Wyatt Couloir / Cardiac Ridge Chutes 3/9

Stable conditions, great snow, beautiful days: time to get after it. Just looking for a partner! After several tries I managed to get connected with a friend of a friend, Joe Lohr, who was psyched to get up early and get in some steep skiing. As I rolled up to his house early that next morning we introduced ourselves and told stories of skiing while we headed up the canyon. We were the first people headed up Cardiff and enjoyed a beautiful sunrise from the start of Superior east ridge.

From here we got a good look over at Cardiac Ridge and decided to go check out Wyatt Couloir for our first run. Wyatt Couloir is a thin steep couloir about 100 or 200 feet lookers right of Lightning Bolt Couloir. Lightning Bolt would have been fun if it hadn't have slid a few days prior, making the second bend covered in rocks. Next time though! According to Chuting Gallery Wyatt is one of the harder rated lines in the Wasatch. While I'm not too fond of the ski rating system, higher rating means steep and narrow, and steep and narrow means fun! I'll take his word for it and check it out.
Feeling a bit sluggish this morning, Joe broke trail for most of the bootpack up the couloir. For the entire second half I had to wait behind a rockband as large ice chunks, snowballs, and the occasional rock plummetted through the choke. Once Joe was almost to the top, he was stopped by some rotten snow and rocks. I moved up towards him, took a look at what was blocking us from the true top of the line and figured it wasn't worth it for 20 feet of side stepping on ice and rock. We transitioned here and got ready to drop.

Cardiac Ridge: Wyatt couloir is the very thin couloir towards the right. Our second line is the zig-zagging couloir between Wyatt and Lightning Bolt

Joe making his way through the apron to Wyatt

Waiting to climb up

Up I go

I was pretty curious to see how Joe would piece this line together. He is a snowboarder and I was interested to see what hop turns down a steep and narrow line would look like. Instead of this, I watched as he stepped up and pointed the way straight through the couloir into the apron, only turning very slightly at a few of the more open spots. Inspired by this, I followed, throwing in two hop turns to warm the legs up, and then straight lined the couloir out to the apron. Carrying a ton of speed into the apron, I threw in some huge turns in soft snow to control my speed. With the adrenaline pumping and stoked on our line, I skied up to Joe and exchanged high-fives.

The wind and cloud cover had prevented from warming up the snow as much as we expected. It was still soft and light. Therefore, we judged we were fine to head up for run number two. This time, we booted up a line just to the lookers left of Thunderstruck Couloir, intending on skiing Thunderstruck. However, at the top we scouted out another line between Wyatt and Lightning Bolt that looked like a ton of fun. It zig-zags from left to right to left, opposite of Lightning Bolt. I dropped first and went off the initial 5 foot cliff section blocking the upper headwall with the rest of the couloir. Carrying speed into the first turn I hit a patch of ice that sent me sideways. Luckily, I could see this coming and rolled back to my feet without any harm being done. Phew. I continued threw my controlling my sluff as best as I could. Despite the fall, the line was still a blast and got the heart pumping once again. I watched as Joe sent it down the line, slowing down where I fell after watching what happened to me. We once again exchanged high-fives before throwing the skins back on.

Our second line of the day. Awesomeness!

Joe riding out after slaying the couloir

Making our way back up to Superior

Since the snow was still not too warm on the north facing slopes, we decided to head up to Superior via the north chutes. Once again, Joe broke trail and headed up. I followed, dragging behind a little bit, tired from previous week of skiing. We made it to the summit in about an hour and took a look down the South Face. Joe had never skied it before so we thought it would be a good option for our exit. Since it was late in the day, we played it cautiously, keeping eyes uphill to make sure there was no wet activity above us. We enjoyed the 3000 feet of spring skiing back to the road. A quick hitchhike, drive to the Valley, and Chipotle burrito later and we were back in Salt Lake.

GH