Rock Creek

The Rock Creek Road is now open to the Pack Station, the usual spring closure, so I roped in my pal Patrick for a tour. We didn't have any specific goal in mind, but this nice chute off the ridge of Mt Starr immediately caught our attention.

Patrick always brings plenty of stoke!

Pointless Peak. The big lines off the right side held a lot of debris and runnels. Not attractive.

Mount Morgan South

Snack break. We booted up left to the ridge.

Sweet views from the ridge. Red Slate center left.

Mt Starr left and Mono Pass down right.

The snow quality was great. Quite smooth high, then more cups and runnels lower, improving again here below the choke.

 A little tedious descending through heavily cupped and wind sculpted snow in the forest brought us to the road which provided a nice exit almost all the way back to the pack station.

Fine short tour!

Brown Lake

 The South Lake Road is open to Parcher's Resort now. Plowed to South Lake too, but that section is still closed to traffic. I took advantage of the access to tour up to Brown Lake and on up to pt 12862'. I left the little parking area at 7am. The snow was solid with a nice refreeze, so I booted all the way using crampons for the Parcher's slope and the ascent of the peak.

 Bluff Lake with my ascent route back left up the bowl. Folks looked like they had good runs off the ridge on the right too.

Brown Lake. Lots of suncups on the flats and many of the lower angle slopes.

Looking down to Brown Lake.

Runnel city, but the lookers right zone skied well.

Always nice to summit! Agassiz distant/far left. Picture Puzzle mid/left, and Goode right.

Looking down the South Fork.

Honestly, I wasn't sure the skiing was going to be that great owing to the runnels and texture, but the snow had softened perfectly by about 10:45 providing quite fun turns.

The Parcher's slope skied well too.

 Skied right to the car. Always nice! Good medium day in the hills.

White Mountain Attempt

 I got home yesterday from an attempt to summit White Mountain, the third highest peak in California and one I gaze at nearly every day from our house. The plan was to tackle it from the east side, driving up Leidy Canyon, hiking up an old stock trail to somewhere near Perry Aiken Flat, setting camp, then attempting the summit the next day.

The road up Leidy Canyon is well maintained until the last mile where it becomes more of a 4x4 route. I was stymied by this creek crossing. No way was I going to try to drive it, so I had to decide between wading it or bushwhacking upstream to where the road crosses back.

I chose the bushwhack through this. Somewhat of a nightmare, but for only about a quarter mile.

 I easily found the stock trail which was wonderful. Steep but not too steep, good dirt, fine views. I found a fine campsite at about 10,500', set camp, and explored the high country above.

Found an old shepherd's shelter among this small outcrop.

Complete with a fireplace and shelves!

Great stark scenery.

Bristlecones! Saw a bighorn sheep in the distance too.

I also enjoyed a pleasant, low angle ski descent back to camp, which was just a short distance down this drainage.

Took an after dinner stroll up to a nearby ridge with good views of Fish Lake Valley.

I slept well, rising early for my attempt on the summit.

Sublime.

I traversed over the ridge distant left into this huge basin at the head of the North Fork of Perry Aiken Creek.

For some reason my phone camera intermittently malfunctioned, taking blurry photos. A shame, but I include this one showing my routes.

I initially climbed the ridge left, reaching the rocks as the clouds rolled in. I descended and regrouped finally electing to cruise up the large bowl to the right.

Clouds rolling in high on the ridge.

Looking down on the expansive basin.

As I wound my way up the bowl I noticed this route up to the crest. Why not?

On the crest! Just 300' and a quarter mile from the summit (photo blurred so did not include, ugh). Looking north along the crest.

Sadly another wave of clouds rolled in along with steady graupel. Time to bail. I had a great descent nevertheless with just enough visibility to see the terrain and make good turns.

Leaving the basin the clouds parted briefly.

Pleasant descent back to camp.

Where the weather rolled in once again. Snow!

Next morning I hiked out. The creek had fallen, so no bushwhack. 

Sure had a lot of great moments up there!

Jawbone & Alice

 I toured the last three days, keeping it local. Thursday I tried my hand in Jawbone Canyon up Bishop Creek.

 Actually, I climbed "Little Jawbone" a shallow drainage parallel and east of Jawbone proper. It provided easy travel all the way up to pt 11286 - my goal for the day.

Low down in Little Jawbone.

Jawbone headwall.

Pt 11286 provided nice views. Was wondering if this line went, but alas it did not.

Views south along Table Mountain.

Northeast to Bishop

I skied the headwall and then down Jawbone. Fair to good skiing throughout. Warm temps have led to no/poor refreezes overnight, so there's a lot of soft snow out there.

Up canyon view to the headwall.

Yesterday my friend Phoebe and I checked out the South Fork of Big Pine Creek. This chute heading up towards Mt Alice caught our attention.

Phoebe skins up. She had just come up from sea level and was feeling the altitude, but was a real trooper, making it about 3/4s of the way up the chute.

The east aspect of the chute meant an early warm up with mushy snow, but the skiing was surprisingly good. Generally 2" to 3" of slush over a supportable base.

Today I decided to take a shot at summiting Mt Alice. Got a good early start, but the snow got quite soft as soon as the sun hit it. 

Above the low chute the drainage opens up into a wide, beautiful canyon.

The view up canyon to the headwall, where I found the best skiing of the day.

Nice Sierra granite.

Views from the ridge atop the headwall. Mts Winchell, Agassiz, Robinson, Gendarme, Two Eagle, and Cloudripper.

The canyon from near the summit - which involved about a half hour of scrambling and postholing to get to.

Coyote plateau from the summit.

Our summit register entry from 15+ years ago.

The skiing wasn't great, but not bad either. Always great to summit!