Northeast Couloir of Lone Peak 3/20

The NE couloir of Lone Peak has been the number one line on my hit list of the Wasatch for over a year now. An amazing looking line, threading down the massive face of Lone Peak in steep and glamorous fashion. With it's AK style spines, it doesn't even look like it belongs in the Wasatch.

The mighty NE couloir of Lone Peak

Today was finally the day to get after it. The wind pockets had dissipated substantially from the last few days and the weather looked great. Joe Lohr and I set off from Bell's Canyon Trailhead around 3 a.m., psyched to finally check out this line. The first few miles went smooth, following a solid dirt trail in my sneakers. Sooner or later the trail started getting icy and finally disappeared. It was about this time I switched to my ski boots and then eventually skins. On our left we could see huge rock walls outlined by the moon. Definitely want to check out the climbing up Bell's this spring. Behind us we could see the lights of the city still asleep.

Salt Lake City at 4 a.m

Five or six miles later we approached the bottom of the northeast face. Now that's a mountain. There was a colorful sunrise to the east at this time and we stopped to take in some views. To enter the NE couloir it's necessary to start in a couloir lookers left and then traverse over some cliffs that blocks the straight forward entrance. We ended up missing this entrance and going a little too far. We had to downclimb some steep snow to get back on track. After rounding the corner of the traverse, it was a straight bootpack to the top. The fresh deep snow inspired us to get to the top before it got to warm. We arrived at the summit a little later than ten after battling through a lot of soft snow that we would sink right into at the top. We opted to not scramble the 10 feet of rock up to the true summit to save some time.

Looking back at the Wasatch

Joe making his way up

Views from the otherside

After attaching the skis, we waited a few minutes for a party of two behind of us to top out before dropping. Kinda bizarre seeing another group up there, I'm sure they were thinking the same thing but voiced they were happy to have a bootpack already in place. I dropped first and enjoyed steep and deep terrain for the following thousand feet. As we dropped, one of the members of the party behind us snapped our pictures. Thanks a lot to Adam Clark Photography for sending them to me! The run was killer. We paused for a second above the cliffs we had to traverse around on our way up and decided to take the direct route. This involved dropping a 20 foot cliff to get to the apron. Joe went first and sent it right of the nose. I followed and found a line to skiers right. I was pleased to find the snow soft in the landing, and enjoyed the next few turns through the apron. 

PC: Adam Clark

PC: Adam Clark

PC: Adam Clark

PC: Adam Clark

Steep and fun

Let's go with the direct exit

Joe getting ready to drop the cliff

The rest of the skiing out of Bell's went well and we enjoyed soft snow until it dissappeared. We raced out the icy dirt trail and made good time back to the car. Good thing since I barely made it to class on time. This was a morning for the books and one of the better runs I've ever had. Both the line and mountain was unreal.

GH

Castleton 3/16

Took a quick break from skiing to get on some desert sandstone for a few days down in Moab. Here's a few pictures of our climb up The North Chimney of Castleton Tower. Fun climbing and amazing views from the summit!

Castleton in the morning light

Kurt enjoying the sunshine

One of the funnest 5.8 pitch in the desert

A very fun last pitch

The 4th and final belay

Justin celebrating the summit

Rappelling the North Face

The Hypodermic Needle 3/14

The original plan for this morning was to take a rest day, catch up on sleep, and get ready for the coming weekend of climbing in Moab. Spending most of this last week waking up between 1 and 3 am, I definitely needed the rest. However, there are a few lines that are worth pushing through this and waking up at 1 am once more. One of which is the Hypodermic Needle.

There are several different ways to approach the Hypodermic Needle. One of which is parking at White Pine, crossing over to Red Pine, then Maybird and finally Hogum Fork via Small Pass. A quick ski brings you to the bottom of the needle. I've also heard of people approaching directly from Maybrd, but I wouldn't know the beta for this. Lastly there's the annoying hellish bushwhack up Hogum Fork. After a bit of discussion, we ended choosing to go right up Hogum.

At 2am the next morning I met up with  Jon Chandler, Jamie Dillon, and Joe Lohr as we piled in my car and headed up to the mountains. We parked at a trailhead on the right side of the road less than a mile up from the powerhouse. At the trail head there's a sign that reads "Little cottonwood trail". We were going off a collaboration of info we got online and almost instantly got lost, crossing the river way too early. For the better route we should have continued along the trail going up canyon for 5 or 10 minutes until a small trail leads right towards the river, where two logs can help you cross. Despite getting off trail, we managed to find some skier tracks shortly and were able to follow them up to where they met with most of the traffic coming out of Hogum. We made our own skin track/boot pack for most of the way up Hogum, using the wasatch backcountry app to navigate our way.

Sometime between 3 and 4 hours later we got to the apron of the needle. It was just starting to get light at this time, and looking up at the huge steep walls of Hogum Fork quickly got us fired up. Behind us to our left we could see the NW couloir of the Pfiefferhorn, to our right some great views of the LCC south facing slide paths, and in front of us the Hypodermic Needle. 

There was a skin track leading up most of the way up from skiers who dropped into Coalpit. When it got to the intersection of the thinner steeper section of the chute we verged left half to see what we would be skiing on and half because we weren't sure where the other skin track was going. We made full use of the whippets and condors we had making our way up the headwall of the chute. Topping out we had some amazing views of the Salt Lake valley and surrounding mountains, not to mention a perfect view of the NE couloir of Lone Peak, a line that might just be #1 on my hit list for the wasatch right now. It's looking good!

We hung out for a bit up top and grabbed a bite to eat before switching to ski mode. Jon dropped first to get into a good position to snap some pics. I'm excited to see how they came out. Knowing his photography skills I'm sure they're awesome as always. I went next. The first few turns were the steepest up top, about 50 degrees. Maybe this is just because it lacked the cornice that it normally has, but I expected it to be a little bit steeper/harder. After hearing so much hype I was expecting to get a bit scared. But definitely no complaints here, this is still a freaking amazing line! The snow was hardest up top from the wind getting to it. After 25 feet of this it transitioned into soft powder still untouched from the last storms. And this is what I enjoyed the rest of the run: amazing snow down a sweet line.

Making it out of Hogum Fork wasn't nearly as bad as it had been last spring exiting from the Pfiefferhorn. We were able to piece together openings for almost the entire way through and skied until we were only a 15 minute walk from the car. After enjoying some delicious snacks such as mint chocolate cupcakes and crackers with goat cheese at the car, quality of Joe, I had these guys drop me off at Alta where I was teaching kids to ski for the rest of the afternoon. Tomorrow off to Moab for some tower climbing!

GH

Broads Fork Twin Peaks East Face 3/13

Ever since I first saw the East Face of Twin Peaks I was drawn to the line. The face is big and steep, with several winding gullies leading through the rocky cliffs. Getting to this line is no easy matter, for me at least. We chose the Tanners Gulch approach. Parking in LCC, right by the entrance to Tanner's, Joe Brett and I made our way up this classic line very early in the morning. Since we were exiting via Tanners Gulch as well, we had to make sure that we made it out of this south facing slide path before the sun warmed up the snow too much and made travelling in this huge terrain trap a hazard. This means 1 a.m wake up, meeting up at 2, and hiking before 3. As we worked our way up Tanner's we noticed that there was not too much of a refreeze the night before and the snow was still very soft. This made the top section where we were forced to bootpack a lot more difficult, along with better reason to try to make it out earlier.

The East Face of Broads Fork Twin Peaks

We made it to the top of Tanners right as a few traces of a rising sun started to reveal itself behind the mountains to the East. We could see the East Face starting to reveal itself in the morning light. Behind it laid Salt Lake, all lit up. We scoped out our line and made our way to the bottom of it, down a north facing chute that ended having really great snow. After skinning up the apron, we threw the skis on our backs and started boot packing up the most direct couloir. The snow was also deep throughout most of the whole face and made it a bit slower, but we switched off efficiently and made a quick pace to the summit. Even climbing up this route was a blast. It was pretty surreal just being there in such terrain. There was also some amazing views from the summit.

Salt Lake City lighting up the background

Another gorgeous Wasatch sunrise

Booting up the face

Joe enjoying the views

Brett about to summit

West Twin Peak

Some beautiful mountains here

We switched to ski mode not very long after the sun made it's way over the whole run. Brett dropped first, made some turns and cut to a safe spot to keep eyes on us as we dropped. I went second, howling with each turn. It was the same snow conditions, that was deemed some of the best of the season two days earlier. It seemed to be unaffected from sun and wind the last two days and we were able to take full advantage of this. I made my way a little more than half way down the face and paused as the other two moved past. Following them down to the bottom, I enjoyed even more great snow throughout the bottom of the gully and through the apron. We exchanged high-fives and ranted about the great snow we just had. In a hurry to get back though, we quickly threw the skins back on and headed back to the top of Tanners. Exhausted from the entire morning, me and Brett switched off breaking trail about every 15 feet, half joking and half serious about how dead we were.

Joe enjoying the powder

Finishing out an amazing run

The run out of Tanners was soft and playful. Our legs were pretty friggin tired to make the most of these soft turns but we all had a blast. Back out to the road and back down to the city after another morning well spent. Doesn't get better than this!

Top of Tanners Gulch

Brett enjoying some soft snow!

GH

Heart of Darkness 3/10

Trying to get a bit more steep skiing in before the storm, Joe Brett and I headed out Monday morning to ski the 'Heart of Darkness'. This line lies near the summit of Monte Cristo, along it's North Ridge.

Heart of Darkness

We started out early at the Chapel parking lot. There was a solid booter all the way from Cardiff Pass to the summit of Superior, so it only took a little more than two hours to get there. We continued along the ridge towards Monte Cristo and threw on the skis at a false-peak close to the summit. From here we made a few turns down the ridge and towards a large V shaped opening in the rock. This is very visible from the summit of Superior, and we were able to scope out our entrance. 

Gaining Cardiff Pass

The entrance to 'Heart of Darkness', with 'Rampage' directly behind it

The 30 foot rappel into the couloir went well. I went first and dodged a few rocks as Joe and Brett followed. Once I threw my skis on, it was necessary to side slip/step through the short section that was only just barely the size of my skis. It soon widened out a little bit and it was possible to make a few hop turns, being cautious to not clip my tips or tails as I went down. Towards the bottom of the chute, it widened out to an appropriate size for one to make actual turns through the end of it, and then into the apron. As we all finished our ski descents, another skier was just topping out on 'Rampage', a angled snowfield that can be skied. It looked like a blast!

Psyched for the rap!

Inside the Heart of Darkness

Getting in some hop turns

Brett making his way through the chute

Being fortunate enough to bump into a friend on the summit of superior, they agreed to help us out with a shuttle and took our car to the BCC park n ride in order to get back for work on time. Thanks big time! Therefore, we enjoyed a good distance of skiing all the way down Mill B, only having to take off the skis for a few sections. A quick hitchhike out of Big and we were back to the car. Another great morning getting on some steep terrain!

GH