On Saturday Cary and I headed out to Ice House Canyon to do some climbing. It had been 7 months since the last time I climbed anything with snow on it. We were not completely sure what we were going to climb but we figured IHC had plenty of options. Around 7am we started hiking up the canyon. It had plenty of snow of the ground right from the very start. This meant there was going to be a ton of snow up top. After 1.5 miles of hiking up the canyon we put on our crampons and decided to climb Timber Mountain (8,300 ft). We climbed this mountain last year, however, from a slightly different part of the mountain. The traditional trail leads up Timber from the saddle but we veered up Timber about half a mile before the saddle. It was great to climb again, we switched back and forth until we reached a ridge. From there we followed it to the top of Timber Mountain.
It was a great day, a few scattered clouds but mostly sunny. When we reached the summit it was covered in snow, no foot prints except from one animal. No one had reach the summit since the storm last weekend. Good times! We ate our traditional pizza lunch (one of us cooks a pizza the night before, usually digiorno) and relaxed for 20 minutes. On our way back down we put on our snow shoes and started to descend via the saddle. We soon realized, thanks to a cross country skier, that going down the slope was a lot easier without our snow shoes. We could simply dig our heals into the soft snow and head straight down. We finally reached the trail head at 3:30.
Future climbs:
- In late March I am heading to Denver to do some telemark skiing and also attempt a 14er with Cary and Katie.
- I also plan on attempting a California 14er in April or May.
Below is the GPS track of our hike. You can save the track and put it in Google Earth for a 3D view.
Stats:
Start: 7am
Summit: 1:00
Return: 3:30
Elevation Start: 5,000 ft
Summit: 8,300 ft
Round Trip Mileage: 5.35 miles
Click here to see more photos
Sorry for the poor video quality, I forgot to switch my camera settings.
View Timber Mtn in a larger map
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4 comments:
Absolutely beautiful! Breathtaking scenery. Hard to believe you weren't in Colorado, rather than outside of L.A. I love how the trees are twisted and broken - and it appears that wasn't part of the burn area from last summer. I wonder what animal made the tracks - guess bears are hibernating this time of year. Whew! Looks like you a perfect day to get back into climbing.
sweeeeet! gettin' ready for the 14ner already!
telemark is where it's at... why do all the work going up and still have to walk down? hiking is so pedestrian.
He's Back! Yea! I love reading and seeing your adventures.
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