Nuthouse 1/1/11

[Chris G]

SB looks like a bust with low BL Top etc etc. Let's start the year off right with some Nuthouse action!! Should be a great day with a stellar lapse. Nordhoff at 10! Be there!

[Chris G]

Awoke this AM to sunshine and distant high clouds. BL Top in SB seemed a bit weak and Ojai had a 25º spread so I called a 10 AM meet at the HS for Nuthouse but by the time I was out of the shower it was clouding over pretty heavily. Started to have my doubts but figured a wee hike on New Years Day would do me good anyway. 3rd annual! Andy D met me at the HS and we were on trail by 10 past 10. The clouds had pretty solidly covered the sky except for a band of sun marching toward us from SB. It made the hike easy! By the time we were 3/4 of the way up, we had perfect sun again and cycles were starting to come through. Couldn't have timed it better. On launch by 11 with stellar cycles and lots of sun but we could see leading edge of the cold front coming in from SB with associated shade. We were going to have a window and it was going to be relatively short. I was off by 11:25, after getting hoovered from launch like an upside down bungee jump. Easy climb to 23 and surfed across a few spines before hitting ridgetop. I looked back for Andy and saw heavy shade had already covered Matillija dam which I was sure was going to shut things down permanently. It was a race to the Pyramid to get established before it started to suck. Andy got caught in some shade and had to wait for cycles but finally got off and joined me on the ridge. Most climbs capped at 32ish but near the Pyramid they jumped to the mid 4s. Lift was smooth, light and easy and by the time Andy hit the ridge top everything was in solid shade. We could see clouds tickling the top of Pine and Reyes, dumping snow. Beautiful scenery over the back. We had aspirations of making Chief's but I ran into a pretty solid East wind at the West end of Nordhoff and some very strange air. It had been an amazing day which great climbs in total shade, and we had the HS on glide. Easy decision and we both headed out. Chief's with 4500 into a good headwind just didn't seem likely.

The hike really isn't that bad and for that kind of flying it's absolutely worth it. Stellar way to start off the new year!

[andy dainsberg]

smiles courtesy of an easy hike in the frigid mid 50s~

see if u can spot chris in this frame

altho it was overcasting, we still had some sweet simple slow climbs to the mid 4s