daxegraphix
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Wicked fun hike. One of the best I've had. The slide was a river of ice that looked like a still photo of a river. Every undulation of rock and falls was exaggerated by mounds of rippling ice. The colors were cool, also--golds, greys, azure.
For the approach I pulled out my old files and found Tom Haskin's apt description of a few years ago. I did this slide in the fall of 2000, I think.
Take the Southside trail for a couple miles till you pass the "Cut". This is where the tote road rejoins the Southside trail. The map shows this.
It is just beyond Rooster Comb brook. After about a 1/4 mile you'll hear water running under the trail. Go just a bit further and see an uphill sharp trail-turn to the right. Just before that bend in the trail look left. There's a wide brook (20ft). That's Bennie's. Head up the LEFT bank. After about 5 minutes you'll run into a nice surprise. The illegal trail that someone cut a few years ago runs all the way to the base of the slide. If you go now before a big snow, you can see the cut saplings sticking up like pungee stakes. Follow these all the way up the left bank of the big brook. In some spots it's a little hard to follow. My trail mouses around in a few places but eventually leads back to the trail and the brook. This takes about 20-25 minutes. All the sudden you're at the start of the slide. The ice is incredible.
I took about 15 minutes to put on my crampons and get geared up because I couldn't stop looking around. Of course I didn't have a camera.
Anyway, you head up the river in crampons and climb over the rocks and walk up the falls for a while till you get to the split in the slide. It's a Y shape. Take the right hand side if you want to exit to the range trail.
I've never done the left side, and know nothing about it. From here things get a bit steeper.
I'm no ice climber by any stretch of the imagination. But I don't want to minimize the risks here for any readers who have no experience climbing slides and icy ones at that. This could be very dangerous.
As I looked up at the last stretch of icy rock winding up into the woods, I thought about turning around. My plan was to go back down the slide anyway, and I really considered bagging at this point. (When you're hiking by yourself you have to supply your own "hiking partner-with-better-judgement" in order to have a balanced view of certain situations.) Well he lost and I proceeded up the hill with lots of caution. I got to within 30 feet of the point I had exited the slide in the fall of '00, and stopped. I was really considering turning around at that point, using phrases like, "not worth it" and "if I fell here I would slide and bounce for a hundred feet" and "Geez, I'm so close, I can really consider that I made it without having to take even more risks."
But for some stupid reason I kept going. I decided that those climber guys who must have stones of iron probably would not panic in this situation, but would realize they will be OK if they just take one move at a time and plan ahead. I said all that to myself but was still sort of scared. I got to within 10 feet of my planned exit point and realized that if I did make it there, I would have a wicked tough time getting back down. I decided it wasn't worth it and then I kept going (?!) I was front pointing and using my long handle cheapo EMS ax as a pick up in front of me to provide another point of contact. I felt like I was on a ladder, and was extremely uncomfortable. Finally I reached up and touched the rock which I had picked out as the goal at the top of my exit point, and immediately started to inch back down. ( I knew if I stopped I would crap myself.) This next 15 feet was definitely the worst of the hike, and yet it felt good after it was over. I was kicking the crap out of the ice below me trying to get a good hold, all the while knowing that my ax was hanging on by about a 1/4 of an inch. At one point I got that panic rush for a split second. I made it to a rock hold and felt like I could safely make it down from there.
I'm no ice climber, that's for sure. This couldn't have been more than 40 maybe 45 degrees tops. But something about no protection, being by yourself, and having no real training in what you're doing all adds up to a scary time for me.
Anyway the climb back down was a lot of fun. I had to fight off the "It's Miller time" syndrome and keep focused on what I was doing. At a few spots I practice self arrest and realized it's a lot harder than I thought. You could get hurt--bad. I also learned that the glazy ice--even 20 or 30 degrees is potentially wicked dangerous with hundreds of feet of the same below you.
At one spot I thought I would try sliding down since there was a snow bowl about 20 feet down this gentle slope. I got going about 90, tried to arrest, nicked my heels on the ice-ow-and finally stopped only when my ax found some snow. Could be dangerous, to say the least.
The bottom half of the slide is really not too bad as far as walking back down
I would not hesitate to do this hike again.
I'll add more later.
For the approach I pulled out my old files and found Tom Haskin's apt description of a few years ago. I did this slide in the fall of 2000, I think.
Take the Southside trail for a couple miles till you pass the "Cut". This is where the tote road rejoins the Southside trail. The map shows this.
It is just beyond Rooster Comb brook. After about a 1/4 mile you'll hear water running under the trail. Go just a bit further and see an uphill sharp trail-turn to the right. Just before that bend in the trail look left. There's a wide brook (20ft). That's Bennie's. Head up the LEFT bank. After about 5 minutes you'll run into a nice surprise. The illegal trail that someone cut a few years ago runs all the way to the base of the slide. If you go now before a big snow, you can see the cut saplings sticking up like pungee stakes. Follow these all the way up the left bank of the big brook. In some spots it's a little hard to follow. My trail mouses around in a few places but eventually leads back to the trail and the brook. This takes about 20-25 minutes. All the sudden you're at the start of the slide. The ice is incredible.
I took about 15 minutes to put on my crampons and get geared up because I couldn't stop looking around. Of course I didn't have a camera.
Anyway, you head up the river in crampons and climb over the rocks and walk up the falls for a while till you get to the split in the slide. It's a Y shape. Take the right hand side if you want to exit to the range trail.
I've never done the left side, and know nothing about it. From here things get a bit steeper.
I'm no ice climber by any stretch of the imagination. But I don't want to minimize the risks here for any readers who have no experience climbing slides and icy ones at that. This could be very dangerous.
As I looked up at the last stretch of icy rock winding up into the woods, I thought about turning around. My plan was to go back down the slide anyway, and I really considered bagging at this point. (When you're hiking by yourself you have to supply your own "hiking partner-with-better-judgement" in order to have a balanced view of certain situations.) Well he lost and I proceeded up the hill with lots of caution. I got to within 30 feet of the point I had exited the slide in the fall of '00, and stopped. I was really considering turning around at that point, using phrases like, "not worth it" and "if I fell here I would slide and bounce for a hundred feet" and "Geez, I'm so close, I can really consider that I made it without having to take even more risks."
But for some stupid reason I kept going. I decided that those climber guys who must have stones of iron probably would not panic in this situation, but would realize they will be OK if they just take one move at a time and plan ahead. I said all that to myself but was still sort of scared. I got to within 10 feet of my planned exit point and realized that if I did make it there, I would have a wicked tough time getting back down. I decided it wasn't worth it and then I kept going (?!) I was front pointing and using my long handle cheapo EMS ax as a pick up in front of me to provide another point of contact. I felt like I was on a ladder, and was extremely uncomfortable. Finally I reached up and touched the rock which I had picked out as the goal at the top of my exit point, and immediately started to inch back down. ( I knew if I stopped I would crap myself.) This next 15 feet was definitely the worst of the hike, and yet it felt good after it was over. I was kicking the crap out of the ice below me trying to get a good hold, all the while knowing that my ax was hanging on by about a 1/4 of an inch. At one point I got that panic rush for a split second. I made it to a rock hold and felt like I could safely make it down from there.
I'm no ice climber, that's for sure. This couldn't have been more than 40 maybe 45 degrees tops. But something about no protection, being by yourself, and having no real training in what you're doing all adds up to a scary time for me.
Anyway the climb back down was a lot of fun. I had to fight off the "It's Miller time" syndrome and keep focused on what I was doing. At a few spots I practice self arrest and realized it's a lot harder than I thought. You could get hurt--bad. I also learned that the glazy ice--even 20 or 30 degrees is potentially wicked dangerous with hundreds of feet of the same below you.
At one spot I thought I would try sliding down since there was a snow bowl about 20 feet down this gentle slope. I got going about 90, tried to arrest, nicked my heels on the ice-ow-and finally stopped only when my ax found some snow. Could be dangerous, to say the least.
The bottom half of the slide is really not too bad as far as walking back down
I would not hesitate to do this hike again.
I'll add more later.
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