The day started out beautiful, and we followed the cattle train up Flagstaff. I felt alright, just plugging along at my snail's pace. As typical, the wind whipped up as we were approaching the ridgeline and I silently cursed that horrid approach. The clouds had moved in and the light was ridiculously flat. Great.
But, the silver lining to the horrid cold was that the snow was still great. We dropped in on Two Dogs and decided to do a lap on West Bowl in the trees. We motored up to the ridgeline and were extremely excited by the quality of the snow. A quick pit showed three feet of consolidated snow to a small facet layer at the ground. Shear testing looked good, so we hit it. The snow was awesome, and the extra hike was so worth it.
After more fueling up, we started the slog back up to the LCC ridge. Now the fun really got started. The south-facing exit getting out of LCC was NASTY. An inch of breakable crust was coming off in plates while we dodged buried trees and rocks. Lots of traversing and kick-turning (FUN!) We skied the bottom of Toledo Bowl, and finally the snow softened out a bit for the last couple hundred feet. After watching Josh double-ejecting on a compression, we got back to the car and headed straight for Lone Star.
One good thing - I think I found a good method to keep my hands warm. I tried out our Mammut ice climbing gloves for skinning. The concept was that if I never had to take my gloves off, my hands would never get TOO cold. Well, it seemed to work. I was able to get in and out of my bag, handle skins, eat, dress, and everything else without ever having to expose my hands to the air. No more glove liners. I used my mittens for skiing and for when my hands got cold, and it was extremely manageable. I think I'm going to toss those stupid REI gloves.
Stats for the day:
3.0 miles
2833 ft vertical
Click below for route and profile info!
1 comment:
Nice work grinding out that last climb out of Days Tgirl. You are an animal.
Post a Comment