Snowbird with Tony C 29-30 Jan 2022

[jimk]

Here are some photos from a sunny day at Snowbird with Tony C and friends.

Lisa on Mark Malu trail in Little Cloud Bowl

Andy in Rasta Chutes area

Tony foregrd Chip midgrd and Vince lower backgrd Rasta Chutes

Matt ready to drop Mark Malu and head to Rasta Chutes

Chip Rastaman vibrations

Chip wide view

vince rasta chutes and tony lower left

Andy with rasta chutes area in background, Little Cloud Bowl

Then we moved on to the Cirque area of Snowbird. If you want to get a little elbow room on a busy Saturday at Snowbird, head for the Cirque in low tide conditions.

This is Matt and Chip scoping out a rocky Upper Cirque

We opted for a chute in the Middle Cirque area.

Vince dropping...

Chip Middle Cirque, MICHIGAN WOLVERINES!

Andy Cirque

photoslut

accidental artsy shot of Tony in Cirque

Enjoying a good East Coast cheapie beer for lunch on Bypass Rd- Yuengling

Chip in Hot Foot Gully

Matt set to drop Hot Foot

Tony and a nice shot of the Salt Lake Valley inversion/haze

Very nice way to spend a Saturday!

Almost left out a nice one of Tony C getting after it in Rasta Chutes!

 

[Sbooker]

Nice pics.
You don’t wear a helmet Tony?

 

[Sbooker]

 

[jamesdeluxe]

You don’t wear a helmet Tony?

No helmet and aviator glasses from 1958 -- that's how he rolls.

 

[Sbooker]

No helmet and aviator glasses from 1958 -- that's how he rolls.

As someone who feels the heat I am sympathetic to Tony's aversion to helmets. The difference is I'm a relative novice and I wouldn't dream of trying to ski some of those lines without one.
If I know I will be exclusively cruising groomers on a warm spring day I'll go with sunnies and no hat.
Even though I love the aviators I couldn't pull that look off. Props to Tony.

 

[Tony Crocker]

Great pics by jimk, saved me some work. I'm impressed he had the time to take them as we were moving at a brisk pace with locals Andy, Lisa, Chip and Matt. Jimk in Rastas:

Inversion haze on the drive down Saturday after 23,600 vertical:

 

[Tony Crocker]

Both days I dropped Liz at Alta for her Kristen Ulmer clinic, then parked on the bypass road to ski Snowbird. Andy led the way and both days were similar. On Sunday we had Andy and Lisa's local friends Matt and Keith, plus former Diamond Dogs visitors Steve and Debbie.

Sunday's pace was at least as fast as Saturday, as many people wanted to get home in time to see most of the NFL games. We took our first 4 runs in Mineral Basin. In January only partial south facing melt/froze, so east facing sectors like Silver Dipper had smooth chalk not so different from north facing areas like Bookmark Gully.

We moved to the frontside after Mineral Basin line built up. One of our few stops was to check out this porcupine in a tree.

We skied Gadzooks and some off trail variations from Bananas on Gad 2. we moved to Little Cloud via the Bassackwards Benches, which I had surprisingly never skied before. On Little Cloud the Rastas and Hoops continued to deliver the best snow the mountain. I also skied Old Ladies, which had stiff chalk similar to the ungroomed lines I had skied in Mineral Basin. While in line at Little Cloud we saw two guys air this rock.


Departing Little Cloud I thought I could find a clean way into the Upper Cirque but I navigated poorly. I ended up in Shot 11, which had a line rocks down the middle which I sideslipped past. I was quite beat after that but went up top once more to ski Upper Primrose, which as usual was excellent. I finished at 2PM with 24,400 vertical.

I also learned today that Andy's local friend Matt runs the website skimap.com These maps have topo lines and are viewed from directly above. I linked one last year from Mt. Bachelor as the format is paticularly useful for areas like that with 360 degree exposure.

 

[Marc_C]

I also learned today that Andy's local friend Matt runs the website skimap.com These maps have topo lines and are viewed from directly above. I linked one last year from Mt. Bachelor as the format is paticularly useful for areas like that with 360 degree exposure.

I find the maps totally unreadable. They need to be converted from small jpg to a scalable format. You also cannot click from the region listing page - a big usability issue.
Another issue is being unable to move the map around with the mouse after zooming in or to reorient compass direction.

 

[Tony Crocker]

I have not studied those maps systematically. I used the one for Bachelor because the standard trail map has practically no detail of the backside, where Liz and I skied a lot last April.