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Re: Snow Travel for the Inexperienced

Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2012 10:10 pm
by tomba
funcrew wrote:I was going over a small 20-foot wide innocent-looking snow patch on an otherwise dry trail and postholed against a rock, taking most of the skin off the front of my leg and wrenching my back.
When we crossed Glen Pass last year several days after an early October snow storm, I took off the baskets from my trekking poles to be able to poke through the snow all the way to the the rocks underneath. It was quite useful.

Edit: Since this thread is about safety: I don't recommend going in soon after a significant snowfall covers the terrain. We were ready to retreat if things turned too hard, and we approached the class 1 pass from the worse, northern side. Also there didn't seem to be an avalanche risk.