After taking a day off yesterday, it was definitely time to get out of the inversion in the valley and head back up to the fresh air. After waiting until about 10:30 for the others to get up and figuring out everyone in the house was sick as dogs, I was headed up the canyon solo by 11. After parking near the chapel across from alta and throwing on the skins, it took a little more than an hour to gain the ridge of Toledo bowl. From there about a half hour to gain the summit. On my way up I saw that there was three possible lines of descent.
.jpg)
The largest and most obvious one (the actual Toledo Chute), is on lookers right. To the left there was two variations of the line that both looked fun. I decided that I would scope out the center line on my way down and drop that if it looked good.
From the top it took a few turns to even get a look at the middle chute The line looked good and the snow was in good enough condition in the chute so the middle variation was a go. With soft snow, tight jump turns, and decent exposure, the line was a blast.
Once I got out to the bottom of the chute it was a different story. The soft snow quickly turned into a hard wind and/or sun crust. It led to quite sloppy skiing for the rest of the ride back to the car. However, no skiing is bad skiing so even the crusty exit was enjoyable.
I was definitely not looking forward to returning to the inversion in the Valley. Gotta get back up ASAP.
GH
No comments:
Post a Comment