Day 72: Free entertainment.
With motivation still at a low point I nevertheless made it to Alta's Wildcat lot at the 7:30 a.m. meeting time. We left my truck and Bobby's car there, and piled into AmyZ's Subaru to drive back down to Snowbird.
We easily made the 8 a.m. tram, which was barely a quarter full -- if that. Snowbird patroller Steve Mineola and wild woman Heather would join us for our usual jaunt over to Alta, but today we'd do it first thing as it was warm overnight. The temperature at the summit was already 39 degrees.
We dawdled for a bit on Hidden Peak. We didn't have to be in a hurry as Steve was one tram behind us, and at this time of year they run only every 20 minutes.
A number of the scree fields below LTD are now melted out, so the Chamonix traverse has become the Chamonix walk in a couple of places. I'm not sure that's a bad thing, for I honestly believe that walking is easier than the gradual sidestep-up traverse that we usually follow. You still have to be careful where the snow transitions to rock and vice versa as there are many undermined spots from when the rocks heat up during the day, and in those places it's all too easy to punch through up to your crotch.
Steve, the animal, nearly caught up to us and arrived at Sugarloaf Pass mere minutes after we did. We started off down the EBT but quickly came to an abrupt stop.
An avalauncher shell was laying right in the middle of the EBT, unexploded and according to Steve still armed. As one of Snowbird's top explosives guys, he ought to know. It's like stumbling across a hand grenade that's missing the pin. Steve called over to Snowbird Patrol HQ and had someone come over on a snowmachine with a blasting cap to detonate the sketchy device.
We lost a lot of time dealing with that shell, but the snow was still staying firmer than we'd anticipated. We therefore opted to kill some more time on Germania Pass waiting for east-facing Backside to soften up a bit further.
As we sat there we were shocked to see a bunch of skiers heading from the top of Baldy toward Main Chute. If the snow at Germania Pass was still too firm, north-facing Baldy had to still be as hard as a rock.
Steve made another call to Snowbird Patrol as we watched. Two in the party dropped into Main Chute and out of sight, while the rest wisely backed away and headed toward an easier route on Baldy Shoulder. We watched on in horror, however, as the second one fell and started on a slide for life toward the 80-100 foot cliffs that span the lower Shoulder. Miraculously the first guy down the Shoulder managed to dive on the sliding skier and play shortstop, keeping her from tumbling into the abyss while avoiding getting dragged down himself by her momentum. The pair stood there for a while, obviously so that the fallen skier could regain her composure, then slowly and gingerly inched their way back left toward the ridgeline and the relative safety of the trees. It took even longer for the remainder of the group to get off the top of the Shoulder.
Like I said, free entertainment.
The show now over, we resumed our route and arrived at Backside right as the snow was softening, but not quite enough to make the sun cups completely irrelevant.
The lower we went, the better it got. Satisfied, we skated down the dormant Transfer Tow back to my truck. There we encountered the Baldy party coming down Collins Gulch. The girl who slid down the Shoulder had to have been about 15, while they also had a kid about 12 years old with them as well. As dumb an idea skiing Baldy first thing in the morning was, in my opinion the adults in the group were absolute idiots to bring kids with them at that hour and risk their lives in the process, no matter how skilled those kids may be. It's nothing short of a miracle that there were no casualties. Stupid, stupid, stupid ... but all's well that ends well, I guess.
I dropped the rest of our crew off back at Snowbird. While the others went back up, my ever-so-slight hunger to get out of the house and onto the mountain this morning had been sated, at least until tomorrow's final day of lift service.
With motivation still at a low point I nevertheless made it to Alta's Wildcat lot at the 7:30 a.m. meeting time. We left my truck and Bobby's car there, and piled into AmyZ's Subaru to drive back down to Snowbird.
We easily made the 8 a.m. tram, which was barely a quarter full -- if that. Snowbird patroller Steve Mineola and wild woman Heather would join us for our usual jaunt over to Alta, but today we'd do it first thing as it was warm overnight. The temperature at the summit was already 39 degrees.
We dawdled for a bit on Hidden Peak. We didn't have to be in a hurry as Steve was one tram behind us, and at this time of year they run only every 20 minutes.
A number of the scree fields below LTD are now melted out, so the Chamonix traverse has become the Chamonix walk in a couple of places. I'm not sure that's a bad thing, for I honestly believe that walking is easier than the gradual sidestep-up traverse that we usually follow. You still have to be careful where the snow transitions to rock and vice versa as there are many undermined spots from when the rocks heat up during the day, and in those places it's all too easy to punch through up to your crotch.
Steve, the animal, nearly caught up to us and arrived at Sugarloaf Pass mere minutes after we did. We started off down the EBT but quickly came to an abrupt stop.
An avalauncher shell was laying right in the middle of the EBT, unexploded and according to Steve still armed. As one of Snowbird's top explosives guys, he ought to know. It's like stumbling across a hand grenade that's missing the pin. Steve called over to Snowbird Patrol HQ and had someone come over on a snowmachine with a blasting cap to detonate the sketchy device.
We lost a lot of time dealing with that shell, but the snow was still staying firmer than we'd anticipated. We therefore opted to kill some more time on Germania Pass waiting for east-facing Backside to soften up a bit further.
As we sat there we were shocked to see a bunch of skiers heading from the top of Baldy toward Main Chute. If the snow at Germania Pass was still too firm, north-facing Baldy had to still be as hard as a rock.
Steve made another call to Snowbird Patrol as we watched. Two in the party dropped into Main Chute and out of sight, while the rest wisely backed away and headed toward an easier route on Baldy Shoulder. We watched on in horror, however, as the second one fell and started on a slide for life toward the 80-100 foot cliffs that span the lower Shoulder. Miraculously the first guy down the Shoulder managed to dive on the sliding skier and play shortstop, keeping her from tumbling into the abyss while avoiding getting dragged down himself by her momentum. The pair stood there for a while, obviously so that the fallen skier could regain her composure, then slowly and gingerly inched their way back left toward the ridgeline and the relative safety of the trees. It took even longer for the remainder of the group to get off the top of the Shoulder.
Like I said, free entertainment.
The show now over, we resumed our route and arrived at Backside right as the snow was softening, but not quite enough to make the sun cups completely irrelevant.
The lower we went, the better it got. Satisfied, we skated down the dormant Transfer Tow back to my truck. There we encountered the Baldy party coming down Collins Gulch. The girl who slid down the Shoulder had to have been about 15, while they also had a kid about 12 years old with them as well. As dumb an idea skiing Baldy first thing in the morning was, in my opinion the adults in the group were absolute idiots to bring kids with them at that hour and risk their lives in the process, no matter how skilled those kids may be. It's nothing short of a miracle that there were no casualties. Stupid, stupid, stupid ... but all's well that ends well, I guess.
I dropped the rest of our crew off back at Snowbird. While the others went back up, my ever-so-slight hunger to get out of the house and onto the mountain this morning had been sated, at least until tomorrow's final day of lift service.
