The Most Villainous, Breakneck Route, chapter 11: Troubles Are Not Single Spies

If there is any doubt where to approach the rim of Oakes for Central or Airplane, I brought along a Magellan GPS loaded with a couple of waypoints marking the tops of the runs. A pocket GPS receiver loaded with points picked from Google Earth is a remarkable navigation tool. Most of the time it stays in the bottom of the pack, but today it is spot on confirming what I thought was our best way into the gullies. We choose Central Gully, since the Airplane skiing, if there is any, is another fifteen minutes of hiking toward another something we haven’t seen yet. Just a few more minutes of rock-hopping connects us to about 1000 feet of gentle, untouched corn which funnels into the steeper stuff lying below on the Oakes headwall.

Oakes Gulf - Google Earth image

There’s a phenomenon in mountain climbing called summit fever. It’s an irrational drive that pushes climbers to the top of a mountain at any cost, even with the odds against them of getting back down. Many of the tragedies in the mountains, from Mt. Washington to Mt Everest, happen because of summit fever. Ed Visteurs, who has summited and returned from the top of Mt. Everest seven times, lives to remind us, “Getting to the summit is optional. Getting down is mandatory”.
By inference, getting to the bottom of this gully today is optional. Getting back out is mandatory.

I film Phil and Rick skiing away on the snowfield until they’re out of sight, then get my first turns of the day. I leapfrog ahead to where the snowfield steepens and begins to funnel into a gully so I can film them again. The camera guy can get first tracks if he has cooperative subjects, as I do. I stay close to the left side enjoying a bunch of short turns and pull up into a few scrubby evergreens. Again, lovely skiing by Rick and Phil. One more time I leapfrog down, this time stopping about 200’ above a narrow passage through high rocks that will end up being the thorn of this thin-stemmed beauty. I stomp out a narrow perch, jam my ski poles deep into the snow, and immediately drop a lens cap and watch it flop over several times before it stops just out of reach. Damn! I’m tucked into the edge and unseen by the guys waiting over the horizon, but they hear my command, “Ready? Go!”

One at a time they appear. First Phil, right into the center of the funnel, not a hair out of place, controlling the free-fall with faultlessly linked, short turns. Here it’s steeper with softer snow, and each of Phil’s turns releases a harmless gob of mush that won’t rest. A few consecutive turns peel off enough of the stuff to cause an annoying little surface avalanche called a slough. The gully is like a solar panel tilted 45 degrees to the midday sun, an optimal slant for melting, and sloughing.

“Slough management” is how you deal with these rivulets of slush so you don't get tripped up by all that goo. The idea is to try to change lanes from time to time and let the slough pass you by. Even when you do manage to move out of your own slough, the river of mush moves on, plowing a deepening furrow called a runnel. Subsequent ski traffic starts new sloughs that gouge out the existing runnels even deeper. Skiers who miss the early prize find no consolation in skiing these knee-deep ditches. Fortunately, it’s a temporary situation. Left alone with continued melting, some rain, or a few inches of snow, the smooth canvas is restored for your next visit.

Next Rick appears, high above us on a little headwall that is on the opposite edge of the funnel. He stops before dropping into the throat.

“Should I do this guys?”
“Oh yeah! I would. Let’s see it.”
We’re all caught up in the moment.

This morning the USFS snow rangers posted their daily Avalanche Advisory for Tuckerman Ravine: low, but  we are reminded that the shoots and climbs in Tuckerman are just a few bits in a vast array of avalanche prone areas throughout the Presidential Range. Any remote area presents a different set of risk variables than Tuckerman and the  forecasters advise travelers to do their own snow stability assessments when using terrain outside of the forecast area. We glean information from our observations and weave it through the fabric of the daily report to keep us safe around these local hazards, seen and unseen. On this extremely warm day, there’s a lot of meltwater percolating down through the snow and snow cohesiveness is breaking down . So far, our little sip test of this gully has tasted pretty good, but sometimes when a sip tastes good, the whole lot of it may be too much.

Once committed, Rick has to focus on skiing and how he'll react if something bad happens. Phil and I get to watch what unfolds while Rick slices off several beautiful turns down the funnel, heading right for Phil into the middle of the gully.  It all goes well, except I forgot to trip the camera shudder (sorry Rick) and now the narrow thread of gully below is awash with sloughing mush. We take another look at things.

water running under snow

An unseen stream has likely eaten away the underside of the snowpack and we may be suspended on a thin deck of snow above a steep cascade of very cold water. We don’t hear the water; sometimes you don’t. In this situation, a heavy step on a boot ladder or a hard edge while skiing can trigger an unfortunate chain of events. A leg can break through, twisting a knee or breaking a bone. Worse, you disappear down the hole to a cold, wet, and fatal ending. Still possible is a wet snow avalanche. If we do choose to continue down, no countermeasure to any of these threats will eliminate the tedious, eight hundred foot climb out in unsupportive snow. It’s uncertain if the run beyond the narrow passage below is skiable.
With little discussion about continuing down, we unanimously agree to turn back.

The route back to Lakes follows the snowfield we had skinned up an hour earlier. It's as much fun skiing back as it was touring up but we are wary of clumps of vegetation and scattered rocks. They mark traps, rotten snow and air pockets, that can snap a hiker’s ankle and trip up the most balanced skiers. Instead of swooping down onto the lake, we traverse high above it on the south side. The little north-facing headwall here offers maybe 100’ of vertical and an untouched surface which is still frozen for the first few turns. It looks like it might have been crowned with a sizeable cornice after the last southeast gale, but today the rim rolls over by degrees, from two turns of very steep, to a nice thirty degrees, and then transitions gently to the flat surface of the lake.

Phil suggests a quick run off Monroe following the line we had studied during lunch. In hindsight that was a fabulous idea, but I stubbornly argue for heading over to Monroe Brook right away. The long run with its steep pitch and 1200’ of vertical will add some degree of success to the day, even if it takes all the time and energy we have left.
chapter 12: Monroe Brook Blunder