Early Season Boarding

[knuckledragger]

I've been to tucks many times in the spring, and camped at hermit lake.
I want to go up earlier to try to get some real snow and camp, my question is:

for a snowboarder, are crampons necessary to get up in the bowl this time of year?? I would be boot packing the whole way. Do i need snowshoes??

any help is greatly appreciated!

[skicdave]

Crampons are always helpful, even in early Mid April, especially if the trail is icy. Usually packed enough that snowshoes would be unnecessary.

[notjustanotherboarder]

Sorry I missed your post earlier.

For a boarder, the wall is is problem early season. I'm guessing you wear soft boots. It is difficult to post hole up the wall early in the season wearing soft boots, like jan-mar. Its usually two steps forward and one step back. Occassionally, its one step forward and twenty steps back. Hard boots work MUCH better. Crampons are a good option. However, You should to go to the top where its flatter in order to get them off safety and get on your board. So, if your skills are marginal and you plan only to go part way up..., From what I read yesterday on the Mt Wash. site, its bulletproof and you absolutely would neet crampons. But there would not be much point in going in the first place.

Latter in the season there are so many people there that there are plenty of footsteps to follow.

[likwid]

Monday after the ice hiking tuck's wasn't a problem at all in soft boots... There were plenty of steps over on left gully and over by lunch rocks... And everything had softened up enough to kick through where necessary with soft boots.

The hike up on the other hand was almost necessary in plastic boots and little headwall wasn't safe without crampons...