Memorial Day Beartooth Adventures

The close to a grueling testimony of responsibility and dedication brought a ski car camp mission to the Beartooth's to celebrate memorial day. I was very excited to have my beautiful wife Jenny along although her recovery from restoration surgery of her shoulder prevented her from skiing. 

Showing up mid evening on Saturday, most spots close to the Beartooth Highway were taken. The abundance of orv's and generators motivated us to push far up the road seeking isolation from the domesticated populous. We succeeded and found a splendid camp adjacent to a low gradient section of Rock Creek, littered with boulders for scrambling fun!

Our ski objective, June Couloir, from camp.

A gorgeous view from camp up Rock Creek.

Getting closer.

We made quick work of the elevation gain but our nerves were being tested with frequent and close lightning. It is an almost certainty that any adventure in the Beartooth's will have weather. 

Mike nearing our high point.

The lightning, coupled with the abundance of debris kicking off the top and funneling down the couloir, provoked us to click in and descend. 

Mike McClure shredding June Couloir!

The skiing was perfect corn and made for some great turns!

With time to spare and our marginal weather in a holding pattern, we decided to boot up the adjacent couloir. This chute appears to have a mandatory air at its bottom but careful inspection reveals a side gully around the cliff. We booted up until the steepness was beginning to scratch my nerves again so we started our descent. A very similar sensation to Bridger Bowl was experienced while skiing to the top and traversing above the cliff. 

My highpoint on the adjacent couloir. The angle steepens significantly at the pinch.

Our initial plan was to ski these backcountry lines on Saturday and head to the pass for some car laps on Sunday. However, typical Beartooth weather prevented our Sunday lines as a spring snow and wind storm moved in and closed the road. 

A great ski adventure was had. Great camping, huge demanding mountains, and wonderful company had every time in the Beartooth's will keep me returning here for the years to come! 

One happy camper.

Idaho goods

This weekend brought great adventures while visiting Mr. Mike McClure in his new found hometown. After a couple quick tasks, I was leaving work mid morning to load the van and hit the road. After 5.5 hours of desolate western highway driving, admiring the endless possiblilities of the Southern Madison Range and the Henery's Fork Mountains, later trying to stay cool crossing the desert of the INL site, I arrived and Mike's house and he generously showed me his private fishing stash with productive result.

I was somewhat surprised to see such a low snow line on the range. That of course means hoofing it with skis on backs. 

Where's the snow?

Mike's recent pruning efforts provided efficient travel on the initial hike that followed a climber's/game trail up the creek. 

A surprise companion on the trip was Lloyd Corwin of Idaho Falls. Mike, amazed to see skis on a random vehicle in town before my arrival approached Lloyd in the cafe, demanded an explanation, and invited him for a day in the hills. Lloyd is a nuclear engineer at INL living in Idaho Falls, a former ski instructor, and one hell of an awesome dude!

Lloyd Corwin at the ski/foot transition.

Once we reached the skin line, I noticed a lone skinner higher in the basin. Was this a real person or a rock or stump? I watched longer and sure enough it was a real person moving! But from where did this person come? There were no other vehicles at the "trailhead". Did he descend Brietenback from the other side of the range and was now skining back out? Mike, again craving ski partners, raced away from Lloyd and I to attempt a meeting with the mysterious skinner. We missed him but later on our ascent, the mysterious skinner skied to us and we met Steve from Pokey, an experienced ski mountaineer of the region. He and Mike exchanged numbers, he skinned up with us for another 1000', and descended from our day. We learned he had approached from the Super Gully trailhead on Lost River Mountain. Leaving Steve, we were making quick work as we entered the upper basin. 

Mike McClure making quick work of the nice grade into the upper basin.

After some technical skinning with one ski on steep talus while the other was relying gratuitously on a detached cornice, we reached the false-summit of Mt. Breihtenbach (~12,000). 

McClure refuels before a Spring decent with Mt. Breihtenbach in the background. 

Once refueled and primed, the decent commenced. We traversed the ridge, crossing several scree sections taking little precautions for base preservation with the objective nearing and the stoke high. Oddly, after seeing McClure step through rocky sections, without any communication or Mike's attention, green Lloyd descended abruptly down the main face. I shrugged at the notion and contemplated yelling for him to stop. Figuring he seemed okay and the risk was only somewhat prevalent, I simply watched until he was below a roll over and rejoined Mike to a few more rock traverses until we reached our objective. Lesson: ensure the entire party is aware of the objective and communicate. Naturally, we assumed he would just follow us, eventually it turned out okay but in winter conditions this would be completely unacceptable form. Not all to blame on Lloyd though as his nickname implies, he's somewhat green around the edges and obviously we had no formal discussion of "the plan" so are equally at fault. After we observed Lloyd safely clear his run, we descended. As a great guide does, Mike offered me first corn tracks down the prominent double coulair. I won't exaggerate, the semi-quality spring snow was somewhat challenging but once I found a rhythm balancing weight and momentum of my turns to the penetrable and heavy upper 12" of the snowpack, I was shredding the line without hesitation. Mike followed with a repeat of the coulair he skied the past weekend only to traverse into my coulair mid-face. 

Mike executing flawless form on spring snow. 

We decided rather than another lap, we should descend to the laborious hike out followed by cold beer that awaited in the truck. 

What a great day! Mike and I made a new friend and we all shredded a high alpine peak in (mostly) great spring corn!

Mike and I were contemplating the next day's objective. We drove north to observe how the snowpack was holding up on those mountians. We initially were considering Dickey Peak but serious lack of snow drove our attention to the Grand Prize that is Mt. Borah, Idaho's highest peak. Should we take it easy so I can get home early and be ready for work Monday? HELL NO! Not that old yet! At 12,699 ft, the standard route climbs 5,500' in 3.5 miles from the trailhead. 

Mt. Borah from US HWY 93.

We decided to get a mildly early start, leaving Mike's house at 6 am for a 7 am trailhead departure. Making quick work of the elevation gain, we took a break and relished the viewshed. 

The objective is the looker's right coulair starting clean at the top ending in a mess of outcroppings.

After more ridgeline slogging we reached "chicken out ridge". Being the highest peak in Idaho, the venue sees a large number of regular attempts ranging from mountain experts to semi-advanced hikers. As the name implies, a large portion of all attempts end at the chicken out ridge due to its attention getting exposure and required confidence. For gripping reasons, I took only a few photos along the ridge which conveniently turned out blurry. Geez, these darn smartphones can't even consistently take crisp, balanced pictures. 

We finally reached the summit after some gripping knife-edged ridge traversing and front pointing. Again practicing good guide form, Mike sensed my anxiety and offered to start off the descent. 

Quite a long run, I'm guessing around 3,000', we leapfrogged our way through the upper coulair where "mostly" consistent snow made for great turns. 

We arrived at the technical lower section of the face where Mike executed perfect steep skiing form.

 And approached the crux section (WI2). 

After some traversing of the bottom face, we cursed as we skied through recent wet slide debris and awful snowpack. Ever have your tips sink no matter how far you lean back? We finally reached the transition zone and bountifully hiked through soft forest and meadow to the car. 

Wow, I almost forgot the classic "Reverse McClure" descent technique. He's actually faster than myself walking normal down a steep slope and his knees feel great!

What a great trip. I owe many thanks to my unpaid guide Mike. He graciously showed me his treasures and I eagerly accepted! Looking forward to subsequent visits. Certainly one for the memory books. After returning to work the last couple days I can't wait until the weekend when I can venture into the mountains again and continue to have vividly real experiences like these that make me really feel alive! 

Crazy Corn

This past weekend, happenstance brought two of my best buddies to town for a visit: Ty Gittins and Mike McClure. Both have spent many years in Bozeman getting degrees while honing their skiing and climbing technique but have relocated for career opportunities. A common tale in this town since jobs are limited and competition is high.

The NOAA point forecast for the Crazies at elevation was suggesting wind with highs in the 70s, not the most inspiring conditions and given our recent winter bursts I was hoping for some pow. Albeit, I was stoked to get in the high country with great friends.

The road approach

We arrived at the campground just before 9 am, an alpine start by the workingman's standards. Important decisions were made regarding footwear for the initial approach that was discontinuous snow cover between longer sections of dry trail. All three of us elected to hike in our touring boots with skis on packs.

After a short mile and a half and some discussion as to what aspect will favor good skiing, we ascended 700' of a snow filled coulair on the lower north aspect of Big T Peak. A strange transitional snowpack exhibiting a low density upper 1 - 2 feet capping denser snow below had me craving more experience in this type of condition as my nerves were being tested on the steepening slopes. Upon climbing about 700', an ice crust was encountered, almost certainly making the skiing gawdawful. We all agreed to descend and focus our efforts on the sunny side of the canyon with hopes that the consistent strong winds would keep rapid melting at bay.

Our line just left off the ridge center image

After another mile and a half of flatlanded skinning we reached the toe of the couloir we had targeted from the top of the previous run. We did some planning for the ascent route, a mixture of skinning and bootpacking. The couloir was about 100' wide and ran about 2000' to the north ridge defining the canyon. Ty and I elected to start bootpacking up the couloir proper, as this provides a means of assessing the conditions. Conversely, Mike chose to climb the boulder/scree field adjacent to the couloir.

Ty slogging 2000' vert

Swapping trail breaking duty, Ty and I gazed at Mike crawling up the scree and cursed him to come help us break trail to no avail. Regardless, Ty and I reached a high point about 300' shy of the ridge and Ty was ready to shred probably due to the beginning of an ice crust forming from the decreasing temps at elevation. Our curiosity had Mike and I pressing onward to the ridge to inspect the viewshed. The beautiful view was difficult to enjoy while I experienced the most powerful ridgeline winds ever. My clothes were inflated, micro sized ice pellets were blasting my exposed skin, and the loose ridgeline rocks were making me nervous as I envisioned myself being blown off the ridge. Time to shred!

To our surprise, the crust up top broke easily and revealed easily pushable corn snow beneath. As I reached Ty's starting elevation (he was long gone to the bottom) the conditions were improving. It felt like effortless, bottomless winter powder! I can't believe corn skiing can be this good. We all held fast continuous lines for the entire 2000', what an amazing run!!!

View up Big T canyon

At the bottom we all high fived and decided it was worth another lap. Another hour (+?) of slogging brought us to the top of a spur tributary couloir we had left untracked. I offered to go first and stop partway to take some photos.

Ty enjoying the view of Granite Peak.

Mike slicing some great Spring corn.

After another glorious corn run, with conditions warmer than our first run, we noticed pinwheel formation and some larger masses of snow moving downslope so decided it was time to receed from the sun.















We skied most of the way down trail to the car, with the exception of about a half a mile walk. Tired, we cracked a few High Life's and basked in the trailhead parking lot to the last rays of sunshine with sunburnt faces typical of Spring skiing!

Mike perfecting his dynamic kick turn technique.

Great trip, thanks boys!

Corn Fest 2013

Here's some photos of corn festival this past weekend. I rolled in late Friday night to meet the boys from billings in secret city. Dugan (my high school buddy), Swainer, and Freddy. We had a couple beers and fired up Freddy's snocat for a midnight ride. We skied two laps by moonlight down daisy pass road, in dumping conditions.

I woke in the back of my truck, foggy, to the early morning roar of snowmobiles firing up for the day's adventures. After breakfast we gassed up the cat, Ryan jumped in, and we headed for lulu pass road. After a couple beers swainer tandamed me up Rob's knob for a lap of freshies. After another lap and a few beers at the base party area, local ripper Joe showed us the famous pillow lines of goose creek. A spectacular run, we returned to the party in full on whiteout conditions. Thanks to Joe for showing us the way, we would have otherwise likely ended up in Yellowstone.

Back at the party we were pleased to find free beer and brats courtesy of big sky brewing. Thanks guys you rock!

After more beers we rallied towards daisy pass. Swainer graciously let me play on his 2013 800 xp, sick! Rallying the pow takes some getting used too but is super fun. I'm now plotting on how to get a sled of my own.

We were stopped by a SAR dude requesting we aid in a rescue. We waited a while, then Swainer went up to check on that group. Turns out they did not need help from the cat, you're welcome anyways. After soaking up the last rays of sunshine, we hoped in the cat and returned to town. I said my goodbyes. Driving through Yellowstone on the way home I saw beautiful sunset, plenty of bison, numerous elk, and two wolves!

I rolled into Bozeman late, barely staying awake to cuddle with my beautiful wife :-).

Great trip, thanks boys!

Intro

Well, I've finally started an adventure blog like all my friends. I figure its a great way to document our outerworldly adventures and provide a creative outlet.

Hopefully, I will stick to it! Stay tuned.
Matt