Day 12 - Saturday Dec 29 - A Family Affair

I picked up Jer at 6:00 this morning. We then met CJ and Jed Whittaker at the mouth of Little Cottonwood for a nice tour before the obligations of our day. CJ, as usual, took off ahead of us and was kind enough to break trail the entire way (I would be happy to if he would only allow me to keep up with him). We went up and skied the south side of Black Bess. What can I say? The skiing was great! These storm cycles just keep bringing us fantastic ski day after fantastic ski day. We all decided we had time for another lap and we got some even better turns. Then CJ and Jed made their way to the car while Jer and I made one final lap up the Patsy Marley ridge to the first open bowl for a few more turns. Big surprise... they were fantastic! We really had a great day out there and I need to be getting out more often!

Day 11 - Monday Dec 24 - 'Twas the Day Before Christmas

Following tradition, Cole and I went up to Snowbird today. I went over to his house a little before 8 and we had breakfast before heading up to the hill. We were able to get a bunch of runs in before we needed to head back home around 2. It really is fun every now and again to go to the resort and catch a number of turns without having to hike for them. Don't get me wrong, I prefer backcountry skiing to resort skiing any day of the week, but it was nice to do this today and perhaps once or twice more this year. Cole is becoming quite the skier. He is even showing more interest than ever before in learning to telemark so I need to be sure to jump on this soon so he doesn't fizzle out. We had some good runs in Gad Valley and off the Cirque. Mineral Basin totally sucked (as was expected). Cole did take a little fall our last run down the Cirque and he lost a ski. He then had the hardest time getting his skis back on. What a sucker. My skis don't even release. Sure, this may pose a problem when it comes to the overall safety of my knees and leg bones when I do fall; but hey, I never have to worry about the hassle of putting my skis back on when they pop off in soft snow! We had a good day together. It was fun to go out just the two of us. We enjoyed each others company and we both improved as skiers.

Day 10 - Saturday Dec 22 - USA Bowl

Stacy and I went up to USA Bowl this morning. I have been wanting to get out with her and allow her to actually have the opportunity to ski rather than just kind of get back to the car as has been the case in the past over at Porter Fork. We passed a few interesting things on the way up the canyon including a moose and several guys I work with. Having never been to this area before, I had been told this week by a few different people how to get there. I have to say that I was expecting a much shorter approach by the way people had explained it. Not that it was terribly far (in fact, it was shorter than most of the tours I do), but they just made it seem like there is, in essence, no approach - which wasn't the case. We met some nice people on the way up - Doug, Robin, and Melissa. They asked us if we wanted to blaze one during a short break to which we politely declined. When we reached the bowl Stacy was a bit tired so I continued on for a quick lap with our new friends while Stacy rested up. The snow was great. It was light and deep - just how I like it. I came back down and met Stacy and we then hiked up for some turns. She was nervous since this was going to be her first experience in powder, one of her first few days really telemarking, and the terrain was a bit steeper than she would have necessarily chosen on her own. I was having a blast. I was really just happy to be out there with her. She, on the other hand, got a little frustrated after finding that powder skiing is not as easy as I make it out to be. I do feel like she had a good time even after all the difficulty and hardships. It really was a good day. I had the best of company, the skies were blue, and the snow was sweet. Ahhh.

Day 9 - Thursday Dec 20 - A Morning of Solitude

(Or at least across the street). CJ and I went up around 6am this morning, parked at Solitude, and crossed the street into Willow Fork. We broke trail for the majority of the skin up in the deep snow. We had our usual in depth conversation concerning gear and, in particular, the pros and cons of active vs. less-active bindings. I am sure you would all find it fascinating. This was my first time in Willow Fork. I liked it. The snow was deep and it made for some great turns (CJ was wallowing a little on his skinny skis). I think I prefer Mill D or Butler Fork to Willow Fork, but it is nice to have another area that is easily accessed and well protected. We were able to make a couple laps before we had to be on our way to work - which was a considerably further drive for me since CJ currently works at Solitude. It was a good morning. The snow was deep and the turns were smooth. No major instabilities in the snow were observed.

Day 8 - Saturday Dec 15 - Just Right

The stars aligned therefore allowing me to have a long tour today. Cody and Jer met me at my house this morning at 7:30. We then met a friend of Cody's, Seth, at the mouth of Big Cottonwood at 8. We knew we were going to have some time today so we wanted to choose an area where we could go for a long walk. We determined that Mill D would be a nice place. I brought my two pairs of Insanes for R&D. The one pair is mounted about a half inch forward of the other pair. Jer and I were going to try to figure out what difference it made. None of us had been been past Short Swing in Mill D but we decided we would do a little exploring and go a little further. It was not until after our return that I found out that we had gone into the Desolation Lake drainage, but let me just say that this was not desolate in the least. The skiing was fantastic. We eventually found a line that we were excited to ski and skinned our way up. After reaching the top we dug a few snow pits and concluded it was okay to ski. I took the first line to the first safe spot and it was sweet. My turns were on and the snow was great! The others followed and we then were able to ski all the way to the bottom of the line. I was just feeling longer and wider turns at this point for some reason and they were a lot of fun. We arrived at the bottom and quickly prepared for another lap. That was too good to wait for the second round. The skin up took much less time this round thanks to the previously laid skin track and less chatter between Jer and Seth. At the top we ran into a lone ski tourer named Craig. His wife had dropped him off at the Spruces parking lot (where we parked) and he was making his way over to the Canyons where he worked. He gave us a little info on where we were, but did not know what that specific drainage was called. The second line we took was even better than the first. It was at the bottom of this run that Cody and Seth pulled out their homemade "goos." They were simply a mixture of butter, chocolate, and just about any spice they could find in their cupboards. Yeah, it sounds disgusting. However, it really didn't taste that bad. We didn't waste too much time because we were having such a good time. We made our way back up the skin track in order to get back down the south side on our way to Short Swing. We had to navigate our way through a little bit of a boulder field before we reached a batch of aspen trees that were perfectly placed to allow for optimal snowfall, protection, and room for turns. These were some of the best turns of the day. We then skinned up and past what Craig called Powder Park Near and then on to Short Swing. By this time it was about 4 o'clock and we only had daylight for this one last run. Short Swing is one of my staple runs for high avy danger and it was great today. The snow got a little sparse as we neared the bottom. We had to ski through a little brush which produced a few humorous falls coming from each of us. The run out of Mill D past the cabins and back to the road is always a rough one on the legs. There is just something about that luge style skiing especially having just had ski toured for eight hours straight with little to no rest that just pushes your legs over the edge. We did make it to the car in time to get back down and I was able to get to Stacy's company Christmas party. Yes, it was a wonderful day.

Day 7 - Saturday Dec 8 - Too Deep?

After yesterday's excellent skiing, there was not much that was going to keep me out of the hills today. I had a super busy Saturday ahead of me with the ward party and everything so I had to find someone to dawn patrol with me. Lucky for me, Jer is also a sucker who has to do a bunch of stuff on Saturdays. We met at my house at 5:30 and then made our way to the canyon. Before arriving we decided we were likely not going to have much luck getting up the canyon with all this snow. So we stopped at 7-11 where we picked up some chains. I have to say that I was rather surprised with the added traction these gave. I am stoked I have them now. We got up to the hill around the same time as a couple other groups, but I imagine they were headed out for longer than we. We went up into Grizzly to pretty much ski the same stuff I skied yesterday. It turns out that today wasn't as easy as yesterday. The snow was too deep for this line and all we ended up doing was swimming down the mountain in snow up to our chest. We felt as though we could find a line that would better suit our needs and we skinned back up to a steeper section. This was tricky because we had to find something that wasn't going to slide, but was still steep enough to actually turn on. We found it. Our second line was fantastic. We had good momentum and big pillows of snow just bounding over our head every turn. My goggles were all fogged up by this time so it was difficult to see, but I just went Karate kid style (although just with my eyes closed - I wasn't quite blindfolded) and still got some sweet turns. It was saddening to discover that the time had come for us to be on our way. We are suckers for having to leave this for ward parties. Oh, well. On our way down we ran into the PowderWhores on their way up. I spoke to one of them for a minute and then we made the rest of our way down to the car. Really it was a sweet day. I have to apologize once again for the lack of photos. I know I promised photos on this one. The batteries were dead when I first pulled it out to use it out there. I did take a couple with my camera phone so if any of you are dying to see photos from this day you can send me a text message to which I will reply with a photo or two. Peace!

Day 6 - Friday Dec 7 - Negativity is For the Birds

I must apologize now for the lack of photos in this post. I was just too far from home this morning when I realized I had forgotten my camera. I understand what a disappointment this may be for some of you, and I sincerely apologize. I will do my best to have extra cool photos from tomorrow's tour.
Anyway, I had difficulty getting partners for this morning's tour. Has responded immediatley that he was in, but CJ, Luke, and Jer were all slugish and eventually said no. They were all negative about the conditions and they are total suckers for it. I met Has at the canyon at 5:15am. I was surprised to see two other groups of dudes arrive at the same time once we arrived at the Grizzly Gulch parking lot, but we did end up going to different places so it didn't matter. We made our way up through the cabins and onto the Patsy Marley ridge. It wasn't until we were finally reaching our destination that we began to see enough light to be able to ski. The first run down was a good one for me. Some snow was moving, but nothing major. It was just the new snow that was moving and it was going so slow it was unlikely even to mess up my sweet turns. The snow was surprisingly deep. Has followed and we made our way back to where you either head back up the ridge or back down to the car. We looked at the time and at the snow and made an executive decision to put our skins back on and get another run in. This one was even better. It was really good out there today! We were very close to heading up for one more run, but Has had to be to work by 9. Instead, we just skied out and back to the car. This morning was good enough to convince me that doing a dawn patrol before I had to be anywhere tomorrow was totally worth it. I will see you then.

Day 5 - Saturday Dec 1 - A Day To Be Remembered

After the storm in the middle of this week Jer and I decided we would head out today. We then saw last night's storm coming and there was no way we were going to miss it. The avalanche forecast done by the Utah Avalanche Center that was posted yesterday afternoon was very mild. Bruce Tremper called for low danger with some spots of moderate on certain aspects particularly in wind affected areas. This was promising, but I knew better. I knew that the layer beneath this week's snow was week and was not likely to hold the new stuff very well. I had this premonition confirmed when reading what the Wizard of the Wasatch had to say so we made sure to be very careful out there. We tried to get out a little earlier than we suspected everyone else would so Jer picked me up at 6:30. The only problem was that neither of us have a car that is four-wheel drive and his Jetta was not doing super great even on the flat roads in the city in the new snow. We took a little detour over to Jer's parents' house to borrow their X5. We could not even get his car up the hill to their house. We had to park it on the side of the approaching road. It was very kind of Neils to allow us to borrow his car. Needless to say, we ended up getting started a little later than we had planned. We were finally headed up the canyon around 7:30. There were a bunch of people up in the Grizzly parking lot as we had expected. We tried to get going as quickly as possible. We were surprised and joyed to find that we were the first ones to be heading into Grizzly Gulch and up on the Patsy Marley ridge from this storm. Most people were going to skin over in the closed sections of Alta where I assume they must feel more comfortable. We traded off breaking trail and we were not rushing anything as we were not in any huge hurry. We were passed on the ridge by Andrew McLean (the world's premiere ski mountaineer) and his touring partner who were thankful for our skintrack and were kind enough to then lay one for us for the rest of the way (notice the photo of Andrew's urine). Our original plan was to go into the Patsy Marley bowl, dig a snowpit, and preferably ski it. This changed when we saw the natural slide that had occurred in the bowl before our arrival. Just for educational reasons, we dug a pit anyway in an area that was very representative of the area that slid. We found that underneath the new snow from this week was a meltfreeze crust on top of loose facets to the ground. The top layer slid very easily and this information did not exactly instill confidence in us and our desire to ski this line. So we adjusted our plans. We took our skins off and headed back down the ridge a little to an area that we were confident in due to its lower angle and tree growth. This proved difficult for both Jer and I to ski. I found myself putting too much weight forward and therefore my tips kept diving. I soon figured it out and got some sweet turns the rest of the day. We skied back down to the area where the skin track begins up to the ridge where we put our skins back on and made our way to the top (only after discussing the snow conditions with a group of people checking things out). We did not traverse the ridge this time. We just skied the area just West of the first open area on the ridge that has become a mainstay of our backcountry skiing repertoire. We found this to be stable enough to ski and we got some sweet turns in it. I have to say the these were the best turns of the year so far. I was really happy Jer got some video of at least one of my runs because it was great out there. We took a couple laps in here and then decided it was probably time to head back. It was 12:15 and we both had things to do at home. The skiing was great. The exercise was great. I really enjoyed digging a pit again and remembering all that I learned from last year. I can't wait to get out again!