Baker!

As a backcountry skier I’m in the middle of the spectrum among my friends. To me, summiting a volcano isn’t a huge deal or a bucket list item I have to spend months preparing for, but I’m definitely not bagging peaks all the time. And aside from that one failed attempt on Hood, I actually haven't done any volcanoes, so I was excited to head up Baker on Tuesday. 

When we moved here, we were quickly adopted by Jon, a guy who’s fresh out of college and probably the most rabidly enthusiastic skier I know. In the Tetons it’s easy to live and breathe skiing — not like there’s much else to do, and you’re only twenty or thirty minutes from any given parking lot. But here the riding is distractingly good (and much closer) and the snow is consistently inconsistent and so dang far away. That doesn’t adulterate Jon’s glee though, so he’s always the one trying to reverse our slump into non-skierdom each winter. 

As spring arrived, he had a mission to get us to ski Baker. Cy had various ailments and prior commitments that kept him from doing it but when Jon told me there was a choice weather window coming in 48 hours, I decided to shirk my duties that day. 

We had a call on Monday to talk gear and timing. I reminded him I wouldn’t be an equal partner on the hill. I have zero glacier travel experience and only a nebulous understanding of what all the ropes and dangly bits are for — don’t fall in a crevasse is the number one rule, I guess? And I know tackling an objective while operating with a guide or mentor mentality is more fatiguing than being with a peer. He said he was understood and was looking forward to that aspect. Fortunately I was confident that, unlike in the usual guide-client partnership, I could hold my own on fitness. 

We left the trailhead at 4:30 a.m. We were both wearing running shoes for the three-mile dry walk on trail, but Jon changed his mind at the last minute and instead we committed to some semi-heinous PNW-style forest 'shwacking in exchange for a lot more on-snow time on the descent. 

We started skinning up the first col as the sun rose. The snow surface, pebbled like a lizard skin with ice crystals, was firm and slick. I churned forward, feeling good until the track got steeper, the snow got icier, and we climbed into a wind tunnel at the toe of the glacier. I longed for ski crampons. During a snack break I had a small crisis of confidence. Wind plus icy skinning always makes me feel vulnerable and irrationally scared. Cy has dealt with me in this deer-in-the-headlights mode several times. 

But the wind let up and we strapped on boot crampons and my mood immediately improved. The crampons made me feel beyond safe, like a superhero she-panther stalking up the steep pitch, the snow the perfect firmness for fast side-pointing progress.

We summited with little ado. We needed to wait for the snow to soften up on the main descent and Jon had his eyes on the Park Headwall, a slope that had already received the right amount of sun. The extra ski meant we had to climb back out of a hole, but I was game.

Jon dropped onto the perfectly slushy pitch with fluid, powerful arcs. When it was my turn I realized the slope was much steeper than it looked — 50 degrees, we later confirmed — and I shakily made clumsy hop turns, my eyes glued to the row of bergschrunds below. Is this bad glacier travel behavior? An intermediate skier hopping for her life in a no-fall zone? Maybe. 

Something I’ve realized about Jon is that he’s such a good skier and spends so much time with other good skiers that he sometimes forgets that the downhill, not the uphill, can be where someone falters and finds their limits. As a result, I have accidentally followed him into some scary places where I'm in over my head. I learned to ski as an adult and only started feeling proficient a few years ago, and skiing has taken a backseat in Washington. But I have survival fundamentals, and I did indeed survive the Park Headwall. 

We were still on a steep, hot slope when we switched back to uphill mode and I tackled another of my fears — transitioning in steeps. Cy has coached me through this several times to help me overcome the irrational terror of falling backward and the more rational terror of a vital piece of equipment sliding away, never to be retrieved. I am generally a meticulous person and being meticulous is essential when you’re managing gear in the steeps. 

With crampons back on and my skis safely strapped to my pack, I was back in control, happily punching steps into the snow. I felt remarkably strong even as we exceeded the vertical gain of my biggest ski day ever. Then we skied delicious bonus turns on the Roman Wall, skinned up again, and enjoyed 6,000 feet of the best, most consistent corn skiing I’ve ever experienced. 

After we picked our way down the snowy banks of Grouse Creek, I bumped up against bonk-flavored frustration for the first time. Jon called a reset and we doffed sweaty clothes and helmets, drank water, ate snacks, and prepared for the thankless final ‘shwack. 

The day went as well as I could possibly have hoped. We did the volcano quickly, in good style, in perfect conditions, and as a smooth team. 

Even though I’m relatively inexperienced with big objectives, I’ve done so much backcountry skiing (and have benefited from Cy’s gear and knowledge largesse). I have a very light setup that I'm comfortable with, I have a tried and true layering system, I know how my body and brain work (and yes, as usual, I didn’t eat enough, but I never actually bonked), and best of all, I have so many years of endurance stored up in my legs that climbing feels almost effortless. 

The next day I was riding home from work and saw the snowy behemoth on the skyline. I didn’t expect it to have an effect on me, but I got goosebumps. I skied that!

Co-Ed Bachelor Party

Squad

In 2019 we started planning for a Canada mountain bike trip this month to celebrate our pending nuptials with Nate and Amanda, Sam and Jordan, and Chrissy, a group of people that could handle basically any ride, conveniently including women that would be happy pedaling all day and guys that were interested in goading each other into hitting gaps and stuff. But COVID happened and closed the border, as well as delaying my and Chrissy's passport renewals, so we cast our eyes elsewhere and came up with Winter Park, Colorado. That was the plan until last Tuesday, when we learned that Jordan, who went down early with Sam, had a major crash and broke bones at Trestle Bike Park. She needed surgery and they wouldn't be able to come along on the trip. 

Suddenly, Cy and I were thinking the same thing: Colorado is hot, Colorado is crowded, why were we planning to go there? He started pacing the kitchen and spouting the benefits of northern Idaho, his beloved old stomping grounds. I was soon convinced, so I called our other group members. Rather than resenting our last-minute change of heart, they were totally game to go northwest instead of southeast. 

Base camp, night one

We departed early on Thursday morning. After finding a campsite outside of Kellogg, we set off for what I'd mistaken for a short afternoon ride nearby. We were all immediately delighted by the dense dark woods and rich creek beds lined with ferns and huckleberries, but less so by the unrelenting climb that continued growing steeper and rockier. (The adjective "unrelenting" was used in the description of the trail, a detail I glossed over.) We finished the slog soaked in sweat, then descended over steep root tangles and scattershot rock piles and through stream crossings. One crossing was studded with the remains of a moose skeleton and Cy claimed a paddle for our bone garden at home.  

Top of a very hard climb

Friday was dedicated to Silver Mountain Bike Park, which quickly proved to be technical, challenging, fun, and humbling. We learned that black diamond trails are accurately rated and that I'm still a bit too skittish for real DH, but it was a great day. Cy and the Careys took extra laps while Chrissy and I drank beers and lounged in the sun, counting our blessings to not have sustained injuries or bike failures on the rough, feature-laden trails.

Silver Mountain was hairy

After sleeping in the Silver parking lot we headed over to Coeur D'Alene for an easy little dog ride, then kept going to Spokane where, Cy promised, there was a rowdy in-town trail system. We rode Beacon Hill despite the devastating (to our delicate mountain bodies) heat and sun, and found some of it absurdly challenging (chunky rock rolls into kitty litter) and some of it quite entertaining, including an impeccable pump track. After a quick splash in the very inviting Spokane River and a brief stop at a dispensary, we headed north into Idaho. The town beach in Sandpoint was wildly crowded so we ate some tacos and drove up to Schweitzer Mountain Resort. Cy's nostalgia grew palpable as we arrived at the ski hill where he held his first season pass and started down the path to becoming the person he is now.

On Sunday, I enjoyed an actual breakfast burrito at an actual coffee shop after a few days of campground granola, then Cy and I took the dog for a short ride. We all regrouped and pedaled a mellow but lovely trail to the Schweitzer summit, where Cy felt all the feelings. We took a rocky, loamy descent back to the base, set a shuttle, and dropped further down the resort road on a purpose-built downhill full of small and large features, ripe with good dirt and giggles. 

You can sense the nostalgia

Although we had planned to spend another night at the resort parking lot because it was easy, the previous night had been marked by strong winds that knocked over camp chairs and filled every crevice with sand, so the Careys lobbied that we descend. Fortuitously, we found a quiet, scenic campsite on the north end of Lake Pend Oreille and enjoyed an evening swim in the choppy but not too cold water.

A lovely evening at Pend Oreille

On Monday morning our paths diverged. The Careys returned to Silver (it was that good) and Chrissy moseyed home, while we had firm plans to go for a run that Cy loved. He truly undersold the experience. After four miles of perfect running trail we summited to massive, breathtaking lake and peak views and visited with some very docile, photogenic mountain goats. Definitely on my top five best runs ever list.

Now we have more photos of us together

Perfect, perfect running

Oh yes, there were goats

Despite obligations looming on Tuesday, we opted to make one last detour on the long drive home, splitting the distance with a Monday night stop at hot springs deep in unknown (to me) territory. Despite being very popular hot springs, we found them nearly empty and devoid of weirdos. An easy night's sleep at the trailhead and a six hour drive home ended one of the best road trips I've ever gone on.

A worthwhile detour

Idaho, it's terrible. Don't come here.

Open Season

Last week at an informal state of the snowpack talk, Don Sharaf of the American Avalanche Institute told his audience that, while the Bridger-Teton Avalanche Center forecasters don't like to turn the whole pyramid to green, it's officially open season in the Tetons. The frightening early season instabilities have healed themselves and slow, steady accumulation with negligible weird weather means the best possible snow conditions: deep and not moving.

"This kind of stability means you get your bucket of balls and just start teeing up shots," Big Don told us.

Indeed.

We had planned in advance to go use up a couple Mountain Collective days at Big Sky, so unfortunately we weren't taking as much advantage of open season as we could be, but decided to aim for a big walk on Sunday. Talking about it and poring over trip reports on the drive home from Montucky, we laid out a plan for Buck. We decided to approach the massive jutting peak from a different route than most people did, a route that added in a little chute and seemed to make more sense.

Buck is a beaut, for sure.

I had a vague sick feeling in my stomach thinking about the descent, mostly because a half decade of hyper-awareness and timidity around avalanche terrain really runs counter to the idea of skiing a huge, steep, open, east-facing aspect, completely at the mercy of those twin snow-movers, sun and wind.

But we packed all of our sharps (a whippet, ice axe, and crampons for each) and arose at 4 a.m. to tackle the peak, maybe. Our biggest fear was that the face would warm too quickly, but at the trailhead the temperature gauge read -10 degrees, and the shock of cold totally blindsided us. Our concern turned to the wisdom of leaving the dog in the car, which we usually do in the Park because it means she isn't left at home to her own devices for what could be twelve or fifteen hours. We fluffed jackets and blankets onto the seats for her and hoped the sun would emerge quickly and turn the van into a greenhouse.

After last week's mission I wondered if big tours were getting easier, but this week I wondered why I felt so shitty. We were both slow and dehydrated from a quasi-debauched Big Sky weekend with Bria and soon lost sight of the objective. Halfway up the annoyingly uneven Maverick skin track, we stopped to have that important conversation: we're not moving fast enough to tackle the summit.

Also, the standard way people get up the peak is via an airy knife ridge with 1,500 feet of exposure, and while we knew the bootpack had been well-established by purportedly fifteen skiers the day before, I loathe exposure. I'm not really cut out for ski mountaineering, obviously. We could boot up the less-exposed face instead but it'd be slower going and people might drop onto us at any time.

We skinned up a gusty, wind-slabby traverse to the top of Chute the Moon and I remembered how much I need to work on keeping my composure when the uphill is even a little bit sketchy. I fall apart every damn time.

So so so so so beautiful.

After skiing the mellow chute in crappy snow, we did another short, windy, butt-clenching climb that should have been a breeze, then pushed past that into the calmer sunshine.

Looking around the deeper part of the range in perfect visibility, it was astonishing to see ski tracks on some of the most consequential lines and faces. Wow, everyone got the memo about open season.  This weekend people tagged the biggest summits in the Tetons and tackled objectives that only get skied a few times a season, if at all. It's very inspiring, and very humbling, because I don't have the ability to climb or ski most of that stuff.

Backing off an objective but still getting to ski two couloirs in a day is pretty neato.

The line we skied, Buckshot off the north side of Buck, was very cool and very steep (for me), and because it has a big snowfield above it, I would never touch it in more dangerous conditions. As it was, the snow was edgeable but wind-battered and firm. I skied slowly, stopping often to catch my breath and shake out my legs.

We continued to admire ski lines all the way down Avalanche Canyon, then committed to the undulating luge through the trees that spat us out on Bradley Lake.

A quick snack stop on the lake. I'm so fortunate to have this one as my backcountry partner.

While we didn't even come close to the summit, it was worth the walk to look around at the majestic peaks in the range's interior. And being done by one left plenty of time for lounging in the sun, eating pizza, and bemoaning the new tanlines on my face. And the dog was fine.

Building Character: The Teton Traverse

Last weekend after a couple lackluster pre-season Shoshone laps, Dapper Dan made a surprising suggestion: a November Teton traverse. 

In the summer people often run the Teton Canyon to Death Canyon traverse, which is a pretty mellow way to get from one side of the range to the other. In mid-winter some people exit from the back of the Village, thus starting high and finding some interesting lines along the way, but the Teton to Death traverse doesn't have much appeal to skiers. 

It's still low tide in the Tetons, but Dan's proposal started to make sense; route-finding would be straightforward because the summer trails are still visible under the sparse snow, avy danger has yet to really rear its head, daylight savings is looming, and the Teton Canyon road is still open, cutting off four miles of travel. 

I did my last big ski tour on Cinco de Mayo with Cy and BriAndrew. It was a long walk to a big line, the aesthetic (and amusingly named) Fallopian Tube on Mt Woodring. Hot, footsore, recovering from some moments of intense fear, and feeling exceedingly accomplished, I packed up my winter gear, took the batteries out of my beacon, and filed away the Grand Teton National Park skiing mentality, to be retrieved no earlier than 2020 (or maybe December if the early season was really deep). 

Yep, skied that!

So imagine my surprise to find myself once again at a trailhead before dawn in single digit weather on November 2, turning on my headlamp and shouldering a pack that was stupid heavy. 

Our expectations were completely realistic. The purpose of this undertaking was conditioning, covering ground, trying out weird new set-ups (Cy had awesome AT snowblades and Dan was using XC skis and mountaineering boots, very appropriate for what was basically an XC mission), and coming home with that full body fatigue that only comes with really really big days--a fatigue that I find hard to achieve in mud season when everything is kind of meh. 

I really didn't expect to be doing long approaches before dawn in November

Skinning along the Teton Shelf at sunrise

We wore running shoes and were glad about it, because the first three miles and the last five miles of the traverse were on dry dirt or thin snow. We emerged from the Devil's Staircase and finally started skinning on the Teton Shelf just as the sun rose, illuminating beautiful couloirs above us all along the shelf. After a snack break at Mount Meek Pass we started along the Death Canyon Shelf, wondering if we'd have to follow the circuitous summer trail all the way to the head of Death Canyon. Although the south-facing cliff band below us was alarmingly scoured, we managed to find one still sketchy but not completely bare path down to the canyon. I had the dubious fortune of bringing the only normal ski set-up, although Cy skied the choke and rocky apron with flair and Dan down-climbed with the agility of a goat. 

The only "skiing" of the traverse

Looking down the chute, I knew I couldn't ski as if it were my second day of the season, melting into the backseat as I tried to remember where to point my torso. Nope, I had to draw on memories from last season when we skied several lines outside of my comfort zone and I finally became a proficient enough skier that being locked into skis felt way safer than being on foot. 

So I made tight turns and a few long side slips down the chute. It wasn't pretty but it was safe and I didn't even scratch a base beneath the chute while bopping through the boulder field blanketed in a few inches of snow. 

Those few turns were the only ones of the trip. We put skins on and learned something about Death Canyon: it's flat as fuck. Down skinning for miles and miles is fairly offensive, especially when interspersed with short techy descents that rattled Dan with his strange but sort of perfect skis. 

So...much...skinning

After another much needed snack and beer at the Patrol Cabin we set off again but soon realized that the well-traveled boulder-strewn trail did not merit skis. Back into running shoes. We each settled in to bang out those last miles, numbing our thoughts with music or Star Wars audiobooks, one foot in front of the other. Dan had left his truck at the winter trailhead, not realizing the summer trailhead was still open, so, further demoralized, we trudged down the road. Eventually some nice Jackson bros stopped and drove us the final mile to the truck, much to my relief. 

So...much...walking...with...skis

It was a hard day. Eighteen miles in ten hours. It was a little irksome that my skis only served as glorified snowshoes, greatly improving travel over flat, untouched snow but never eating up the downhill miles the way skis usually do. However, I wouldn't have chosen different conditions in which to do that traverse. In deep skiable snow the route still wouldn't be much fun, and if I tried to run it in the summer I would hate how flat it is. Why set an elaborate shuttle and go through the mountains when you can just climb to the top of them instead? 

We joked that we were prematurely preparing our bodies for ski tours that wouldn't be happening for another two months. But it felt really good to do something a little silly but very demanding, to remember my limits but to also know that I'm a stronger backcountry traveler than I ever have been. And to see the Tetons at first light from the heart of the range. 

But seriously, very beautiful

I Used to Do This

I wake up feeling antsy. And angsty. I've let too many sunshiney days go to waste. I have watched the evenings pass with beer in hand instead.

I don't want to go for a run, because for a couple reasons I don't like short runs here. I am particular. I don't like running trails that I'd prefer to bike, and the hard trails I want to run are populated with megafauna that I'm not tryna fuck with. It's too bad I don't have that perfect backyard loop like at Camp, or the miles and miles of steep ridiculous Pisgah trails to hurt myself on.

Oh well.

I decide to ride up to Targhee. The warm morning air feels heavy with moisture (like, fifty percent humidity, not real southern humidity) and black clouds are pushing north across the valley but here black clouds don't always mean a storm, especially not in the morning. I pack a jacket and go for it.

I feel fast. I love spinning. The road is quiet. It's opening day at the resort but no one is heading up because there's still six feet of snow at the top. Two trails are open to bikes.

The shoulder is so wide and the pavement is so smooth. I breathe hard but don't think hard. I feel like my thoughts are left trailing in a wake behind me. I can't hold onto any thoughts when I exercise. Bye, thoughts.

Daily rain showers have left everything so green, the greenest, the most emerald, jade, lime, verdant, in contrast with the peaks, still snow white. I look at flowers, look at the corpses of little birds and squirrels on the road, look at the rumps of what might be elk tucked down next to the creek, look at big boulders and think about the book Sylvester and the Magic Pebble. What if all those boulders were actually donkeys?

This ride feels like when I used to get out all the time in the mornings. Before I felt constrained by a nine to five schedule even though my job is flexible and there's no way my boss could fire me. Back when I was an athlete. Now I'm enthusiast. But this is why I was an athlete. Because I used to do this. I resolve to do this again. I haven't ridden to Targhee that many times, because I don't like out-and-backs, but it's a twelve-mile climb on a beautiful road that ends at 8,000 feet. How did I get so lucky as to live here? Why wouldn't I like this? A quick hour and a half in the morning and I'm a happier person. I will do this again.

I believe one is contractually obligated to take a photo at this vista if one pedals to Targhee.

Resolve

I did a tour in GTNP a couple days ago, this tour but with a less complicated descent.

The conditions were identical: deep, light snow, single digit temps, no wind, cloudy skies.

Skinning across Taggart Lake...I love GTNP
Pic courtesy of Cy

The journey was completely different. Three years ago, I was still really new to skiing. I did fine on the uphill but the downhill was painful. I slowed down the group, I wasn’t a competent skier, and it was irresponsible for me to be out there. I think we all have to go through these deep end experiences and hopefully are able to learn from them rather than dying from them.

Now, in my fifth season of skiing and touring, I’m a different person. I’m probably more conservative than I was then, because I don’t let other people make decisions for me. I can make my own observations, do my own research, and navigate somewhat adequately. I often don’t get it right but every time is a learning experience, and I’m never a passive follower going in over my head without any knowledge. I can’t handle emergencies yet but I have the everyday systems dialed, and I’m a pretty good skier. Not pretty, and not good, but pretty good.

I like the word resolve more than the word resolution. Resolution is fluffy and aspirational; resolve is iron-spined.

 I set little goals every year. I don’t always remember them, but mostly I follow through. At the dawn of 2012, I vowed to shake up my life. In 2013, I wanted to say yes to everything. I remember talking to my dad on the phone early last January and saying that I wanted to write more. I was scared to say it out loud because then I was accountable.

My 2016 goal came true in a more definitive fashion than I could ever have predicted.

What do I resolve to do this year? Have more adventures, probably. Keep learning. Maybe get outside my comfort zone. Maintain my obsessive quest for novel experiences. I did a lot of that last year but I don’t want to lose momentum.

And now it’s in writing, so I guess I'd better do it.

These Are the Days of Miracle and Wonder

On Halloween everyone went to the Knotty and a local band performed all of Paul Simon's Graceland. It's the kind of album I forget about until I hear it and sink back into its wonderfulness. Today a line from "Boy in the Bubble" scrolled on repeat through my brain while I was running.

The November sunshine and warmth tricked me and Tyler into attempting a trail ride but the freeze-thaw resulted in greasy thick mud. It was nice enough to run though, so I rallied Cy and Patrick for a run up Taylor with the option of continuing on to Moose Creek.

The morning was cold and the ground was hardened in the shape of hikers' boots braving yesterday's mud. We pushed up to the ridge, reaching snowline and stomping steps into the suncrust. At the summit the Tetons jutted up to our north, the Palisades spread to the south, the Gros Ventre loomed impressive across Jackson Hole, the Big Holes rippled brown over Teton Valley.

Stoked dogs and snow on the Taylor ridge
Pic courtesy of Patrick

We plunged down the west face of Taylor in deep sugary snow, skiing on the soles of our feet, eating shit and laughing. Sophie and Mya porpoised through the snow, mocking our lack of grace. For those couple of miles skis would have been the weapon of choice, but then we got back to tromping through sagebrush and ankle-deep snow, with wet feet, scraped shins, and an awkward gait from all the slippery sidehill.

I kept us moving toward the idea of a trail and we finally (sort of) found it, a worn-in ribbon through the trees, primitive and plagued by blowdowns. At the bottom of the drainage it got willow-thick and moosey, then we abruptly popped out on the horses' muddy highway, Moose Creek Trail, and ran back to the shuttle car.

I am now happy to store my shoes away. I have done some really incredible runs this season and was fortunate to find a running buddy who does not appear to have the word "No" in his vocabulary. I ran through and over mountains, more for experience than exercise. I chased sunlight down the slopes of the Village, looked at the Grand from every angle, posed for pictures on summits, flushed moose from meadows, bushwhacked through bullshit, glided on ridgelines, stood in alpine lakes, and absorbed the unbelievable beauty of this range.

Days of miracle and wonder, indeed.