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TAY Picnic, Crystal Mt., April 18, 2004
Greg Louie off the top of "Brain Damage," Silver King, Crystal Mountain
The Pacific Northwest backcountry community got ready to party down the week after Crystal's closing as Seattle-based Internet forum Turns-All-Year held their second annual year-end party at the base of Campbell Basin. Open to anyone with the leg and lung power to skin up to the party site, the gathering was a chance for posters and lurkers alike to see and be seen, especially by those they had heretofore only known online. A typical introduction ran something along the lines of "Hi, I'm so-and-so, I post as ______ on TAY"!
Following the buffet setup on the unoccupied seats of the Forest Queen chairlift, most in the group set off in search of fresh tracks in the upper Campbell Basin, with the crowd below giving marks to the riders as they descended. TAY regular Kam Leang was the man of the day, dragging up a keg of top-fermented barley beverage for the enjoyment of the masses.
TAY split-boarder Stefan Giles (sag) and I made the somewhat longer trek to near the summit of Silver King for what looked to be the goods, only to find on arriving that the top was heavily wind-crusted and the rest heavily avy-debrised, but the sun was shining and the challenging ski down was fun nonetheless.
A big shout out is due to TAY moderator Ron Jarvis and Jeanette Morrison (Mad_Dog) for organizing this event, as the crowd enjoyed themselves thoroughly and were already formulating plans for next year's event on the ski down.
