buckyball1
New member
Where to start? First the "academy award" speech. Thanks to all on the Board who have helped me in the last year. Amicus with getting me started on these last 24 in August 2006 and for innumerable pieces of advice, B&G and PBear for web site info on many hikes, Nate and Neil for for repeated thoughts/ideas, Micheal J and bigmoose for advice on Scar W route, Dugan, Rocks & Rolls and SilentCal for great company and support yesterday--am sure there are more of you i missed --thanks
Somehow i managed to leave Scar to last on this list and headed over there in July to solo it from the N Loon side after getting route advice from Amicus. I misinterpreted some good advice and being already whipped from tough hiking the day before made some errors and came nowhere near what i now call the "magic line". After hours of thrashing, i ended up in a dismally thick, steep area north of the peak and retreated (in disarray as Amicus would later say
), glad to just get out in one piece. This was my first "fail to summit" since a wack of Sunrise in the Sentinals (ADK) in 88 or 89 and i really let it play with my mind (for a week i was going to stop the solo wacking again forever)
But you know how it goes...so back i go yesterday, this time with the company of SilentCal, Dugan and Rocks&Rolls,a great group of new friends for this usually solitary hiker. I had watched the weather since last Monday and saw Saturday as the only "bad" stretch surrounded by days of sunshine; I was sure the forecast would change/move by at least 12 hours as it "always" does , but it was spot on. I spent the night car camping in one of my $3 special NFS sites and woke around midnight to the pitter patter on the roof and then steady rain starting about 1:30. I met the gang at McDonalds in Lincoln at 6:30 and seriously considered just driving home... but off we went
I had gotten permission to park behind the main lodge at Loon (they were great to me, but be a bit careful as there are serious concerns re privacy/security here) and we headed up the left most ski slope, Walkin' Boss. It was coolish, still raining and got progressively windier as we ascended, great hypothermia conditions. A Loon employee who is also a S&R guy talked to us with a worried look in his eye as we left the bottom and mentioned "maybe some snow up high today"-yikes. The ski slope was the usual calf/achilles burner (maybe 2000 feet in 1.5 ? miles) and we huddled near the gondola at the top and geared up for the woods ahead.(by now we were all totally soaked, my leather boots were already squishy even after slathering on SnoSeal on Thursday and i'm sure people were wondering "why the hell are we up here today?"
After 2 goes, I'd opine that the Loon N approach to Scar W may be a "better" one if you hit what i now call the "magic line" the Amicus group followed earlier this year, but it's a very thin corrider . With more advice from Amicus, Micheal J and bigmoose, i was convinced i now had this route down pat--hah, hah, hah. I was lucky to immediately find the herdpath which goes much of the way to Black (lucky because the last time, it took me 40! minutes to find this and i was too upset coming out to notice where it really was). We followed the herdpath for about 1/2 mile and turned toward the peak just as the path swings from east and slightly ENE to almost north towards Black--the same spot i tried in July.
The terrain back in here is not at all obvious, you can't just go "up" and visuals are very limited. Trying to follow good advice, I suggested we stick to a curving course about 100' or so north of the ridgeline to a point about 0.3 miles "below" the summit and then head east.This is what i thought would take us on the line with relatively (for Scar) mild wacking conditions. The rest of the crew graciously agreed to my plan and the mistakes we made were all mine. For the first 0.1, all went well,but then we starting hitting thicker stuff and the going got slow and hard, still maybe 1/2 mile to go before the turn due east toward the summit-we talked constantly to make sure we keep track of one another in the dense cover-we were also getting a bit chilled by now and "should we go on?" was on everyone's mind --just could not find a good way up. After much effort we finally reached the point about 0.3 miles below the summit and felt it might be doable now, but damn it was getting cold and those woods were often dark, wet, tight and and miserable.------note to anyone headed up here--i think the magic line is VERY close to the north ridge perhaps even on the ridgeline coming up from the herdpath--even out 100' or so to the north might just as well beeen a mile off--and i should have "listened to the mountian" as i often do rather than slavishly stick to my directional bearing plan.
The last 1/4 mile to the summit wasn't too bad, a few thick bands at bottom and top, but pretty decent going. The top is a nice large flat open area. There is an obvious can, nicely done and well placed by bigmoose--only 2 entries since placement earlier this summer. Quick congratulations and time to head down as it's now getting chilly and we face the "crap" again going down. Since the line going up failed, we decide a straight shot course toward the herdpath jumpoff spot can't be any worse--wrong again. We end up crossing over the ridge and slip way too far down on the south side. We get one of our few visuals (of Black i think, not having my glasses on and Silentcal tells me it's the gondola on N Loon--we are way off our line)You know how this goes; when you try to sidehill to correct in thick stuff it just seems to force you further off/down. It's gets crazy thick here, we are slowed almost to a crawl and often can't see one another even 6-7 feet away- this is the time even i wonder why am i doing this stuff.
After a stretch of very tough going, we reach the herdpath near where we started.A final indignity is about 0.1 miles from the ski slope we lose the herdpath at a large blowdown patch right where i lost it in July--but we're close and soon are on the ski slopes. Spirits soar and we return to the bottom under a windy, but no-rain, slightly clearing sky.
Dugan surprises me with a few bottles of good homebrew cider/mead and cookies, we toast the top, talk about our day and each turn toward home.
Thanks again to D/R&R/SC
(oh, and now it's finish the 50F list (5 left)-Moxie next week?)
jim
Somehow i managed to leave Scar to last on this list and headed over there in July to solo it from the N Loon side after getting route advice from Amicus. I misinterpreted some good advice and being already whipped from tough hiking the day before made some errors and came nowhere near what i now call the "magic line". After hours of thrashing, i ended up in a dismally thick, steep area north of the peak and retreated (in disarray as Amicus would later say
), glad to just get out in one piece. This was my first "fail to summit" since a wack of Sunrise in the Sentinals (ADK) in 88 or 89 and i really let it play with my mind (for a week i was going to stop the solo wacking again forever)But you know how it goes...so back i go yesterday, this time with the company of SilentCal, Dugan and Rocks&Rolls,a great group of new friends for this usually solitary hiker. I had watched the weather since last Monday and saw Saturday as the only "bad" stretch surrounded by days of sunshine; I was sure the forecast would change/move by at least 12 hours as it "always" does , but it was spot on. I spent the night car camping in one of my $3 special NFS sites and woke around midnight to the pitter patter on the roof and then steady rain starting about 1:30. I met the gang at McDonalds in Lincoln at 6:30 and seriously considered just driving home... but off we went
I had gotten permission to park behind the main lodge at Loon (they were great to me, but be a bit careful as there are serious concerns re privacy/security here) and we headed up the left most ski slope, Walkin' Boss. It was coolish, still raining and got progressively windier as we ascended, great hypothermia conditions. A Loon employee who is also a S&R guy talked to us with a worried look in his eye as we left the bottom and mentioned "maybe some snow up high today"-yikes. The ski slope was the usual calf/achilles burner (maybe 2000 feet in 1.5 ? miles) and we huddled near the gondola at the top and geared up for the woods ahead.(by now we were all totally soaked, my leather boots were already squishy even after slathering on SnoSeal on Thursday and i'm sure people were wondering "why the hell are we up here today?"
After 2 goes, I'd opine
that the Loon N approach to Scar W may be a "better" one if you hit what i now call the "magic line" the Amicus group followed earlier this year, but it's a very thin corrider . With more advice from Amicus, Micheal J and bigmoose, i was convinced i now had this route down pat--hah, hah, hah. I was lucky to immediately find the herdpath which goes much of the way to Black (lucky because the last time, it took me 40! minutes to find this and i was too upset coming out to notice where it really was). We followed the herdpath for about 1/2 mile and turned toward the peak just as the path swings from east and slightly ENE to almost north towards Black--the same spot i tried in July. The terrain back in here is not at all obvious, you can't just go "up" and visuals are very limited. Trying to follow good advice, I suggested we stick to a curving course about 100' or so north of the ridgeline to a point about 0.3 miles "below" the summit and then head east.This is what i thought would take us on the line with relatively (for Scar) mild wacking conditions. The rest of the crew graciously agreed to my plan and the mistakes we made were all mine. For the first 0.1, all went well,but then we starting hitting thicker stuff and the going got slow and hard, still maybe 1/2 mile to go before the turn due east toward the summit-we talked constantly to make sure we keep track of one another in the dense cover-we were also getting a bit chilled by now and "should we go on?" was on everyone's mind --just could not find a good way up. After much effort we finally reached the point about 0.3 miles below the summit and felt it might be doable now, but damn it was getting cold and those woods were often dark, wet, tight and and miserable.------note to anyone headed up here--i think the magic line is VERY close to the north ridge perhaps even on the ridgeline coming up from the herdpath--even out 100' or so to the north might just as well beeen a mile off--and i should have "listened to the mountian" as i often do rather than slavishly stick to my directional bearing plan.
The last 1/4 mile to the summit wasn't too bad, a few thick bands at bottom and top, but pretty decent going. The top is a nice large flat open area. There is an obvious can, nicely done and well placed by bigmoose--only 2 entries since placement earlier this summer. Quick congratulations and time to head down as it's now getting chilly and we face the "crap" again going down. Since the line going up failed, we decide a straight shot course toward the herdpath jumpoff spot can't be any worse--wrong again. We end up crossing over the ridge and slip way too far down on the south side. We get one of our few visuals (of Black i think, not having my glasses on and Silentcal tells me it's the gondola on N Loon--we are way off our line)You know how this goes; when you try to sidehill to correct in thick stuff it just seems to force you further off/down. It's gets crazy thick here, we are slowed almost to a crawl and often can't see one another even 6-7 feet away- this is the time even i wonder why am i doing this stuff.
After a stretch of very tough going, we reach the herdpath near where we started.A final indignity is about 0.1 miles from the ski slope we lose the herdpath at a large blowdown patch right where i lost it in July--but we're close and soon are on the ski slopes. Spirits soar and we return to the bottom under a windy, but no-rain, slightly clearing sky.
Dugan surprises me with a few bottles of good homebrew cider/mead and cookies, we toast the top, talk about our day and each turn toward home.
Thanks again to D/R&R/SC
(oh, and now it's finish the 50F list (5 left)-Moxie next week?)
jim
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