Adam came out for his second day of the season and we awoke to a few inches of new snow in town, with maybe a bit more at the upper parking lot. It continued to snow as we cross country snowboarded to the far end of the lake, but by the time we were half way up Grizzly Pass the snow had stopped and the blue skies looked like they were on their way in.

We headed up the south side of pass towards the smaller of the two chutes I'd seen on the ridge. The plan was to take a look and bag it if it looked good and if not, just enjoy a longer powder run down to the meadows. With only a bit of exploring, I found the entrance, but from the angles I could see it almost looked like there was a small mandatory at the bottom. I didn't have the image on the camera anymore, but from memory, I was pretty positive it went and that there was only two chutes on the ridge. By process of elimination this had to be the one, right? None of this gave Adam a whole bunch of confidence when I offered to let him have first tracks. I'd also given him the Venture to try today - nothing like making your first turns of the day on a new (rockered) board on only your second day of the season into the unknown. He made a couple of timid turns into the chute until his line of sight permitted him to confirm there was no mandatory, then stepped on the gas pedal and charged the rest of it and the slope beneath. I was right behind him and felt a bit timid myself being back on a cambered board. A few turns and it felt like home being back on the Khyber though. Adam named this one Indecision Chute for fairly obvious reasons.

From the bottom of the meadows, we opted to recycle my up to the Herbst thanks to the mostly blue skies. With snow in the forecast for today, we were stoked to be able to get up high and enjoy the views. Near the top of the ramp, we opted to boot pack rather than put in switchbacks and we gained the ridge in no time. From there we continued to skin up with plans on getting up above at least one of the cliff bands. The weather had other plans and with the ceiling dropping, we were turned back at about the same height as I'd made it to solo. I headed for the other exit that dumps directly into the meadows this time. It has a bit of a tight choke with blue ice on the one side which concerned me a bit, but once above it and looking down, I was a lot more confident. Even if there was ice beneath the choke, it wouldn't have been that big of a deal. In the end there was no ice and soft turns were enjoyed down to the meadow. I named this exit the Herbst Hallway and after talking a bit we decided to go back the for the only remaining chute on this ridge.

I put in the up to gain Grizzly Pass then tied into the first up of the day. A few switchbacks higher brought us to Big Decision. We'd named it before we even started to climb - it seemed to fit given the Indecision name for the smaller one. It's a bigger chute with larger consequences on a poor stability day (which today wasn't). It looked to be a straight shot when viewed from the bottom, with just one piece of rock to maneuver around. As it turns out, Big Decision was a very apt name when viewed from the top. That one piece of rock turned out to be a very pointy mandatory and the path beside it was very tight and in very close proximity to a cliff band that was littered with icicles. The big decision in this case was will this snow hold? Can I get a turn in before the choke? And what's around the corner? In the end, there were too many questions so the Big Decision was to leave it for another day when there's either more snow or we have a rope. Plan B involved descending what we'd just climbed and then dumping into the trees which we'd skinned up through to gain the pass. This resulted in probably the best snow of the day.

Once again down in the meadows, I opted to recycle the up to East Knob from a few days ago. We soon crossed the border and headed for the bowling alley. We found an untracked lane with great powder all the way down to the lake. Once down and skinning back across the lake, we saw evidence of quite a few groups making laps off the knob today. Talking to the Moose tonight, he'd counted about 15 people including his own group today. That might make it one of the busiest days I've seen n my park, although today I spent most of my time in that other park south of the border.

Total up today was 5,510 feet, probable first descents were 2, and number of people seen where we were riding was 0. Today put me over 200,000 feet for the season. It was my 42nd of the year and I rode 22 of 31 days in January.

I travel with backups of just about everything - two boards, extra bindings, two pairs of poles, etc. I managed to forget both pairs of poles this morning, so after arriving at the trail head at 9:15 with the Moose and Mrs. Moose, I had to bail and return at 10:00 with the poles. They'd made a partial lap off the Knob before joining me in heading up Grizzly Pass. We tried a lap off the head wall with little success as the wind had messed things up.

We gained the pass again and then dropped down to the meadows. I split skied the whole thing and linked turns. We recycled the up towards Herbst Glacier until we gained the Warden's Knob where we soon found a tree that the Moose liked. For reasons still not clear, he climbed it and I took a picture.

We dropped down the east aspect to the creek and found much better snow. From there we recycled my other up of a few days ago and dropped to the north, finding much better snow. One final climb up from boundary creek to the Knob and a lap down the Landing Strip where things are starting to get pretty tracked out, but there were still pockets of soft. Total up was 5,460 feet.

The winds picked up over night and were forecast to be active during the day along with mostly clear skies. I decided to head for the Galloway Bowl with hopes of getting some views to the Herbst Glacier that weren't afforded last spring when we made the trek for the first time ever.

I recycled the up and dropped from the same spot on the backside of the knob. The wind had beat me and the open slope was mostly toast already. This time I descended until I couldn't anymore rather than traversing over towards Herbst. Skins on I was relying on memory and a handful of gps waypoints from last spring. I really need to get the US topo data soon! I got a bit off track and gained some elevation, only to have to give it away. In the dense forest at the bottom of the valley it's virtually impossible to see any landmarks. There are numerous creeks to cross, most of which are at the bottoms of fairly steep banks.

Soon enough I started to gain the ridge, which we didn't name last year, so I'm going to call it H.S. Ridge. That may or may not stand for Homeland Security Ridge. The wind hadn't been able to penetrate down into the forest so trail breaking was light to moderate. Eventually the distinctive east ridge appeared followed shortly by the buttress at the top of the Galloway bowl. I made my way to the bottom and debated making a lap. It's an extra 1,000 feet of trail breaking and it'd be a shame to come all this way and not bag it, but time wasn't on my side. I opted to head down via the same exit we'd taken last spring. It was also left unnamed, but given that it's on the H.S. Ridge, it's only natural to call it H.S. Chute. Could that be the Holy Shit Chute? There is one a bit to the south that looks to have a pretty big mandatory in the middle of it. This one goes all the way and is probably called Homeland Security Chute. I grabbed some nice photos of Herbst Glacier before enjoying great turns all the way down.

I opted to take a different route back home this time. I had broken in the up from the Grizzly Pass meadow a few days ago so all I needed to do was skirt the one high point between me and the meadow and then recycle the up. A couple of creek crossings led me to the base of the high point and I changed my mind - rather than going around it, I was going to climb it. I soon gained the top of it, named it Warden's Knob (we once ran into park warden's on the wrong side of the 49 - they were on their way back from skiing this feature), and made a half dozen turns down to the meadow. The up track soon became filled with hard slab, while the adjoining snow was scoured, but with a very light wind crust. It was easier to re-break than to deal with the side slipping when the skin track wide hard slab would break with each step. Not what I'd hoped for as it burned time and energy - both things I was running short on.

I finally crested Summit Ridge and headed for the Hook. It offered up more good turns thanks to the shelter. I bailed on the open slopes that normally greet you at the end of the Hook and instead traversed over to just beside Christmas Tree Hell before enjoying a few more sheltered powder turns down the lake.

The wind on the lake was down right miserable - goggles and big gloves until I hit the shore. Head lamp came on near the Akamina Pass trail head and I finally arrived at the vehicle after 13.9 miles and 6,270 feet.

Greg Hill famously climbed 1,000,000 feet in a season a few years ago. He skis big lines and climbs like a mountain goat, but now he's on a new quest.....

2,000,000 feet in a calendar year starting as of January 1st, 2010. The math is stunning - 365 days means if he skied every single day he'd need 5,480 each time. Even with a planned trip to the southern hemisphere, riding every single day isn't going to happen.

He is an inspiration to the entire touring community and some day, somewhere, in some hemisphere, I'd like to share a skin track with him. I know the Moose would as well. With a lofty goal like he has this year, I think we'll need to starting punching out 5 digit days on a fairly regular basis though before we get our shot...

The forecast was for clear skies and calm winds, so I continued with yesterday's theme of exploring new areas. I headed for the small zone I'd missed seeing for several years until I took a closer look from the top of Moose Peak with the dslr. I headed up Akamina Pass and took the summer trail towards Forum Lake.

The Moose tracked out Lemming Lane on Sunday and had said he saw people in this zone - as I neared and saw what looked like snowboard and ski tracks I wondered if the people he saw was actually the Moose Posse. Once I started up the skin track I quickly dismissed that idea as it was very shallow and very poacher friendly. Definitely not a Moose up. It was a short climb to the col where I peaked down at Wall Lake and tried to remember where that chute was. I couldn't find anything that for sure went, so I continued on up the ridge towards the triangle. The group from Sunday was dropping quite low, but the more interesting terrain is up higher. I started skinning up and quickly got forced into boot packing. I switched back to skins once before going back to boot packing again. The snow was quite faceted around the rocks and made for slow progress. Once I gained the high point of what I'm going to call the Alpine Triangle (homage to the Tree Triangle in the Asulkan Valley at Rogers Pass), I decided to keep on exploring. The chute run I wanted would have been fun but it will have to wait for another day as I elected to continue the ridge walk.

The Akamina Ridge is supposed to be one of the better ridge walks in the Rockies. I'd never been up before - summer or winter. Super scoured and monster cornices were the norms. Nearing the first high point, I saw the summit of Custer and quickly realized it'll never see turns from the top. After the first high point, there were three more to gain and descend from. It was a lot of walking and down climbing, but it allowed to me to scout terrain to the south that I've been obsessing over via Google Earth and topo maps. So much beautiful terrain. Definitely some disappointments (the Rockies will do that to you), but still lots of rideable terrain that I'll wager has never seen turns. I even found the Pterodactyl of my park - well technically it's in the adjoining BC provincial park, but that one's mine too.

I soon found my way down to the top of Bennet Pass which I'd ridden from the bottom up on Thanksgiving this year. This time there was enough snow to ride it from the top, but it was corniced in spots and I was worried about dust on crust. I found a route to down climb and came up against the hardest snow of the day. Slowly but surely I found my way to a point where I could finally convert to downhill mode. The first ten or so turns had me puckering and wishing I had an ice axe, but this soon gave way to glorious powder. I rode all the way down to Wall Lake and then took the very long cross country snowboard back to the vehicle. I was able to de-skin and slide sideways down the Akamina Pass trail and with some double poling managed to keep sliding sideways almost all the way to the vehicle. A long day with not many turns, but some amazing views. Total up was 4,230 feet and distance covered was a half marathon (13.1 miles!) I also managed to break the lower lace retention thing on my boot in the morning while gearing up and during the course of the day, also managed to break the upper strap on my pack. The pack was an easy fix, but the boots will turn out to be a pain in the ass.

One of my goals this winter is to explore new areas in my park. Lapping powder is fun, but with increased fitness it can tend to be become repetitive. I set out today to explore an area technically outside of my park as it's south of the 49th.

Herbst Glacier looked promising on the topo maps - it's a north east aspect off of Mt. Custer. It's a bit of a walk but that's why it's likely not seen tracks before. I left the vehicle at 9 and recycled the up from yesterday before dropping down into Boundary Creek. I started a traverse near about 3/4 of the way to the bottom rather than following it right down like we did last year for the Galloway Bowl. I soon ran out of traverse capability and switched to skins. I followed the contour around and soon arrived at the meadow beneath Grizzly Pass.

I trended to the climber's left and followed the large timber up and past a large horizontal cliff band. I soon found a natural ramp that permitted me to get past the next cliff band. It steepened up quite a bit and required numerous switchbacks, but the new storm snow was bonding quite nicely up here on this aspect. I eventually gained a ridge that gave me my first good look at the face in question. As is often the case, the face gets less and less steep looking the closer you get. There were some moraine looking features and a couple of recent loose snow avalanches were noted.

I followed the prominent rib up towards the base of the next cliff bands. I soon spied a couloir that dropped from the ridge. It looked to be the only line up to the visible ridge. There were some lines that would require some navigation through various cliff bands, but they seemed to terminate up high with impassible terrain. I departed the rib and headed towards the middle of the slope with plans for a closer look at the couloir. I put switchbacks into the loose snow bed surface and found the snow to be very soft. As I got closer, I could see a couple of thin rock bands hiding under the surface of the couloir and elected to stop the climb for today. It was almost completely blue and eerily calm. It's not often that my park (or the one south of the 49th) isn't windy, but this was the second straight day. With some more snow and a partner, I believe this couloir will see tracks this year.

I enjoyed terrific powder turns down the moraine before I descended down the steep ramp, hung a left and headed towards a gap in the lowest cliff band then down to the meadow. I was still on the wrong side of the knob and needed to gain the ridge to get home. There's some nice open spaces on this side of Summit Ridge and I slowly but surely busted in the required up. Near the top I was starting to feel it. I was just shy of 5,000 feet and about 70% of that was trail breaking. I opted for another lap and once again enjoyed more great powder turns down to the meadow. It seems the storm snow has consolidated a bit as I never felt a crust on this lap either. Once switched over and pointed back up hill, I thoroughly enjoyed the second climb thanks to my efforts on the first climb.

On top of Summit Ridge, I crossed back into my park and country, making sure to declare the powder turns I'd gotten while out of the country. I headed to the Scimitar and had a blast on the way down until I hit the apron above the peninsula. It had acquired a few death cookies, but they were confined to a fairly short band of elevation. Once through them it was all blower back down to the lake. One final switchover and then the long walk back to the vehicle. Total up today 6,180 and distance covered was 12.8 miles.

After taking yesterday off to watch Treepilot Jr. link turns at his second snowboard lesson, I met up with the Moose and his skier friend Brian this morning at the usual spot. I was running a bit late, but we were starting the cross country snowboard by just before 9AM.

The park had gotten some snow that missed the surrounding ski hills. The weather station was reporting about 15 cms of new, but we found 25 to 30 up high. It was super light stuff over top of a thin layer of old consolidated snow, over top of a solid crust. The first few climbs were quite difficult with a lot of slipping and sliding, but the three of us eventually hammered out a pretty good up.

I made two laps down the landing strip, and one down the bowling alley. Brian was spent and headed back to the vehicle so the Moose and I made another lap coming down Knob North. Blower snow on all four laps, but I found myself holding back a bit due to buried cookies. Conditions should improve as this storm snow sets up a bit. I debated a fifth lap, but elected to save some for tomorrow. The days are getting noticeably longer - it was 4pm when I started the exit and there's enough light that you could still be riding up til 5:30pm.

No pictures today but another 6,270 added to the tally and I hit the halfway mark for 5,000+ days with #25.

I met Dave H. and Rich in town early and we were the first group to leave the parking lot up high at 7:30am. We were headed north to explore a new zone around Wolf Peak. There was supposedly a cabin somewhere up there too.

From the parking lot, we gained Cornice Ridge, then Buzz's ridge, then followed it around until we hit the high spot that I'd split skied from yesterday. We descended north from here through a nice chute with some decent snow, then toured straight north along a ridge that tees into a bowl above Waldie Lake. Google Earth and the topo maps suggested this might have a few entry points. We pretty much stumbled on a very promising one as soon as we gained the top. Dave took a few cautious steps down into the bowl and dug a pit. CTE(2) down 30 sudden planar followed by a few pretty clean CTM's down 60 and 80 or so fueled the retreat. It was a short shot, but had exposure on the fall line. We poked around a bit more and found a protected entrance via some trees. Nothing ended up moving and we enjoyed playing on the natural gullies down to the bottom of the bowl.

We toured north following the creek to Waldie Lake. There's no flat terrain beside the east and west edges of the lake as the mountain meets the lake, so any cabin would have to be at the north end - a half mile walk. We headed across the lake and soon found no cabin. Looking at the maps, we think it's closer to the end of the logging road, which is another mile and about 500 feet lower than the north end of the lake. Since we weren't planning on spending the night, the search for the cabin was abandoned and we stopped for lunch. This area offered up lines everywhere we looked - several big chutes and one large un-kootenay looking rock feature that would be more at home in Roger's Pass.

We headed east up to the smaller un-named lake under Wolf Peak and set our sites on the summit of Wolf. Yet more lines revealed themselves and we soon were nearing the summit. Once gaining the final ridge we saw that the summit is split into two pieces by a small channel. We opted for the northern summit and after picking our way through a few rocky bits descended down the north face and wrapped around to the east towards Pristine Pass. From there we toured up to the high point on the ridge between Pristine Pass and Windy Ridge. Several very appealing lines were encountered on the north face of this ridge, but we were running short on daylight. We dropped south towards the power lines and enjoyed some wide open old growth trees. Soon we ran out of usable down hill and switched to ski mode sans skins. Under the buzzing power lines and then out via someone's up track. 10 minutes of poling and we were at the Creston side parking lot. Thumbs illuminated by headlamp and the three of us were quickly given a ride back to the vehicle on the top of the pass. Total up today was 5,310 feet, we covered 11.3 miles, and found so many new things to go back and bag on another day.

I was solo again today but an old friend decided to join me. He didn't make his appearance until after I decided to head north from the parking lot. It's about 400 feet up to gain a view into the bowl and with my lack of corrected vision, I thought it looked pretty good. Part way up the climb along the ridge to the top of Cornice Ridge, my old friend made his appearance. I'd guesstimate he was 80 gusting 100 but he blew in from the north east. It seems he must have been lurking over night as well because the slopes that previously looked pretty good now were showing obvious signs of wind affect. I debated turning around and heading to the trees on the other side of the road, but mostly blue skies and a desire to see what was off the north side of Buzz's ridge kept my face buried behind a toque, collar, hood and goggles.

I'd previously only spent two days north of the parking lot and didn't have very good visibility the day I went to Buzz's ridge. There's definitely some terrain available, but with the reverse loading (and scouring) it looked to be best left for another day. I tour without corrective glasses and have a contact lens phobia so my evaluation of distant slopes is suspect at best. When in doubt, I generally assume the worst. Maybe they were fine, but I thought the bowl between Cornice and Buzz was good too.

I kept wrapping around the ridge until I got over top of some trees. They snow would be better due to the shelter, but the aspect was now pretty much pure south and my other old friend - that big yellow ball in the sky - was doing his stuff. The turns were good but getting heavy. At the bottom I considered another lap - the only way up I knew was around the ridge and back to wind hell. The slope I'd just descended was quite steep and breaking switchback hell for average turns wasn't that appealing.

I made the walk out and up to the ridge above the lake, got some below average turns back to the vehicle and looked at my watch. It was past noon - leaving about 4 hours of daylight. With the lack of snow lately, it'd be a bit of a walk to find something fresh - the return on investment for walk in/out vs laps didn't appeal to me, so I drove down to the Creston side parking lot. I'd heard that some people tour by where the power lines cross the road - it turned out to be the same spot where I sat and waited for a tow truck when my transmission blew up a few years ago.

This parking lot is about a thousand feet lower than the top of the pass, which due to the precarious state of winter this year meant that you'd need to climb quite a bit before getting into good snow, but with this aspect being south facing, you might run out of mountain before finding the goods. It's a place I will return to when the snow is good down low - with about 2,000 feet of relief, it looks to be some of the longer vertical available here.

I decided to go for a drive and see what the local touring book had talked about for touring around Red Mountain. On the way through Trail, I nearly cried when I saw the famous covered staircase that Blair and I had ridden a few years ago. It was crusty when we hit it, but in the snowboard movies that made it famous, they had blower powder. Today is was dry. I bookmarked the gps locations of the touring parking spots by Red and will investigate options on the maps. For what it's worth, there weren't many locals touring, which might tell me all I need to know.

An abbreviated day and an embarrassing 2,170 feet .

I met up with Adam today and we opted to head to an area neither of us had been to before. The Crags is east of Baldy Rocks and looks intimidating from the highway. There are likely some lines in there, but we opted to ride the backside of what you see in the link.

The tour starts by following the standard climb up Baldy Rocks - I was amazed again at how much smaller it felt today - I must be getting stronger as we were nearing the summit in no time flat. We stopped just shy of the true summit and started the traverse to the east. Getting to the Crags involves some up and down - there are two high points along the way which are only 200 feet or so up from the low points. This meant some split ski descents, which obviously meant some spectacular crashes. Along the way we found a couple of chutes which I bookmarked in the gps for later.

The summit of Crags was fairly wind affected, but lower down we found some great turns in the bowl that drops away from the road. We put in the up for the second lap along the other ridge - the snow was softer on this side and it made for easier climbing compared to the more pressed ridge. After the second lap, we put in a another new up that skirted the one high point to gain the saddle. From there we climbed up to the first high point to the east of Baldy Rocks where the chute was. By now the visibility we had earlier in the day had disappeared. Still enough to bag it but it would have been more fun with the views we had earlier in the day. It was a nice rock walled entrance that flared out after it turned to the left. Short but sweet.

One final climb up from the bottom of the bowl gained us the ridge over looking the department of highways sheds. We were soon on the summit of Baldy Rocks and tried to find some fresh lines. This is probably the most highly trafficked spot at the pass, so completely fresh didn't happen, but we did find some pockets in the trees. A solid day with some new views. Total up was 5,160 which I learned was Adam's second 5,000+ (his first was a couple of days ago)

The problem with hitting a new area solo is that it takes 3 laps to pack down the freshly broken up. The area I went to today isn't new to me, but it's been a couple of years since I was in there. Blair and I talked about going there yesterday but ended up elsewhere. It's a fun zone with lots of cliffs and pillows. It's also a northerly aspect too so the powder was sweet today.

After the third lap, I headed up to the top of the ridge, tried to find the "Old Faithful" chute, but missed it and instead found trees to pilot. No complaints there! Down to twin lakes where I jetboiled some lunch then headed up the other side. I spotted quite a few extra tracks beyond what we'd done yesterday, so I dropped from a different spot near where the up gains the ridge. I had a blast until I found myself cliffed out. It was a big one, probably 30 feet or so. I went with the gut instinct and took a peek to the left - there was a exit available - 10 feet or so to a steep landing, quick couple of turns then off a pillow to the bottom.

Once down I followed a couple days old exit around the bottom of the ridge, then opted to break a bit higher to pick up my up from the 3 laps in the morning. Fourth climb was perfect - finally a well packed up! At the join, I pointed it downhill and was soon back at the vehicle. Total up today was 5,310 feet, which puts me over 150,000 feet for the year meaning I'm 50% to target. Today was also the 22nd 5,000+ footer, so I'm close to halfway to the target as well. Despite some challenges, it's been a fantastic winter so far.

Kootenay Pass rarely disappoints and today was no exception. Blair and I met Dave H., Rich and their friend Adam up top at 8:30ish. We were skinning by 9:00. Blair just doubled his number of children before Christmas and hadn't been out yet this year. Dave is still in the process of getting over a broken collar bone from the summer, so I wasn't sure what to expect. I have this silly goal of achieving a certain amount of vertical, but sometimes it's nice just to enjoy the snow and camaraderie, so I went into the day with no real vertical goals. Whatever happened was fine with me.

We headed up towards the drop for twin lakes and I was surprised at how much smaller things seemed this year. I'm not sure why, but somehow the scale of things seemed to decrease for me. We gained the ridge in no time and shortly after that we were up top looking down a chute Dave has called the Gauntlet. It's a steep entry onto a northerly aspect followed quickly by a thin tree band which then gives way to a bit of a rock walled chute before opening right up into a large clearing which then transitions to a traditional slide path complete with some christmas trees. The turns were phenomenal - classic Kootenay Blower. It was also my first run on the demo Venture Storm. It's the rocker flavoured version - other than that it's largely the same shape as my Khyber. I can't say I really noticed too much difference on the descent - perhaps a bit more float on the nose, but nothing too significant. I did find myself up on the tail more though. I attribute this more to the upturned tail rather than the nose.

For the second lap we toured up the other side of twin lakes to the ridge, with plans to summit the "muffin". Upon reaching the tree line though, it didn't look so hot so Dave, Blair and I took a chute called LSD, while Rich and Adam jumped into the trees. Dave has never bagged this one, so he got honours. It's got a lot of south in it and Dave's cut into it didn't yield any results. Way less powder than the Gauntlet, but still a very fun shot back down to the same spot.

We stopped for lunch at the bottom and opted to make another lap through the trees that Rich and Adam had taken. I hopped off the established skin track on the climb back up and tested my theory about rockered boards on the up. My fears seem to be confirmed - I couldn't seem to punch in as steep of an up on the Venture. I also noticed that it often slipped on the established skin track. We were soon enough up at the top and I offered up a demo ride. Rich jumped at it, which put me on his 165 Prior Backcountry, which is actually Peter's old board. It's traditional non-tapered shape means you have to plan your turns a little ahead of time, but with increased physical exertion you can still make an elephant dance if you need to. I had a blast charging through the trees. Lots of pillows and cliffs to play on.

For the last climb, I let Rich complete the demo. His experience on the up was the same as mine. Slippage on the established and by now, very well packed up and also while test breaking. Dave broke another up beside Rich's on his cambered board and experienced virtually no slipping. Rich was super stoked on the descent, but coming from the traditional shape, I chalk his stoke up to the shape more so than the rocker.

This time at the top of the climb, we hung a right and went looking for a chute Dave was calling the Banana. He'd never ridden it and wasn't 100% sure where the entrance was. Another group had exited before us and sure enough their tracks more or less lead us to it. We (and they) missed the top entrance, but we still caught the bottom 3/4 of it. A great final descent with daylight fading. One final changeover, followed by a creek crossing and few hundred feet of climbing back up to the highway. 15 minutes of attempted hitchhiking eventually landed Adam a ride in the snowplow.

Total today was 5,030 feet up, which was my 21st 5,000+ footer of the year, but more importantly it was Blair's first ever. I believe his previous biggest was 3,870 last year at Teton Pass. First day of the year and he digs way down deep to crank out a day of this size. Everyone in the group including me was very impressed with his tenacity. Without a doubt the snow conditions provided him with motivation, but good snow or bad, you still walk up the same mountain.

The key thing is figuring out where. Sometimes it's obvious, other times not so much. Turns out I probably missed a few powder days close to home in the Moose's backyard. After yesterday's outing, I wasn't in a big hurry to get out today and left home at 8. It was 9:40 when I arrived at the Moose's house and we stopped again at the Cinnamon Bear Bakery. This time they were open and actually had buns. Very tasty, but still not as good as mom's. A 40 minute drive and we stopped at a nondescript spot on the side of the road. You'd never think this would take you to powder, which is just how the Moose wants to keep it. It was 11am before we were pointed up hill.

With a starting elevation of less than 5,000 feet and not much snow to begin with, things didn't look promising, but it was new terrain so I shuffled along up the trail. The snow depth steadily increased with elevation but it was still quite sticky. We crossed under a chute that is on the Moose's list and we opted to take a closer look. Two readily visible melt/freeze crusts that went easy, coupled with a rutschblock that failed as I stepped on it meant it's still on his list.

We soon gained the bottom of the destination bowl. It's a couple miles and 2,000 feet up from the road. Another 500-327 feet gains the ridge. Topping out on the ridge for the first time, I put my heel risers down to make the traverse along the top of the ridge easier, only to find that my heel didn't go down. The new Fuse bindings had accumulated a ton of snow under them. I unstrapped to take a closer look and promptly fell over into a buried christmas tree well.

The recessed area by the toe straps was packed with snow so densely I had to use a screwdriver to chisel it out. The few grams of weight saved here by this recess are not worth the hassle it creates. I think the inserts in the board that hold the touring bracket will be placed under considerable stress due to the lever action created by the fulcrum of snow and ice. All of your weight is in the heel and something has to give. The Fuse's are quite stiff thanks to their billet construction - which leads me to think it's only a matter of time before the screws or inserts give up.

After extracting myself from the tree well and cleaning the bindings, we traversed along the ridge a few hundred feet before switching over to board mode and dropping in. Wow! It was legitimate powder day. A few cliffs and numerous pillows were the norm over the next 5 laps. I stole the name from Valhalla Cats and coined the area Moose's Dick - it's short but sweet.

Total up was 5,430 feet of beautiful powder. I wish I'd gotten out of bed earlier and not spent the time poking around the chute. Short runs meant lots of switch overs, but the upside is you don't even have a chance to get tired with climbs that short. The exit was filled with alders and includes a mandatory creek ollie, but it dumps you back at the vehicle with only a bit of double pole skooching action.

After sulking for almost a week, second guessing not heading to Roger's Pass and almost dropping everything for the "once in a generation" storm that is/was supposed to hit the Sierra Nevada's, I found myself back in my park today along with Adam.

He missed the great start to winter by spending 6 weeks in Micronesia, Thailand and other sunny locations halfway around the world. Lots of diving, but no powder turns. I wanted to catch Treepilot Jr's first snowboard lesson and Adam was looking for an easy opening day so we went with low expectations and plans for a partial day. The weather station had reported about 10cms new in the past day and I was expecting to find a skating rink thick crust underneath. Turns were actually ok. Pretty good when you consider no turns for almost a week or down right incredible if you've spent the last little while swimming 60 to 80 feet below sea level. A single lap off Knob north and we headed back to the truck, then down the road to the dark side.

Treepilot Jr. was in ski lessons a few winters ago and was bitter because even young children know you should slide sideways. He was registered into a group lesson, but luckily the "group" turned out to be one, so he wound up with a private lesson. He rides regular (I think being goofy is almost as bad as skiing?) and was close to linking turns by the end of the day on the bunny hill.

I was in a puffy jacket, wearing running shoes, and using a borrowed board but I hiked the 150 foot bunny hill and made a final lap with him. Other than being mildly disgusted at my proximity to a chair lift, it was pretty nice to share some turns with him. If he's still stoked on it in a few years, maybe I'll make him a split and let him experience what riding is really all about.

Total up today, including the bunny hill bootpack was 1,850 feet.

I should have made another lap or two yesterday. I was lazy and worried about a day with the Moose. He bailed on today after we checked the forecast last night. I should have bailed too, but I had a faint sliver of optimism - maybe it would stay just cold enough that I could find some turns in the sheltered trees.

It's almost impossible to get motivated when the temperature at the weather station (almost 6,000 feet) reported +1.5 at 3am and it continued to rise. The forecast for the town site for the next 5 days is all on the wrong side of zero - sometimes into double digits. I procrastinated until about 10am and then finally got my stuff together and headed up. I was going to check out the Ruby Lake valley to see if there would be turns there. I parked at the Crandell trail head, where the truck said the outside air temperature was already +7C.

Snowshoers have packed this trail down nicely and I was able to travel with relative ease on this fairly flat summer trail. It gains a few hundred feet before benching out around Crandell Lake, where it falls off the other side towards the Red Rock Canyon road which is not plowed or open in winter. I followed the trail all the way down to Blakistan Creek, across the bridge, then I got off the trail and broke some wet sloppy trail for a few hundred feet to gain the road. At this point I was about an hour or 2 miles from the truck, about 3.5 miles to the Red Rock Canyon parking lot and 5 miles to the barricade on Highway 5. Coming this way saves about 3 miles of walking the road from the barricade. Is there touring terrain up here? Maybe, but it's likely beyond the day trip range. Going this route would provide simpler access to stuff like the north face of Blakistan and Lone Mountain. What's worse when you're hauling your camping gear? 3,000+ foot climbs and 5 to 10km long ridge walks or 15 to 20 km valley slogs?

I got discouraged at the isothermal sludge that used to be powder and the views that I could see of the Ruby Lake valley weren't promising, so I turned around and cross country snowboarded to the truck. Zero turns, but 1,130 feet gained. Kootenay pass webcam is showing +0.4C right now and their forecast says warmer too. Rogers is ok at the moment, but it sounds like a huge natural cycle is set to begin on the buried hoar layer with incoming warming trend and precipitation. I think I'm going to head home, get the Khyber fixed and wait for my warranty base plates to arrive. I was out on the Voile sliders/Burton binding setup today - I'd forgotten how much they suck.

I tried to save the group the cross country snowboard and took them up Rowe Bowl instead. I thought for sure that one of the two aspects up there would be ok. Our group was +2 today with the addition of David and Nik, who was out for his first day ever on a splitter. I'd hoped to see 10 splitters this weekend, but we fell a bit short with only 6 in the end.

I punched in the majority of the up from the parking lot to Dave's Dive and was happy because the snow was quite good. Moderate trail breaking but these slopes really aren't steep enough to make laps on. Shortly after Rob took over trail breaking, the snow went to crap. A group of this size is always going to be filled with some contrary opinions and we weren't sure what to do as we could see and feel what the wind had done. We ended up heading over to Rowe Shoulder to check out the gullies which hopefully would be softer.

We did find some soft snow in the trees on the climb, but gullies #1 and #2 were rock hard. A few of us retreated to take a look at a lower gully, while the others took the trees back down into the bowl. Shane was first down the gully and has naming rights if he wants them because like most other things around here, it's likely never seen tracks. The snow was variable, but pretty good overall. We soon met up with the rest of the group and the bottom where we stopped for lunch.

David and Nik headed home to celebrate a very late Christmas, while rest of us tried to figure out what to do. Bail and take the cross country snowboard? Make another lap of the same? Try the treed side of Rowe Bowl? In the end, we opted for the last option and while climbing through the trees you'd go from wind/sun affected to soft powder in a matter of steps. Homer Simpson snow - woohoo one second, doh! the next.

The ridge was soon gained and we hiked along the scree a bit to the high point on the northern part of Rowe. I was able to get a higher view of the couloir that I'd found up the other drainage. From this vantage point it looks very steep, much more so than it did from underneath. I also found one entry spot that could potentially work to ride from this ridge down into the other drainage. You'd want to be very sure that this entry point was going to take you where you wanted to go as there are significant cliff bands in some spots. It'd be a neat descent more than anything else - definitely not something you'd make laps on.

We dropped through the trees and actually enjoyed some reasonably good turns. The snow was better in the tight trees where the sun and wind weren't as likely to have left their mark. Down low the snow got even better, but the slope also flattens out considerably. The Calgary crew was wanting to get on the road and I mulled another lap. I find it harder to get motivated when I'm being left solo after being part of a group. When you start the day solo, it seems easier to keep pushing. I broke quite a bit of trail in the past two days and with a Moose day planned for tomorrow, I figured it was probably smart to quit early and recuperate.

Total up today was 3,570 feet. Overall the Calgary crew seemed quite impressed with "my" park. Hopefully they don't tell anyone! We did chat with another Audi driving Calgarian in the parking lot. Thankfully they found wind hammered stuff up on Lemming Lane, so hopefully the bad word is spread.

I was dreading this weekend because the of the supposedly incoming chinook, but the closer it got the better the forecast temperatures became. Winds were very strong today, but thankfully things were on the right side of freezing. Much better than the +8 or so that had been forecast.

Shane, Matt, Rob and Kurt had came down from Calgary to check out the park. The Moose and the Jackelope decided to be anti-social and kept our group to a manageable size. Despite being in the restaurant for 7:30, we didn't leave the trail head until almost 10:00. We tried the one skin trick on the way in and out - it's quicker but seems to use quite a bit more energy.

I took the group up to the knob and punched in most of the up - near the top the Moose blew past us on the way to his second lap and a whopping 8,010 foot day. We made our first lap in the Landing Strip, then another in the Bowling Alley. Shane commented that it was his best run of the year. I like it when my park delivers. Despite heavy winds in the past few days, the powder had survived.

For the final lap, I put in the traverse over to the Moose Peak up and broke trail until the crew had enough near the crossing of the Moose Chute. We ended up traversing over and picking our way through the cliff band to find the top of Zander's Zip.

Not many pictures today, because there are no friends on a powder day. Total up was 5,280 - my 19th 5,000 footer of the year and I believe the first for the Calgary crew.

I bailed a couple days ago after trusting the weatherman. I probably needed a break after the string of big days, but I missed a couple of decent days. It's really odd how much different the weather can be just 16 kms from the town site.

This morning the outside air temperature gauge steadily decreased as I drove up. Winds were forecast to by very strong - 80 gusting 100 km/h then decreasing by afternoon. Town site temperature was forecast to be zero. The winds were right up high, but the temperature wasn't - things were thankfully colder!

The warden/avalanche forecaster I toured with my last day out had informed me they were up the Lineham path yesterday and found terrific snow. They stopped partway up and I figured I should go check it out - maybe ride it from the summit. It's a bit of a slog back into this drainage and by the time I got close enough to see the path, an hour and a bit had passed. It had ripped at some point after they'd skied it, but I'm up here, might as well explore. I recycled their up track and soon reached the point where I was climbing on the bed surface. It was hard to hold and edge and the turns down weren't going to be very good. I threw the board onto the pack and starting boot packing. Progress was much quicker and soon I was out of the path and onto scree.

Several times the massive gusts of wind would force me to stop and wait them out, but soon enough I was topping out on Lineham. A new summit for me and a view to the easterly side of Blakistan (the tallest peak in the park). Riding it has been an obsession of mine, but it doesn't look like this side would work. Perhaps if you caught it on the perfect corn day, but even then, there's several diagonal cliff bands that likely aren't covered by enough snow.

The Lineham slide path was wind hammered up high and offered up a bed surface down low - not the most appealing ride. I took in the views, snapped some pictures with the new camera and decided to walk the ridge further up the valley. I'd thought I could make the loop and get to the summit of Rowe - it'd be several miles, but I was game to explore.

I down climbed several hundred feet following the ridge before starting to climb again. I was able to skin for a bit, but soon enough I was once again throwing the board on the pack. I soon found the summer trail and from there it wasn't long before I followed the scree to the top of the valley. I'm unsure what this peak is called, or if it even has a name. I once again took in the views, snapped lots of pictures and had my first look at Lone Mountain. It's still a long walk from here, but it's a place I plan on camping this winter. It's almost 8,000 feet, offers up what looks to be descents of 1,500 to 2,000 feet off all it's aspects. We'll see. It's hard to rely on topographic maps, since you never truly know what aspects will hold snow. All these peaks are in the Rockies too, so what looks good on the map isn't always feasible either.

I studied the ridge I'd need to climb to complete the horseshoe loop over to Rowe and didn't really like the looks of it, so I elected to drop back down into the drainage. Turns were less than stellar up high as the wind had beat me there, but once lower I did find some very nice sheltered powder. This is a long walk, but on the right day, this slope would be worth it.

I soon ran out of vertical and started the long exit. This drainage reminds me of Roger's Pass - not quite steep enough to be able to snowboard it without a lot of hassle, but steep enough to be often very interesting in ski mode. I ended up trying the Moose's trick and one skinned quite a bit of it, which made things even more interesting. Back at the truck, I chatted with another group who was up on the Knob today - they said turns were great - everything is still doing good up there despite the best efforts of the wind. I'll find out tomorrow I guess. Two new summits and 5,070 feet up.

There was 5 cms of new snow in the town site this morning and the weather station was showing about 10 up high, but it was cold at -15. Forecast said cold all day and some light winds. Fatigue and a bit of laziness didn't get me out the door until almost 10. I was gearing up at the parking lot when warden Edwin and a few of his friends showed up. They were planning a couple laps on Lemming Lane, which sounded ok to me.

3+ km of cross country snowboarding later, I stashed some food and we recycled as much of an up as we could find. 3/4 of the way up, we stopped and dug a pit. Edwin is one of the forecasters here and it was nice to look over his shoulder. He wasn't doing the actual forecast today, but did radio over the results. Things are looking really good here for stability.

The group of 4 were my seniors by 17 to 31 years - I hope I'm still touring at that age. I think getting out and playing in the mountains is the fountain of youth. I took my own line down while they took a bit more conservative path through the trees. Cold smoke, blower, call it whatever you prefer, today was the day.

We climbed part way up again before stopping for lunch, but even still it was cold. The jetboil took it's sweet time bringing the frigid water up to temperature. I was glad to have the puffy in the pack, but even that and a hot meal didn't help much. My nose, fingers and toes were cold even after resuming the climb. The second lap was more of the same and I argued with myself for quite some time over another lap. I should have started earlier, but didn't. I had enough daylight to get up, but would be making pretty much all of the 3+km exit solo with headlamp. I elected to leave with the group and was back to the parking lot for 5pm. A slower and smaller day, but sometimes you need a bit of a break. It was nice to have some company as well. Total up was 3,540 feet.

Forecast is saying more snow tonight then clearing and cold with a windchill of -27 in the afternoon. Hopefully that changes....

I recently booked a long term stay at the hotel in my park. I have a place to stay guaranteed until April 1st. No joke! The price is good enough that I it makes sense to have it even if I'm not here. I won't be here all the time - I still plan on getting out to other areas. I wasn't sure if the price would include the continental breakfast on weekdays, but I was pleased to learn today that it does. That makes it an even better value, because it means that I should be able to find some or all of my lunch as well! On weekends there's no continental breakfast because a few more people show up and I guess it makes sense to do it ala carte.

My small point and shoot camera wouldn't turn on this morning. I've kept it on my person, trying inside and outside pockets, but it would always be wet and full of condensation. I guess it finally caught up with me, so I now need to buy a new one next time I'm back home. I think a waterproof one would be a good idea. No point and shoot coupled with riding solo again meant no pictures today. I wasn't about to lug the dslr around just to snap pictures of landscapes.

There was a couple cms of new in the parking lot and I was doing the cross country snowboard by 9:30. I headed back to recycle yesterday's up. First lap was down into the Landing Strip - the bit of fresh wasn't enough to hide yesterday's tracks, but it did add a bit of fluff. There's still plenty of room in there for tracks even without the new. The second lap was down Knob North (new name!), just rider's right of Christmas Tree Hell.

At 1pm I sat down, enjoyed a bit of the continental breakfast and jetboiled some extra chow as well. For the third lap, I did some split skiing - I'm getting pretty good linking a few turns, but I still keep the training wheels (skins) on. I busted some traverse in followed by a bit of up hill to get to the entrance of the Hook. I was looking for another one though and with a bit of digging and a bit of luck (no batteries for the gps and no store in the park to buy more) I found the entrance. The Hook is fun, but it doesn't go pure fall line. The new one, now called the Scimitar still isn't quite 100% fall line, but it is steeper and narrower. Fun high speed turns to the treed choke, then I pulled to the side, let the sluff pass, then a couple tight turns through the trees, and onto the wide open slopes above the peninsula. Creep and additional snowfall have eliminated a lot of alders, but they're still there.

I could use a bit more relief - three laps off the knob isn't quite the quota of 5,000 feet, even with the bit of extra gained to get to the top of the Hook and Scimitar. I cracked the 591ml of nectar(with a best before date of Oct something, 09 - gotta love "quiet" parks!), shoveled in some chocolate almonds and pointed the skins up hill once again. The Moose did a great job on this up track, but there's a section at the very top that shows off his dark side. It turns right twice and gets steeper each time. There's only 200 or so feet to gain from the saddle, but I got the feeling today he did this intentionally to thwart any poachers.... there were none and won't likely be any until next weekend. I only saw skinny ski tracks today. Anyhow, the fourth time up I was cursing a bit, but not quite enough to punch in a mellower new with switchbacks.

For the final drop, I went Knob North and traversed until I hit the 3rd gully. It was untracked except for the very bottom where the Jackalope had tracked it a couple days ago. He was nice enough to find a route on the bottom to almost the lake, so the exit was pretty quick. I was on the lake by 4:20 and back to the car by 5:00. The Moose said he made the lake to parking lot in 10 minutes yesterday by one skinning it - I still don't know how he managed that, but I've seen him double pole like a mad man before. I *might* be able to do that if I was fresh, but after a day of walking up mountains, it's more fuel than I have in the tank. Total up today was once again 6,420 feet.

The days are getting long and it seems I'm also getting stronger. I seem to have found a greater determination or willpower this winter. I went to the well again today to push out another big day.

The Moose and the Jackalope were back again and we'd planned on meeting Blair, his splitter friend Trevor and David up at the parking lot for 8:30ish. We ended up leaving by 9:00, which turned out to be ok. We planned to make laps off the knob after a single lap on Forum ridge, which we gained the traditional way: up Akamina Pass, then work the Forum Lake side of the ridge until the Forum ridge proper was gained. It had a well worn up track, along with very flat descents that often seemed to rely on the up track to keep speed. While I don't understand the appeal of this, I am happy they're leaving the good stuff for me.

We reached the top of climb with a slight wait for Trevor, above the narrow swath of open terrain at the top of Forum Ridge, which I'm now going to refer to as Lemming Lane - it's the most popular spot in the park and gets tracked quick. We'd made three laps here right after the storm on Friday and it seems quite a few others came yesterday. There were still fresh turns to be found and I grabbed some good pics with the dslr under blueish skies.

Once down we made the trek across the lake to the bottom of Christmas Tree Hell. We stashed the refueling stations and after ingesting some nectar it was time to try to catch the Moose. He and the Jackalope got a five minute head start and despite the fact that he was breaking trail, it was all I could muster to reel them in by the top of the climb. Within a few minutes David and Blair arrived, but Trevor was quite a bit behind. We dropped into the Landing strip and enjoyed the open trees. The snow did seem like it had set up a bit over night, still nice powder, but not quite as light as our final lap yesterday off the knob.

We pulled into the refueling station and I jetboiled some chili beef n mac. Trevor was spent and headed back to the vehicle, while the remaining five of us went up for lap three. The wildlife pulled away, but I wasn't too far behind. Blair showed up not long after and David was only a few minutes behind him. I was stoked to see David right there - I'm 99% positive that today was his biggest day ever - winding up just a few feet short of 5,000. I helped him get the board into downhill mode quickly and we were off to the Bowling Alley. Troy had taken my dslr and snapped some good pics of the group.

Moose and Jackalope wanted to get home, but I did manage to mooch another can of nectar from the Moose before they left. David and Blair were done and Trevor was still waiting at the parking lot. We said our goodbyes and I was alone with my friend willpower. I've learned that the only pace you should set is the one that you can do without stopping. If that means, step, breathe, breathe, so be it. In my case it's a steady rhythm that changes based on the incline - steeper is slower with a slightly shorter stride. Click, step, click, step. Wait for the heel riser to click on the bottom of the binding, step, breathe, visualize, push, focus on the goal. The Moose had set a good up and I steadily gained it. Soon enough I was up top and decided to go rider's right of Christmas Tree Hell because it's nice to get completely untracked stuff. There's a smaller patch of trees on this side that are just as open as the Landing Strip. There are also a couple of very narrow gullies that offer up clear shots. I floated down through the trees and was very stoked to have willed another lap.

I was back to the lake for 4:30 and after the 3.5k cross country snowboard to the car was changing into shoes by 5:30. The Moose refers to the lights getting dim, it's getting dark or going out when you start to hit the wall. About 2/3 of the way to the car, my lights suddenly went dark - it's a flat cross country ski track, but it still takes energy. Unlike the last time this happened, I had a stash of emergency food, water and a jetboil. A few minutes later my lights flickered back to life and I continued the shuffle back to the car. Total up today was 6,420 feet, which I must admit I'm surprised I was able to do as yesterday was a huge day and the first climb today felt less than stellar.

Blair joined the Moose, the Jackalope and myself this morning. We left the parking lot at about 7:45 am and took the leisurely 2.5 km cross country ski to the base of the Moose Chute. We stashed food at the refueling station and then the rest of us took turns packing down the up that the Moose was busting in. About 2/3 of the way up, he said sharing was nice and I took the next shift breaking followed by Blair. Moderate to heavy trail breaking on the way up meant epic goodness coming down.

The Moose chute is a bit thin still - those of us sliding sideways just pointed it and enjoyed it, those sliding the wrong way grumbled a bit about the down, but not too much, because although there's quite a bit of christmas trees and alder, it was still full of fresh powder.

We stopped at the refueling station and with the hard work over, we pressed the up button and soon enough were again on the top. I navigated us down through the tree triangle to the cliff bands. I got lucky and threaded the needle between some big drops, which got us into the zone for Zander's Zip (the new name for the middle chute coming off Moose Peak). I got fooled by some daylight and still managed to miss the top couple hundred feet though. Once I got sorted out, we all enjoyed the wide open untouched powder. The alder at the bottom did present some issues for those sliding the wrong way - Blair and the Jackalope are talking of adding a cup to the early season skiing uniform. Amongst the many reasons that snowboards are superior is the ability to lean back, keep the nose up, cover your face and wait for the alder to stop hitting you. Sliding the wrong way opens you up for impact in delicate locations.

Blair picked up some blisters on the second climb so he departed, while the trio headed up to refuel again. Once more to the top and this time we took decided to take the Piggot Chute. A small cliff entrance followed by a few hidden rocks, led us to the christmas tree band and eventually to the open shot. I dropped first and was hauling ass downhill when I shoulder checked and was surprised to see a small slide chasing me. Moose said it ripped down to rock, but it was too slow to catch me. I was pulled over to the side and watched the debris pile up. Probably a 1.5. The wildlife enjoyed turns on the stuff on the sides that didn't go.

One more time up to the refueling station, this time loading the packs with the stashed gear and food/water for the final push. We were getting short on daylight, so we took the up to the saddle, then attempted to gain the knob. No one had been there today (2 days after the storm and still untouched?) so our progress was slowed, even with the Moose busting trail. We hit our appointed drop time and were 1/10th of a mile and maybe 100 feet short. We'd noticed quite a bit of settling as we were taking the largely flat traverse over to start the climb on the knob. I dug a hasty pit and couldn't find any discernible layers. I did get a easy result with a sudden collapse characteristic, but it was shallow at only 15 down or so and unconsolidated. We dropped into more great snow, with only surface sluffing - we think the settlement up high was failing on hoar in the largely sheltered flat area at the top of the saddle. Soon enough we were at the lake and now had 3km or so of cross country skiing back to the vehicle.

Headlamps came on about 2/3 of the way back. The extra daylight is starting to become noticeable. We probably had time to gain the knob, but a margin of safety is good and you set a drop time as a group for a reason. Total up today was 7,760 - biggest day of the year, biggest day ever at my park and my second biggest day ever. With a slightly earlier start, the 5 digit day was there for the taking.

The Moose and his friend the Jackalope met me at the parking lot for 9:30. The new year brought new snow, which is just what the park needed. We decided to make laps on Forum Ridge and contrary to the typical method that most others use, we didn't punch in the up along the ridge. We went along the lake to the base of the ridge, stashed food and water, then put in the up from there. Why break twice? The Moose set us a very nice up through the trees in storm snow that ranged from 15 to 45 deep.

Moderate to heavy snowfall was the norm as we climbed. Upon reaching the top of the ridge, we were surprised to see a track already there. We'd soon learn that someone had camped and gotten the early start. There's only a few hundred feet to gain from our join to the drop. I'd forgotten how good fresh powder is. Wow! Face shots galore - best turns of the year! Granted the year is only a day old, but suffice to say the snow was epic today.

Down to the bottom, we headed to the food cache to recharge and noticed that our up track looked a little more packed than it should have been. We soon ran into a pair eating lunch - they said another pair was ahead of them and we probably wouldn't catch them - the Moose likes challenges like that and he, of course, reeled them in near the top. We think the pairs only made a single lap and then left. It also looked like the camper with the early start only made a single lap on Forum too.

We dropped again into some open trees and enjoyed more of the same great snow. The visibility on this and the first run was almost zero due to heavy snowfall and cloud. Back to the food cache for a longer break. I jetboiled some beef stew and downed another can of the nectar of the gods. Moose brought gummy bears for everyone today and they came in handy for the last climb.

It's amazing how epic snow makes the climb easier - nectar of the gods and a sugar high from the gummies probably helped too! The skies tried to clear as we neared the top. It never went full blue, but the snow stopped and we had enough visibility that I took the dslr out of the pack. The pictures confirm the conditions. Three laps up Forum with a total vertical of 5,300.