TR: UT11-1 Some bright spots

**1thenaton1** · 01-19-2011, 02:30 PM

Just back from a week in SLC in some unusual conditions. Hadn't snowed much since the new year when I arrived on 1/11. On 1/12 I poked around the girzzly gulch area and found discouraging conditions...anything in view seemed to have been schralped considerably - not all too shocking in the Wasatch. Knowing that the easy access stuff was out, skadhi and I cooked up a plan to head towards Mt Raymond in BCC the next morning for a more substantial walk.
There

Heading up from Butler Fork

Objective comes into view

We skied from just to the viewer's left of the obvious summit ramp (where there was a group of tracks)

We had a beautiful, partly sunny and low wind approach, with great views of the surrounding peaks

As we made the summit push, the clouds rolled in. Could not put a damper though on the incredible endorphin rush that comes from completing a long climb

Drrrrroppping

skadhi

My turn

After the apron we still had a couple thousand feet of widely spaced aspens to play in

(then a bit of a death-luge track at the end, but forget that)

Super fun day and a great peak to check off the list, as anyone who has driven down BCC has probably mind-skied it many times.

The next day a system plunged down from the PNW, and delivered a glancing blow to the Bird. Unusual for sure, but the morning of the 4" snowfall definitely skied like powder, especially on the favored NE ridges. First run was chinese powhill, had a bit of time later on to snap a few pictures.

JCD3 slays upper cirque

MR, tips up

Sun came out for a second for this shot on Gad Chutes

The next day, I got to take a lap out the Gad2 gate with ChuckL (you reading this?) and EM.
CL breaks trail through the clouds

and after a long traverse EM drops into Shady Acres

CL further down

This zone was surpisingly untracked and skied well. Definitely wasn't blower pow, but fun supportive turns for sure.

At this point, the move was to rest up for the party Saturday night at DPS HQ, and get ready to slay pow that was set to come in Sunday into Monday.

Except, Sunday, it rained to the summit of Snowbird. Yep, it rained in January in LCC. Wild stuff. This unfortunately put an early end to our skiing, as the next couple of days were downright scary. Snowbird may have put it best: Current Mountain Conditions*
Due to an unusual weather event at the resort it is highly recommended that skiers and riders stick to groomed runs and recommended routes

Hopefully this will heal the Jan 8 layer of surface hoar. Looks like its starting to pile up a bit again now. Damn snow hoars!!

Pretty one to end on, maybe a future objective

1tn1