Here’s another trip report from last season, Enjoy!
After an eight-hour drive from Boulder to Jackson, we met up with our friend Aaron to discuss some options/ideas for the week ahead of us. It didn’t take long for us to decide to hop right back in the car the next day and drive to Elko, NV. So after a morning lap on Glory and another eight hours in the car, we were in the Ruby Mountains of Nevada aiming to ski one of the most aesthetic couloirs I’ve seen, Terminal Cancer…
We came down to the Rubies with pretty much no beta on the conditions. It was definitely a gamble, but the payoff was huge. The car ride back to Jackson was mostly quiet, as we were all too busy grinning ear to ear about riding Terminal Cancer in knee deep blower. Occasionally, one of us would start laughing randomly at the fact we drove a total of sixteen hours for a half day of riding.
The next day, we had our eyes set on “Chute the Moon” and “Buck Chuter” couloirs in GTNP. Neither of them are particularly long couloirs by Teton standards, but when linked together can make for a great tour. We enjoyed open turns in flat light down “Chute the Moon” then traversed over to “Buck Chuter” where we patiently waited for two guys below us to make their way down the chute. We opted not to bring a rope and rappel like the guys ahead of us and instead downclimb.
Wednesday was our last day in town before we had to head back to Boulder. I had a wedding to attend that cut our trip a few days short, but by this time I was pretty tired already. We went up to Togwotee Pass to ski “Radio Antenna” off the Pinnacle Buttress. With the sound of snowmobilers echoing behind us, we wallowed up the apron until we found good climbing condition in the couloir itself…and rocks. From a distance it looked pretty good, but once we were in the couloir itself that wasn’t the case. We climbed to the top, only realizing then that there was no good place to strap in due to the very firm snow, so we downclimbed to a spot that had softened up allowing us to dig out a bench to set up on. We had soft turns on this spring-like day with a bunch of snowmobiliers at the bottom watching us.
It was a pretty awesome week for the Miss and I, I’m super stoked on spring and even my next trip to Jackson (whenever that may be). BIG thanks to Aaron for everything, we owe ya bud. You’ve always got a couch to crash on in Boulder.