Brighton - Great Western Lift area - safe to explore?

[NeedhamSkier]

Heading back out with the family to Utah next week and psyched to see all the snow out there. Question for any locals - we are looking to explore a little, but will have a short window with the kids in ski-school for a couple of hours in the morning, so need to have a good idea of what we're getting into. At Brighton last year we saw a bunch of tracks heading out of bounds into the woods from the top of the Great Western Lift (skier's right). It looked like a similar pitch to the rest of the area around there and seems you would drop back down to the parking lot eventually - we also saw a bunch of people walking back from that direction at the bottom. Anybody ever been in there and have some beta? But now I've just noticed that it now says 'Cliff Area' there on the trail map (which I'm sure it didn't say last year - maybe the cliffs have grown during the year with all the snow...) so maybe I'm having second thoughts already. Anyways, anybody know anything about this area?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Admin]

The best advice I can give you is to stay in-bounds off Great Western unless you have full avi gear, know how to use it, and can analyze snow layers.

 

[NeedhamSkier]

Admin, your advice is well-taken and I appreciate it. I was sort of trending in that direction anyway. To answer your questions on avi gear – yes we do have it and we’ve practiced plenty, but haven’t taken an avi course yet.

I realized once I made the posting that I may be heading for flame central, so maybe a bit of context to lessen the “who is this bonehead” quotient. The day we were at Brighton there were a lot of people heading in that direction – maybe 10-20% of the people coming off the chair in the short time we were standing around in the unloading area. I also know that there’s a lot of people out there taking crazy risks, so I wouldn’t just follow some random tracks and hope for the best. But if somebody on the board had come back and said “yeah, we do that all the time, plenty of people go down there, it’s mellow terrain, not difficult to navigate” then we might have given it a go. But without that reassurance, we’re not going to do it – there’s a ton of inbounds that we didn’t get to yet, so we’ll stick with that. Overall, we’re pretty cautious (3 kids will do that to you) but always interested in some fun and (relatively) risk-free adventure to fit into the few hours of freedom while the kids are in class.

 

[Admin]

Sorry, my comments weren't intended as a flame and if you perceived it that way it wasn't my intent. I'm just used to seeing folks heading BC with no gear whatsoever, or have the gear but don't have the full knowledge to put it to good use. FWIW, I count myself somewhat in that latter group which is why I'm especially cautious and will only venture out when conditions are rated low. I really need to beef up my skills, though, for that extra margin of safety.

Although it has what is in my mind the least interesting in-bounds terrain in the Cottonwoods, Brighton has perhaps the easiest BC/sidecountry access of any of the four resorts. There was a fatality just last winter between Crest and Millicent when a cornice gave way beneath a snowboard instructor who had no gear with him whatsoever.

I'd just hate to see a visitor become a statistic because they were blindly following othe lemmings. Yes, there are common slide paths out there beyond Great Western.

 

[NeedhamSkier]

No, your reply was definitely not perceived as a flame - it was good, well-considered advice as always and the insight I was looking for (and nearly always get from this board)

Agree also with your point about the terrain at Brighton. Maybe we will get up to Alta and Snowbird this year also - I have skied both in the past and liked them much better for in-bounds poking around. Problem for us is that ski-school and lift tickets are more expensive, so with the two kids it makes either resort a more costly proposition for a days skiing if we want to have some 'adult swim' time. Also we're a bit slow off the mark by the time we get the kids set up in ski school, so first (or even 1,000th) chair is never going to happen, so the less trafficked resorts are a better bet for us on a powder day.

 

[Marc_C]

To answer your questions on avi gear – yes we do have it and we’ve practiced plenty, but haven’t taken an avi course yet.

I don't intend this as a flame - just reinforcement of a critical point folks tend to forget. If you have avi gear and have practiced a lot but haven't taken a course or at least committed most of Bruce Tremper's "Staying Alive In Avalanche Terrain" to memory, then you don't know how to use the gear.

IOW, the whole point is learning how to assess the snowpack and avi potential so that you never need to use your avi gear (other than the shovel for digging pits and doing stability tests). Having the gear doesn't mean you're safe. It just means that you might be able to affect a rescue instead of a body recovery after you've majorly screwed up.

 

[ChrisC]

At Brighton last year we saw a bunch of tracks heading out of bounds into the woods from the top of the Great Western Lift (skier's right). It looked like a similar pitch to the rest of the area around there and seems you would drop back down to the parking lot eventually - we also saw a bunch of people walking back from that direction at the bottom. Anybody ever been in there and have some beta? But now I've just noticed that it now says 'Cliff Area' there on the trail map (which I'm sure it didn't say last year - maybe the cliffs have grown during the year with all the snow...) so maybe I'm having second thoughts already. Anyways, anybody know anything about this area?

I spent a day at Brighton a few years ago with a similar interest off the Great Western lift. However, it was snowing steadily -- a denser variety. Given new snow, and a heavy wet layer at that -- it was not prudent to go out of bounds from the top. Especially when we were not familiar with the area and visibility sucked.

The yellow circled area right off the top looks like a clearing made by repeated avalanches -- so you should know what you are doing. Seems hazardous.

However, I felt comfortable with the risk crossing the boundary half-way down into some rolling meadows -- blue circle area below.