A few years ago, we all rallied at the Bear Tooth for the CNFAIC Fundraiser to listen to Kristoffer Erickson talk about his Alaskan spring skiing adventures. It was a sweet presentation and this cat really got after it, but all he talked about was skiing some "Soft Buttery Corn."
Long days and warm temps rewarded us with some nice spring skiing last night in the South Fork valley. B-real and I hammered up Harp Mountain after work. We arrived at the top wiping the sweat off our brows, dehydrated and looking for a Coors Light.
When the Mountains turn blue, It's as Cold as the Chugach!
I think Eddie said it right... "if you know someone who’s still looking rather pasty, tell em to get off their ass and get into the hills." And if you haven't check his latest footie from his seggie, do so; it's pretty tight.
Its the time of year when all of the season ending parties take place like the Champagne Brunch and this years inaugural "Corn Harvest" sponsored by the CNFAIC. And we all have those good "farmers" tans.
B-real harvests his own crops...
As this epic record-breaking winter winds down we all have to answer the question,
I decided to head off the beaten path a bit out towards the Valley. Usually I take that route to explore the granite spires of Hatcher Pass, but this time deviated towards the Old Glenn Highway with valley local Mitch.
The saddle between East and West Twin Peaks was the destination (the obvious low point in the center of this photo).
We didn't make the best terrain decision, as the back side of this skin track required us to descend about 300 vertical feet that had been baking in the sun all day. We lived to ski another day. We did see some other tracks over near POW/MIA, which appear to be these guys.
The approach and ski back to the truck was one of the worst i've experienced. Alders and Devils Club as thick as thieves. Made the beers back at the truck taste extra good!
Things will slow down here a bit. Working next weekend, playing the last weekend in April, and then working again for my 15 days of mandatory fun! Then we head to the Gulkana for Memorial Day, followed by the real work - building a cabin!
Until next time. I'm still picking Devils Club out of my arms and legs...
WOW! That's all I can say. I've been neglecting North Bowl this year, either due to bad visibility or weather. This was not the case last night. B-real and I rallied for an after work powder mission...with Dogface in close pursuit on the Uptrack. I've got to say that this is my favorite time of year - longer days and good snow!
Anchorage-ites were encased in a fog sarcophagus, while we were climbing in the warm setting sun. There was no wind, but 'ol man wind had its way with the South Fork on Saturday. I observed several small natural slab avalanches and cornice breaks through the terrain. We skied some nice 2-3" dust on a supportable base back to the trailhead.
Here is a quick video edit that I put together of my initial descent. Some day i'll call this LB's run....my favorite!
I have a feeling that with these conditions Gordon Lyon will be slayed in a subsequent after work hammer fest. I haven't been around here as long as some of the "graybeards", but the skiing and stability has been phenomenal - no PWL's (persistent weak layers) and a deep snowpack = LOW danger!
I'm calling it the best day of the year! Others call it "epic"; "bottomless"; "today was as good as it gets"; and "DEEP!" Turnagain Pass received about 30"+ of loose, low density, bottomless, unconsolidated snow last Sunday/Monday.
Today we reaped the benefits of that storm by setting the skin track and breaking trail with JD and B-real.
-15F at the truck, we made quick time, little stops and hammered it out until we got into the sun. And a lot of folks gave thanks! I actually had one guy say "we should have to pay a toll".
This was your toll: First Tracks!
The sock monkey gave me good luck on a phenomenal day. But he didn't keep my feet warm. I returned to the truck walking on two blocks of east coast ice. Riding the "Mattawatts".
Justin and I after tending to our crops....(get it? farming our turns!)
I've got two weeks break to help a friend a build a cabin, and drill. Gotta love it!
The last day of high pressure was just like the last 10. Cold (-26F in Portage), clear and light wind. I met Josh at Ingram Creek and we decided to get our learn on in The Library. We also grabbed Brian as they headed back to Anchorage due to -22F temps at the Twin Peaks trailhead.
The Librarian looking for a good novel.
There have been some quite impressive lines skied in the far reaches of Turnagain Pass. Like these, on the south face of Wolverine and Eddie's. Somebody really got after the back bowl's at the end of Eddie's ridge.
Brian does his homework (that's funny because he's an Engrish teacher!).
Josh taking the final exam after an all-night cram session!
Sorry for all of the school/library references - it was funny at the time. Stability has been bomber and a lot of great skiing was had. But the low pressure has deposited a nice refresh to the Kenai Mountains - we'll have to wait and see how everything flushes out.
In other news, this guy showed up and was ready to shred Tincan.....literally.
Led by Tucker and Brad, whom I always seem to run into, we spent the day touring and standing in snow pits on the lower elevations of Tincan. It was a beautiful bluebird day in the morning, turning to greybird in the afternoon with the winds ramping up - with 70mph gusts on Sunburst and 84mph on Rendezvous!
The previous ~6" of new snow dried out nicely and made for some pretty awesome skiing (...or so i've heard). We ran into some familiarfaces who skied Tincan Proper and Todd's Run....dang jealous!
The view from our snowpit basecamp. High winds over on Pyramid Peak and the north side of the Arm.
2mm surface hoar...something to watch out for at mid-lower elevations.
Five snowpits....looks like craters from a CBU-31 JDAM.
Any snow geeks can find my observation here. We wrapped up the course at Chair 5 over a beer. I always recommend brushing up on your early season avy skills with some type of "continuing education" - and the crew at the AAS is top notch! Thanks Tucker!
This November has been off to a good start, with over a foot of fresh snow in the past week. Not to mention the decent start in October; but I've already got 3 1/2 foot snow banks in my driveway.
I headed out to the South Fork tonight for a quick after work "one run and done" conditions check. I really didn't pay attention to the weather gauge, but there must have been some wind that came in with the recent storm. By my calibrated eye, there was about 4" of new low density snow in the parking lot at the trailhead. I could see the wind was transporting snow on the ridge tops, specifically Harp and some of the ridges deeper up valley.
I observed a small natural slide on the top of Lynx that had been obviously wind loaded. There was a large party that had skied the main gut of Harp proper and it "looked" really good. I would be leery and untrusting of ridgetops and gullies that had been scoured - play it safe!
Here are some GoPro pics. They really don't do any type of justice, but better than nothing.
And of course LB getting hers...
In celebration of Veteran's Day, i'll be out getting some turns. Hopefully i'll have an update of how things flushed out after the "mega storm".
I got the idea to ski into the Hanging Valley last year from Joe Stock who ventured deep into the South Fork for "cooler season."
Although American-ized, we like to call them "coolers" or "coolies" - referring to the french term "couloir": meaning "passage" or "corridor," a narrow gully with a steep gradient in a mountainous terrain.
After a day of excessive partying for a friends 40th birfday party, we got the classic 11:00 late start and made our way into Hanging Valley. Connecting the patches of snow and tundra, we put on/took off our skis about 10 times before making it to the base of the large chute. Not to mention negotiating the rotten saturated isothermic snowpack....
Tyler expresses his need for "couloir love". Our destination is straight ahead.
This couloir, which I dont have a specific name, required a 1500' boot pack. Reference previous posts about boot packing. We went from skinning, to booting, to booting with crampons, and finally to wallowing in waist deep powder wishing we had a pair of verts. We made it about 100' shy of the top, finally peeling our skins and enjoying the fresh May powder.
After nearly 8.5 hours of slogging, we arrived back at the Harp Mtn. pull out. Tired, sweat soaked, sunburned, dehydrated, hungry, blistered, and aching. The "body destroyer" pretty much says it all:
The first day of May skied surprisingly well. I thought that the forecast called for mostly cloudy and rain for the next week, but we got a nice sucker hole. I headed solo up to Hatcher Pass and had my mind set on either a couloir I scoped a couple months back near Gold Cord, or the north facing chutes on the Rae-Wallace Headwall.
LB and I slugged it out and made it as far as I could before I started booting. I hate boot packing. It must've been really warm last week, because there were a lot of rollerballs that made the skiing.....um.....interesting.
The pass also got about an inch of snow during that small front that moved through late in the week. The entire chute skied very well, requiring you to dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge the occasional "death cookie". Lobita was loving the slope angle, but had it rough post-holing through the isothermal snowpack in the south facing flats.
I'll take it for the first day of May. I have to work both of the weekends in mid-May, so next weekend I have to get after it. It may be time to bring it back closer to home. I've got my eye on Raina's north couloir, and the chutes in Hanging Valley.
I guess that's how we approached Mount Gordon Lyon. The tallest looming peak in the Arctic Valley drainage begs to get skied as you drive down the Glenn Highway and stare at its inviting north face. Fellow Eagle River skiers B-real, Eric and The Hoff set out to climb and ski the inviting powdery slopes of the Site Summit ridge.
B-real makes his way towards the Cook Inlet.
Eric being chased by his own lion, Stella.
Contemplating why they call this Mount Gordon Lyon...
So I looked it up. Its ironic that Gordon M. Lyon was an employee at the Corps of Engineers in the Alaska District as a project engineer in charge of construction of the Army Nike Missle site , and later engineer in charge of the Site Summit Nike station.
The newly constructed Goose Bay Forest Service Cabin.
I just returned from spending five days skiing in Prince William Sound out of the Forest Service cabin at Goose Bay. It was constructed last May after the South Culross cabin was demolished. Besides Matt Murphy and his cabin crew from Girdwood, we were the first official skiers to visit the cabin.
Cap'n Mike Bender from Lazy Otter Charters did a great job on the water taxi. Although Goose Bay was partly frozen, we got off about 250 yards from the cabin. This, however, required a two hour movement over the sea ice and steep banks of the bay. Lets just say the return trip was a lot easier to navigate.
The snow conditions were no surprise to anyone. After the horrific wind in Southcentral, combined with no new snow in the last 3 weeks, conditions were dismal. But you've heard me say it before, "skiing is skiing". If it weren't for ski crampons, we wouldn't have been able to navigate to the terrain we skied otherwise.
In a total of 3 full days and 2 half days of skiing, we bagged nearly 11,500 vertical feet. I am going to return to Culross Island when we have powder. The ski access directly from the front door of the cabin gives way to phenomenal tree skiing - something an east-coaster takes a particular liking to...
We took it upon ourselves to name all of the runs that we skied. So if you hear something in this blog, it has been aptly named by yours truly.
Tyler descends the Dogface in the soft afternoon corn.
Marc harvesting the goods.
B-real contemplates the boilerplate.
On Day 2, we toured for nearly 7 hours and finally summitted Goose Peak. This was our favorite run of the trip, named Sound of Sunshine. It was a beautiful south facing shot that ran cleanly all the way down to the water.
On the way to recovery. Where recovery is measured in vertical feet.
Marc working on his tan.
After five full days of turns, I had a tired pup on my hands. When we took a break, she took a break.
Splitter weather gave way to cold and clear nights. With no propane in the two 50 gallon tanks, we had to improvise with our own stash of fuel and below zero down sleeping bags. This is the second cabin trip in a row that was bingo on propane.
The northern lights were out and amazing. I was surprised to see them so well this far to the south.
I also experimented with the illumination of the moon and some other constellations.
Cabin life. I made B-real run back and forth with a flashlight to make this shot. After cleaning this up, I did notice the Aurora in the background.
On the second to last day we got the Tsunami Advisory over our VHF radio. Pretty crazy considering we were about five feet above sea level at the time.
Check out this video of our trip.
If you've never skied in the Sound, make it a future destination on your backcountry bucket list. You won't be disappointed.
Meg and I in a recent trip to Hawaii. She's the better looking one...
Yep, the two most important girls in my life....Meg and Lobita. But recently, it seems that La Nina (or The Girl in spanish) has been at the forefront of conversations in South Central Alaska. The forecast for the next week is clear, sun and cold. Not very favorable if you're planning a ski trip to Prince William Sound.
I checked out the anti-tracks with locals Matt and Agnes from Hagephoto. We headed up Tincan for a "one run and done" - and to see what the wind left us with. Not much...
Matt and Agnes survey the landscape and try to find a place to ski. It actually wasn't that bad, we found some decent carveable turns in the protected trees. Define Powder? As Rick Vance (February 2011, Backcountry) states, "skiing today was like pornography: great to look at, but a poor substitute for the real thing."
Me and one of my favorite girls.
Matt Hage took this photo. It's pretty sweet, and you can find it on his Facebook page. I heart Utica Club. Fun facts about "UC" (or Uncle Charlie's as we call it):
1. First beer sold in the United States after prohibition.
2. Only sold and distributed within 90 miles of Utica, New York.
You know you're an Alaskan powder enthusiast when... a Backcountry Ski Magazine is on your dashboard at the trailhead, and your windshield is splattered with State Parks passes.
The Chugach Front Range certainly did not get the amount of wind that Turnagain Pass had over the weekend. I expected the normal boilerplate, but was rewarded with some nice wind-buffed powder. The ridge tops were pretty scoured, but gullies and lower elevation runs held good skiable snow.
Tyler snagging first tracks.
Disclaimer: There was no trespassing conducted during the making of these powder turns.
The clouds finally blew in yesterday and gave SCAK a little bit of low pressure. Flat light proved our descent of the south face of Eddie's fairly challenging. Josh and I skied a steep south facing shot into Ingram Creek on Wednesday. Just as we were skinning out, the clouds broke and gave way to clear skies.
Josh contemplates which way his sluff is going to go.
Today B-real and I headed up to Hatcher Pass to see what Eddie and the crew have been boasting about. We headed up Microdot and skied the shady north face - known more commonly as "Nosebleed". This is my favorite run in HP. We only saw a party of two walking behind us, and a mere 3 cars in the parking lot on our return.
Tyler sees the light......or lack there of.
The viz was kind of in-and-out. We dug a pit at the top of our run. Typical shallow snowpack of Hatcher Pass (and Eagle River for that matter). Facet farms at the bottom of our column, with failure at the ground.
That's a wrap for skiing the last 18 out of 20 days. Tomorrow is a rest day. I guess if you call a rest day skinny skiing, then its a rest day. Or I may go out and see what this storm has brought us.....
