Don Sheldon Mnt. House/ Ruth Glacier Denali NP AK TR

[TyWebb]

This TR is the raddest thing I've seen in a long time. What a trip/

[fish]

Yeah this is TR gold right here

I found a little video about the Mtn House and a little history about Mr. Sheldon for anyone who wants to know. It's a good clip.
http://www.brightcove.tv/title.jsp?title=752475621

[schindlerpiste]

Damn Dibs, that looks sweet. Noice TR. Many $$$ shots, but that blue ice shot is surreal.

[Alioops]

Fantastic TR. One of the best around. I love Don Sheldon's story. I felt a thrill when we flew in and explored Ruth Glacier, but I couldn't even imagine experiencing it to the level that you took it. Great TR and a wonderful tribute to a great man.

[skifishbum]

Day 6 It was decided we would check out the west fork of the Ruth.
We hoped to ski the RJ Dio secret devil sign coulior

We worked our way around the crevasses


As we made it around the corner the secret devil sign sent a little P&Q reminder by ripping out.
There was a lot of kickass looking coolis and terrain, but most of it had to much potential for asswhuppin from above.

So we skinned up the mellow side as pondo yet again redesigned the volie telebinding using a leatherman ice axe and wire
TBC

[cdlv]

excellent tr dibs.
that place looks amazing.

[Sierra Cement]

In case anyone was wondering why you were traveling roped.....

TBC

such a good TR.

[powderpond]

Looks like we hade the luck o the weather!

http://www.adn.com/money/industries/...ry/367992.html

[Buster Highmen]

SFB r00lz!

[iceman]

woot! sfb 08 ak tr yeah

[skifishbum]

Damn that's ironic. We were talking about this trip the other night at the avvie fundraiser and they were giving me shit for never finishing the TR.
So here are a few more pics and some ramblings/thoughts from a skibum.
I know it's mean but the thought of 10 Japanese students stuck there for 2 weeks, sitting around playing guitar brings a smile to my face.
Someones eating capers lord coombaya. Give me a shot of that sweet vermouth they left oh lord coombaya. I'm really hoping one of those guides found the large safety spliff I geocached..
This is one of those places were a 2' dump would suck, trail breaking across loaded crevasses, in an effort to find steep enough terrain to ski that much snow, without danger from above would pretty much be futile.
I was hoping to summit someting grand and name it for H.I.M Haile Selaisse so we worked our way around the backside

To this point

Even though I had studied it from the other side those last few steps and the self doubt that possibly you were foolishly stepping out onto a cornice unroped, combined with the stunning panoramic views, gave one of those holy shit so fkna glad to be alive moments.
The rest of the crew made it out to this point and a consensus was reached that in such a huge place this was not worthy of H.I.M.
So we went with Judge Joe Brown point.
Once again we were blessed to watch another natural rip out from afar.
A few sucky shots from the ski down

Pondo

TBC

[iceman]

TBC

What, in another 6 months?

[thin cover]

Topher was telling me to check this TR out when I was skiing with him in SA. Definitely the sickness that he had described. Good work, solid turns.

[skifishbum]

What, in another 6 months?

How long you been workin on your novel?
Fellow slacker bro

[Jer]

Raddness.

1 1/2 more days left in summer.

[masterofgreenbeans]

I'm glad you decided to finish the TR I missed this one. Uh thank you.

[skifishbum]

The last day of skiing we decided another slog was in order.
So we head out and down the great gorge again.

We headed towards the Mooses Tooth and up onto the Root Canal glacier.

There was enough wind that day employ a kite on the way down the gorge and the gorge itself was fairly crevasse free. I think pondo brought a kite but never used it. I would have been hard pressed to jam anything else into my pack.
The root Canal glacier was grand and the big walls surrounding it were impressive.

We stopped for lunch and to pour a little out in honor of Mugs Stump who pioneered some sick climbing routes in this area before his death in 92

RIP Mugs you led the "High Life" to the fullest.

We continued on past more crevasses and looming big walls.



The snow and the ski down were stellar
Toph

Josh

Heading back up the gorge was an ass kicker at least for me. I'm a big fan of the ski down and be done not ski down and slog back 3 hours. But we did have Steak and pharmacutical night to look forward to. The setting sun was awesome and gave way to some sweet alpenglow.



TBC in a more timely manner

[SonnyBoy]

Sickness all the way man.

[forest]

holy shit this is awesome. thanks.

[iceman]

But we did have Steak and pharmacutical night to look forward to.

heh.

You kill me mang.

[skifishbum]

We rationed our food pretty well, but by the last night party supplies were dwindleing. I was into my 3rd bottle of vodka and the rest of the crew was down to sweet vermouth that I had poo pooed as a waste of booze space.
Although manhattans are tastey. So after a big steak and veggie meal.
Chef Toph rocking the smiley face airplane fork w/ the goods

And JR's daily sat phone weather check

revealed that we were on to fly out in the am.
The realization that we had made it through the week safely meant we had a surplus of pharmacutical goodies.
Vicodins lorotabs tramidals a shortage of booze emergency was called and things got a bit fuzzy from there.
I promised I wouldn't go into details to protect the not so innocent.
The alpenglow changed to a funky blue bro colored moonlit twilight.


Brockers

Reading the years worth of log/guest books was quite entertaining.
Surprisingly so there really weren't that many people who had come to the hut to ski. The North american tele organization or sumthin to that effect had made a few trips and skied some good lines, but for the most part the hut was primarily used by families flying in for a night or two.
A few climbing parties using it as a base camp like the Japenese Aroura Club.
The most prolific users were Jehovah witness giving praise to jehovah for createing such a splendorous wonder of soul touching, awe inspireing, vision of holyness and other religious gobbly gook.
I am bummed that we didn't take a picture of our alcohol/drug induced 3 page ramblings giving praise to Jah. Giving Props to Phizer, Mercks the Irish for creating scotch,Black diamond, Pm Gear, rappers for the crunk
that kept us grooving. Genisis 1:12 as justifacation for smoking dried herbs.
and of corse the obligatory change 4 a $.05.
Funny shit at least in our minds
The next morning we awoke to the sound of Paul and the Otter flying over and a mad rush to drag our crap down to the landing strip.

A few more random photos
group shot

a few from the flight out



The amount of terrain is mind boggling

Back in civiliation we showered at Talkeetna Air Taxi and hit the town dump returned our shit cans for Nanuque to clean, and hit the bar.
On a trip like this in a small living quarters

In what could be described as dicey terrain,
Group dynamics will pretty much make or break the trip.
I can't imagine 4 more Fkna kick ass partners.
Cheers and thanks for everything my brothers.

The best item aside from skiing essentials was Ipods with speakers definately help feed the good vibe on what I consider a trip of a lifetime.
I gots to get my ass to work cause fundage for these trips don't grow on trees
There is a youtube vid that shows the terrain better than stills and some skiing footage and a serac fall on some weird program that I can't convert but I'll try and figure it out. Or send it to one of those interweb super stars who have the time and skills to post multiple multi colored asshattery threads

[stapes]

FKNA! Inspiring shit man. Thanks for posting all those up, although now I really don't want to be here at work.

[splat]

Eggsellent.

Stoke much needed.

[Arelius19]

Wow amazing TR
Looks like the trip of the life time.
Bringing back the stoke as the oncoming winter starts to be palpable the air…

[chaka]

that was simply amazing, best TR EVAR. Thank you.