Mike T
March 10th, 2005, 01:53 PM
It pains me greatly to make this announcement, but MHES 2005 is cancelled.
I rode at Timberline yesterday, and bottom line, it looks like mid-June up there right now. The main Palmer snowfield area is fine now, but West Palmer and Magic Mile are rock gardens. Even if the snowpack is miraculously maintained between now and then, wind or fog could shut us down for the day, since there will be no lower mountain tarrain that is carvable. (Remember all that fog last year?) Not to mention that Palmer isn't the best place for beginner and low-intermediate carvers; part of my motivation for organizing MHES was to get people to try hard boots for the first time.
Even yesterday, there were a lot of loose lava chunks to be found on the snow, and I had to do two hot scrapes on my Axis to pull out the dirt that got in there during the day. I am "summer-izing" most of my boards this weekend.
There *will* be a session at Mt Hood, Mt Bachelor, or both in 2006 assuming we don't have a repeat of this year's weather fiasco. Again I would like to thank everyone who has donated and sponsored the event; consider your donations and sponsorship good for the 2006 session. Most of the work that has been done for this season - web site, etc - will simply carry over to next season. We decided not to roll out the RSVP form, demo requests, loaner equipmnet, registration, etc until it started to snow in earnest, and well, that never happened.
I would love to see an informal session happen sometime soon, probably at Mount Bachelor because honestly they seem to be the only mountain in the PNW with enough snow. Spring break in WA/OR is 3/19 - 3/27. Maybe something 1st weekend in April?
I rode at Timberline yesterday, and bottom line, it looks like mid-June up there right now. The main Palmer snowfield area is fine now, but West Palmer and Magic Mile are rock gardens. Even if the snowpack is miraculously maintained between now and then, wind or fog could shut us down for the day, since there will be no lower mountain tarrain that is carvable. (Remember all that fog last year?) Not to mention that Palmer isn't the best place for beginner and low-intermediate carvers; part of my motivation for organizing MHES was to get people to try hard boots for the first time.
Even yesterday, there were a lot of loose lava chunks to be found on the snow, and I had to do two hot scrapes on my Axis to pull out the dirt that got in there during the day. I am "summer-izing" most of my boards this weekend.
There *will* be a session at Mt Hood, Mt Bachelor, or both in 2006 assuming we don't have a repeat of this year's weather fiasco. Again I would like to thank everyone who has donated and sponsored the event; consider your donations and sponsorship good for the 2006 session. Most of the work that has been done for this season - web site, etc - will simply carry over to next season. We decided not to roll out the RSVP form, demo requests, loaner equipmnet, registration, etc until it started to snow in earnest, and well, that never happened.
I would love to see an informal session happen sometime soon, probably at Mount Bachelor because honestly they seem to be the only mountain in the PNW with enough snow. Spring break in WA/OR is 3/19 - 3/27. Maybe something 1st weekend in April?