I signed up for this day in order to get some practice on alpine touring gear as well as testing boots. I had only used AT once before, Memorial Day 2003 viewtopic.php?t=5092. FYI I was shocked to hear that my 2003 guide Doug Nidever is currently recuperating from a stroke.
Our guide Ben Traxler met us at Mammoth Mountaineering to get fitted with gear the night before. I had spent some time there in November trying on several AT boots, none of which were comfortable. They had noticed that my feet had overgrown my indestructable 1981 orthotics, so on my next Mammoth trip in December I got new orthotics at Footloose to accommodate my now longer and flatter feet. I was pleased that the Black Diamond Quadrant boots were very comfortable this time. So I rented those and skins. The other 2 skiers Liz and Dorothy were from a New York ski club and needed complete rentals including skis, bindings and avy gear. Their rental skis were super light with Dynafit bindings.
Weather on Wednesday was truly ugly even by Mammoth standards. We started at the Tamarack Lodge cross country trailhead. The cross country trails go through the forest and around the numerous lakes up there.
One might think this area would be sheltered, but the top Horseshoe Lake sits next to Mammoth Pass, which like Minaret Pass by the ski area is a wind funnel. After an hour we tried to ascend above the cross country trail, but we got maybe 200 feet up before wind got worse and no surprise Ben did not like the looks of the wind-loaded snow above. We took off skins, locked down the gear and skied through the widely spaced trees.
In downhill mode my feet were swimming in the "comfortable-for-walking" boots, and I realized I had made the elementary error of not shell testing them in the shop. #-o This mistake was of little consequence as it was the only downhill we did in that weather. It also prodded me to shell test boots at the end of the day. Mammoth Mountaineering did not have the BD Quadrant demo available in my size, but I took out the Garmont Radium for the next day of resort skiing and they definitely passed the performance if not comfort test.
We toured past the edge of Lake Mary, probably to Lake Mamie, before Ben decided we weren't going to get anything worthwhile in terms of downhill skiing, so we returned to the trailhead. View of the area we skied downhill,starting well below the lowest exposed rock in this picture.
Near the trailhead we did a tranceiver drill, and then went back into town for lunch and review of the day. We all found it worthwhile from an educational standpoint. On the 2003 Tioga tour it was a nice day and Doug did as much of my setup work as possible in the interest of reaching ski objectives in a timely manner. Here I had practice applying and removing skins in adverse weather, plus dealing with my always challenging temperature management issues in touring mode. And needless to say I didn't miss anything not being at the resort with most lifts closed. For resort skiers, surely June Mt. would have been the call this day.
This was basically a cross country ski day. I'm not sure I should count it in my alpine tally with at most 200 vertical in downhill mode.
Our guide Ben Traxler met us at Mammoth Mountaineering to get fitted with gear the night before. I had spent some time there in November trying on several AT boots, none of which were comfortable. They had noticed that my feet had overgrown my indestructable 1981 orthotics, so on my next Mammoth trip in December I got new orthotics at Footloose to accommodate my now longer and flatter feet. I was pleased that the Black Diamond Quadrant boots were very comfortable this time. So I rented those and skins. The other 2 skiers Liz and Dorothy were from a New York ski club and needed complete rentals including skis, bindings and avy gear. Their rental skis were super light with Dynafit bindings.
Weather on Wednesday was truly ugly even by Mammoth standards. We started at the Tamarack Lodge cross country trailhead. The cross country trails go through the forest and around the numerous lakes up there.
One might think this area would be sheltered, but the top Horseshoe Lake sits next to Mammoth Pass, which like Minaret Pass by the ski area is a wind funnel. After an hour we tried to ascend above the cross country trail, but we got maybe 200 feet up before wind got worse and no surprise Ben did not like the looks of the wind-loaded snow above. We took off skins, locked down the gear and skied through the widely spaced trees.
In downhill mode my feet were swimming in the "comfortable-for-walking" boots, and I realized I had made the elementary error of not shell testing them in the shop. #-o This mistake was of little consequence as it was the only downhill we did in that weather. It also prodded me to shell test boots at the end of the day. Mammoth Mountaineering did not have the BD Quadrant demo available in my size, but I took out the Garmont Radium for the next day of resort skiing and they definitely passed the performance if not comfort test.
We toured past the edge of Lake Mary, probably to Lake Mamie, before Ben decided we weren't going to get anything worthwhile in terms of downhill skiing, so we returned to the trailhead. View of the area we skied downhill,starting well below the lowest exposed rock in this picture.
Near the trailhead we did a tranceiver drill, and then went back into town for lunch and review of the day. We all found it worthwhile from an educational standpoint. On the 2003 Tioga tour it was a nice day and Doug did as much of my setup work as possible in the interest of reaching ski objectives in a timely manner. Here I had practice applying and removing skins in adverse weather, plus dealing with my always challenging temperature management issues in touring mode. And needless to say I didn't miss anything not being at the resort with most lifts closed. For resort skiers, surely June Mt. would have been the call this day.
This was basically a cross country ski day. I'm not sure I should count it in my alpine tally with at most 200 vertical in downhill mode.
