October Turns (Maiden Voyage with the Grand Teton’s)

**eagleskier** · 10-30-2014, 08:55 PM

GoPro video of the skiing highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgsVgwk7jug

For my October turns this year, I had planned to ski in the Sawtooth Range, but I only had the weekend of the 25th as a viable option. After some conversations via email with my contacts at Sawtooth Mountain Guides, that option didn’t really look advisable. The few remaining snow patches had frozen to ice and had a light dusting of fresh snow on top.

So, the Tetons looked to be the most viable option and I put out the word to see if I could get partners. It turned out Jackson, (my July turns partner), had a couple of buddies who were up for taking a break from studies, (or maybe it was just partying) at MSU. As they looked at the terrain I wanted to hit, the road trip down from Bozeman looked like a real good option for the weekend. We met up in Jackson on Friday night and had a 4AM start from the Lupine Meadows Trail Head. As far as the route goes, this trip basically mirrored my August 1st trip, which was skiing the Teepee Glacier on the Grand, and transitioning into the Dike Couloir that runs down in to Glacier Gulch. We did select a different route on the glacier, choosing a narrow chute that ran climbers left up to the top of the glacier field.
There were two reasons why we went for this route:
1 - It looked to be more fun and...
2 - There was constant rock and ice fall on the other side of the glacier. I'm kind of adverse to having nature chuck rocks at my head while trying to climb and ski.

Prior to this trip, I had decided to switch from the Dynafit Manaslu to the Dynafit Grand Teton as my one ski quiver for AT/backcountry. The conditions that we encountered ended up being an excellent test for the new Grand Tetons. We hit corn snow, powder, bullet proof crust, breakable crust and exposed glacial ice – all in the 2,000 vertical that we skied. As the marketing stuff proclaims, the Grand Tetons had stronger torsional stiffness than the Manaslu. They handled all of the “crappy” stuff, AND were great in the powder and on the corn. I really liked the Manaslus, but I found them to be difficult to set an edge on really firm conditions. They would just chatter too much and I felt like I was having to work extra hard to keep them tracking how I wanted. The Grand Teton ski is almost as light, which is great for the uphill, but they definitely were better for setting an edge in the firm stuff. I am really stoked with these skis!

The only equipment issue that I had was a pre-release on the Dynafit TLT speed Radical Binding, (seen in the video). As it turns out, the problem was a technical issue with the mounting that is being addressed before I get out again.

Photo version of the TR:
At the platforms before dawn and ready to go...

Climbing up towards the Grand with morning alpenglow on the Middle Teton.

We considered skiing the Middle Teton Glacier and the upper chute from the col about 500 feet below the summit. We could see tracks, but we weren't sure on snow quality and having skied it before, I knew that we wanted to "be sure" of conditions.

Jay dons the purple Barney outfit. But he backed it up with some quality skiing!

Heading up the lower section of the Teepee Glacier on the Grand Teton.

The old man leads the way up the steep upper chute. We topped out at the 12,000 ft elevation.

Jay heads towards the crux.

Jay bombs thru the crux. The young guys all hit this successfully, but I chose to down climb it. I only had a few turns on the new Grand Teton skis and wasn't sure I was ready to risk core shots just yet. Or blowing an ACL at 11,000 feet.

Looking back at our route on the Teepee from the top of the Dike Couloir. We skied the chute on lookers left.

We came down thru a gnarly rock field into Glacier Gulch. The ice fall in this photo was very active and we gave it a wide berth. I still haven't found a good route from the bottom of the Dike Couloir into Delta Lake.

Tired but happy. 5000+ climbed, ~2000 skied and 14 miles round trip. Long day, but well worth the adventure!