Sure why not. The line has easy access, and fun, steep skiing. Plus it was a welcome relief after Pyramid the day before. I mean, when you get to skin most of the climb, it takes some stress out of the day. Plus…Lou, Frank, and Brittany made up the rest of the crew for the day.
Lou getting into the somewhat scary entrance to the chute. Exposed on one side and fairly steep.
Our day started with a snowmobile ride up to the sled boundary where Hay Park splits off and we donned our skins. The skinning was easy on supportable snow down in the trees and right on up to the lakes. Another party of 6 is just ahead of us, we catch up to them in the bowl and meet one another. They are headed all the way over to the Crystal Chute. Up we go to the toe of a massive avalanche. At this point it made sense to start booting for a while as the debris field made for generally solid booting.
Some splitboarders from the other crew as the sun begins to fill the sky.
Thats a big avalanche. I've been seeing quite a few of these lately. Seems nearly all of them have been caused by cornice breakage. The Cornice that broke here was the size of a freight train. 8-15 ft overhanging, 25 feet deep and about 300 feet long. My money says that would send just about any slope.
The skins go back on for a few hundred vertical and then a quick booter to a quick, but tricky move through a break in the cornice to gain the ridge.
Frank and Brittany just about to gain the ridge.
A quick skin up to the summit and we find ourselves in some serious wind. Nobody really says anything, but everyone has the same plan. Transition quickly and gitonoutaher! We ski a ways down the ridge to a reasonable break in the cornice for heading over to our chute of choice today. The entrance is steep and a bit wind effected. Caution is a reasonable expectation here.
Lou:
Just about past the crux.
Frank:
Frank does his usual routine of making it look easy.
Brittany:
I really like how this line falls away so plum.
I was there too:
We found some good snow on the more north facing side of the couloir especially.
Yes Brittany is actually in there somewhere.
Lou Found the goods on his way out of the Couloir.
So did Frank:
If you look really closely, there is a black dot that is Brittany skiing the apron beneath our line.
We had some good turns the rest of the way down to the lakes and then motored on out the trail to the biles.
Off to the Carniceria in Carbondale for Tacos!