Snowbird 2/3/10

[Powderqueen]

Day 4 often is the physically hardest for me, but I held tough and skied The Bird.

It was more of a social ski, but the group split up when some of us wanted to ski more off-piste and others wanted to ski groomers or drink beer. Two of us skied a little harder than the others.

Saw Tirolpeter in Mineral Basin.

Best snow was west of Gad and we found some multi-turn untracked powder.

All in all a good day, but boy and I feelin it.

I apologize for my lack of knowledge of all the lines I skied. In fact, I usually have no idea what things are called, but can remember a name I saw on a map or sign in that area. Can someone tell me what that long shadowed run in Mineral Basin is? Bookends? Powder Paradise?

http://harvey44.blogspot.com/2010/01/ut ... -2010.html

 

[Marc_C]

Can someone tell me what that long shadowed run in Mineral Basin is? Bookends? Powder Paradise?
http://harvey44.blogspot.com/2010/01/ut ... -2010.html

You're gonna have to provide a lot more details as to where you were, since there are several named lines in that area. For starters, one major bit of terrain feature and names: the Bookends are the two prominent rock spurs that bisect the western side of MB. The Hillary Step (where the traverse takes you and you side step a short ways up a steep bit below a cliff) crosses the first Bookend - the other one is where the cliffs taper off on the south side, just before a little col, beyond which are the Sunday Cliffs. Powder Paradise stops at the Hillary Step.

 

[Powderqueen]

We climbed up past the bookend, then traversed out only a little more after the climb, then we went down through a nice steep chute. It kinda looks like the longest shot on that side of MB and was completely shadowed, so the snow was very nice. That was the only climbing we did that day, as we were so beat from all the schlepping at Solitude and Alta the days prior.

 

[Marc_C]

We climbed up past the bookend, then traversed out only a little more after the climb, then we went down through a nice steep chute. It kinda looks like the longest shot on that side of MB and was completely shadowed, so the snow was very nice. That was the only climbing we did that day, as we were so beat from all the schlepping at Solitude and Alta the days prior.

Oh, that line. Yep, know it well but don't know the name. I'll have to check my Bird patrol map when I get home. Pretty much every gap between every tree and rock has a name at the Bird.

You consider the dozen or so side steps up the Hillary Step to be climbing? :roll: There's more effort in getting from Gold Miner's Daughter to the Wildcat lift at Alta!

 

[Marc_C]

We climbed up past the bookend, then traversed out only a little more after the climb, then we went down through a nice steep chute. It kinda looks like the longest shot on that side of MB and was completely shadowed, so the snow was very nice. That was the only climbing we did that day, as we were so beat from all the schlepping at Solitude and Alta the days prior.

Oh, that line. Yep, know it well but don't know the name. I'll have to check my Bird patrol map when I get home. Pretty much every gap between every tree and rock has a name at the Bird.

That portion of MB is off of my patrol map poster. Best guess is from the Powder Hound's Guide by Asmus, which suggests that chute is called Ermindale. (News to me. I always called it "That shot after the step".)

 

[Admin]

Speaking of shots with obscure names, skrad...we have to get together so I can get that little something from you. :wink:

 

[Skrad]

Hi Marc,

Found the maps. Look for you in the GMD in the AM (if I don't go BCC backcountry with WMC instead). I could send them to you?

Skied the Canyons with VT friends on Wednesday and took the same wrong turn down Deschutes. They didn't seem to notice that something was wrong.

 

[Admin]

Found the maps. Look for you in the GMD in the AM (if I don't go BCC backcountry with WMC instead). I could send them to you?

\/ I'll be there at the usual 9 a.m. Thanks!!!

Skied the Canyons with VT friends on Wednesday and took the same wrong turn down Deschutes. They didn't seem to notice that something was wrong.

I swear, God as my witness, as I was skiing it I thought to myself, "A MRG skier would think this was normal."

 

[Powderqueen]

We climbed up past the bookend, then traversed out only a little more after the climb, then we went down through a nice steep chute. It kinda looks like the longest shot on that side of MB and was completely shadowed, so the snow was very nice. That was the only climbing we did that day, as we were so beat from all the schlepping at Solitude and Alta the days prior.

Oh, that line. Yep, know it well but don't know the name. I'll have to check my Bird patrol map when I get home. Pretty much every gap between every tree and rock has a name at the Bird.

You consider the dozen or so side steps up the Hillary Step to be climbing? :roll: There's more effort in getting from Gold Miner's Daughter to the Wildcat lift at Alta!

This year I am having a lot of pain in my right patella and a right side uphill side step is very taxing and painful. I don't think it is really a big hike, but it was hard for me with the pain I was in. I would prefer the other direction (like the Baldy hike). Backside hike was also brutal on my knee. At least when we were at Solitude, we skied the left traverse of HC. We nearly killed Cynthia on her first day here at Solitude with that pretty short uphill side-step.

Cynthia, from the real flatlands of the mid-Atlantic, couldn't go up at all at Snowbird. She bailed and ended up skiing yucky snow. I kept telling her to stick with it, but she had been getting so winded she felt like throwing up...though I think skiing in yucky snow would yield similar results. Take 20 more steps and you are there, skiing the soft snow. Hard to convince people sometimes.

Today I bailed on one of the Cobabe hikes (which is also pretty easy) due to knee pain. Another right side schlep.

I'm wondering how I will do tomorrow at Alta. I am going to try to tape my knee. Maybe that will help.

I think I really just need 5 days off from skiing....that will come starting Monday, and I'm just about ready.

 

[kingslug]

Don't know what it is but the left side of my right kne...is friggin hurtin!! but not when I ski or stand, just when I straighten it out after sitting for a while....weird! This getting older thing aint cutting it, but I don't feel my age thank god.....

 

[Acidchrist]

The patrol name for Deschutes at the Canyons is PLUMBER'S CRACK! Does that all seem to make sense now? I had to sled someone outta there with a broken femur...NOT FUN! (my patroller skills were maxed out and then some)
And on another note, I'm detecting some whinyness and gratuitous complaining in this forum?!?! What's up with that?? :-({|=

 

[Admin]

The patrol name for Deschutes at the Canyons is PLUMBER'S CRACK! Does that all seem to make sense now?

Sure does! :lol: