On my first day my buddy had to work so one of my contacts SFB picked me up and lent me a friends pass for a lift ride up and out.
Anywho, here is my new touring setup. The whole thing mount included was less than $500. Dynafit speed turns were on sale and so were the skis, salomon Q98's at evo outlet. I went with the 188's. They are an awesome ski! I would love to get a pair for solely inbounds. I was also really impressed with the dynafits. They felt great even skiing hard inbounds on firm snow and chunder. the skis are very lightweight and are excellent do-it-all touring skis.
We hiked fantasy ridge above summit chair and it definitely caught me off guard! I have heard about it for years but never though much of it "oh, it's just a bootpack up the mtn, whatever" but it's actually pretty exposed and technical/scary. We had just had a safety meeting and I was a bit giddy until I saw the knife edge we were about to cross.
Another dude above us "dry humping the knife edge"
We made it to the top and as the horizon kept rolling over with each passing step I knew what was about to come into sight and my excitement was through the roof!
OMG it had been way too long and the pic does no justice whatsoever! It's the best place in the world.
SFB and I went out to davenport's into silver fork. It hadn't snowed in 9 or 10 days before I arrived so i wasn't sure what the snow would be like. I wasn't expecting much. Boy was I surprised! I should have known, it's Utah! It never got too windy and it didn't even stay that cold, but it was dry and even through the warm temps the snow had radiational cooling and anything within 20 or so degrees of true north had fantastic snow. Cold, settled powder is a beautiful thing.
Friday Logan and I skied at the resort again and did the same scary hike but we opted to drop back into the resort via Shot 22. Shot 22 starts from what I think is the 2nd highest point along fantasy ridge? Whatever, it's tight, steep, and pretty long. It was a great run even though I would have preferred a little more width through the choke.
Saturday we went up and toured. The objective was Red Baldy and maybe Lake Peak if we were feeling up to it.
It's about 3.7 miles and 3800' to the top from the trailhead. I was feeling it!
It was a warm day for the most part but not at 11,200'. The wind was whipping and blowing snow around a lot. I only had sunglasses so we didn't stay on the summit long.
Pfeiff and friends
From L to R: Broads fork twins (salt lake twins), O'Sullivan, Dromedary Peak
The ski down was fun, conditions were variable to say the least. Everything from sun crust, windboard, sastrugi, settled powder, and ice.
Feeling good
We decided to go onto Lake Peak. If it's not deep, let it be steep! We ascended the main chute just below the lookers right ridge. We were able to skin a good ways but had to boot most all of the chute.
Nice Apron!
With a long way to go. And it gets steeper.
The sun was getting lower in the sky and we saw a really impressive lightshow. Alpenglow was not far behind the sun's rays.
The top 1/3 of the booter disappeared and we thought we were going right, but we ended up in a bad spot. It kept getting steeper and the snow was deteriorating into a big mess of facets and sugary rot. I got a little freaked out but it ended up ok. We were above some rocks on rotten snow on a seep slope (48-50 degrees?) and I felt like I was about to fall off the mtn each step I had to take.
Sunday we did sidecountry in hidden canon and pioneer ridge. Monday we did a mini tour up twin lakes pass, but the weather wasn't too kind and we were absolutely spent, but the last turns were creamy goodness.
Jah is watching
I got some pov footage I might put something together. I'm going back in march so I might wait till after that trip
