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View Full Version : Alta/Snowbird, UT 12/29/07



FirstTracks
12-29-2007, 05:57 PM
Day 17: Where are the crowds?

Honestly, we never had a liftline longer than 30 seconds at either Snowbird or Alta today, and that includes: Collins, Wildcat, Sugarloaf, Supreme, Peruvian, Gadzoom, and Gad 2. Apparently they're all on the Wasatch Back, for The Kid reports that PCMR yesterday was a zoo.

Bobby D opted again to head north, so it was The Kid, Skidog, Pat, Tele Jon and yours truly. And boy oh boy, did we do some traveling today!

There were a few inches (I think that the morning report was six inches, I heard) of new snow atop a spongy base. It therefore skied pretty darned good. We started off with early tracks through Fred's Trees, then moved on to Wildcat for our usual lap before heading out the Keyhole Gate into Snowbird. The gully that forms the crux of that route is still awfully narrow with the less-than-mid-season snowpack, but it was still negotiable. I filmed some video right below there:

http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1287024889/bclid1301088717/bctid1351338139

We worked our way over to Gadzoom, en route to Gad 2, although Amy called Pat while we were riding Gadzoom and Pat therefore headed back to Alta (Amy was buying new boots today in the latest chapter of her boot trials and tribulations). The four of us headed off through steep trees to reach Gad 2, enjoying some untracked and lightly tracked en route.

We ripped one through the woods to skier's right of Bananas before crossing over to Launcher Bowl, dipping down under the lift and heading out the Carbonate Gate. Things are still a bit dicey to skier's right of Carbonate -- it's amazing how much deeper the snow is at Alta -- and worked our way over to Wilbere to get to Snowbird Center for lunch in the Rendezvous.

It was then time to return to Alta, so we headed up Peruvian, through the tunnel and into complete vertigo in Mineral Basin. It was unnerving, but we did manage to work our way down to Baldy Express and headed through the Sugar Shack back into Alta. The Kid had opted to call it a day and headed back to the truck, so by now we were down to three.

By the time we got to Supreme the snowfall was increasing in intensity, and it was positively hammering by mid afternoon:

http://www.firsttracksonline.com/boards/files/01_alta_snowfall_sugarloaf_071229.jpg

After one run through No. 9 Trees and down through White Squaw we headed back up to hike way, way out into Catherine's, farther than I've been all season. We toured out across Last Chance to Catherine's Pass itself, and enjoyed untracked leading down the west-facing slopes and trudged out the back route to the Rock Garden. Weather by now was intensifying, and the trudge was made even more arduous by howling winds coming up through the Rock Garden and blowing snow directly into our faces. Heading down the south end of Patsy Marley meant more braille skiing -- but untracked, so it was OK -- to the Albion Flats, skiing back inbounds at Alf's.

We all ventured back up Sugarloaf and down to the car through a succession of trees, culminating in Black Forest at 3 pm.

A big day, skiing AltaBird end to end.

ericchile
12-29-2007, 07:27 PM
My pass has blackouts until the 1st... :-( So I was on the seld today!..

Looks like fun though