I'm up at 1:30 am sorting my pics from the trip. I think I've come down with a case of stoke.

Wintertime would be incredible up there if only there was better access. That place is screaming for a yurt or hut, but wilderness is special and so I'm fine with doing it the hard way, even if I have to grunt up and down gravel roads in ski boots :x The whole approach shoe thing is cheating if you ask me :wink:

I'll follow up with my pics shortly...

Oh yeah--it looks like your skid-out/slide is plenty visible in the pic. thanks again for that and I'm glad you didn't hit the forest. That's the downside of riding slurpy-snow, but it still felt good to me...

Well, I'm not too proud of my photo skills on this trip...
But here is another pic of Hartje cranking it out on the steeps.
Once again, the earth tilts on it's axis - pondering our jibbing...


Hartje, umm - contemplating.. something...
:shock: :lol:

_________________
Coastal Crest Snow Patrol
http://www.zazzle.com/jibmaster
http://www.earnyourturns.com/3878/ccsp-guide-2-mendocino/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jibmaster/

More pics! Hartje emailed me his pictures of last Wednesday.
Here they are in no particular order. I'll just let the pics speak for themselves...

_________________
Coastal Crest Snow Patrol
http://www.zazzle.com/jibmaster
http://www.earnyourturns.com/3878/ccsp-guide-2-mendocino/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jibmaster/