Max on Eddies from Friday, a decent sample of the conditions in the trees.
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November 16, 2011
Max’s Video From Friday
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, Turnagain, video | Tags: Eddies' |Leave a Comment
November 14, 2011
True Winter Weekend
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, Turnagain | Tags: Eddies', Jamie Pierre RIP, Magnum |1 Comment
Thanks to veterans day, and a series of storms blowing through, I’ve spent the last 3 days doing nothing other then ski powder and watch football. My progarm has been as follows. Leave home each morning before the sun is up, spend all day swimming in the snow, a nervous drive home (today the car in front of us lost a wheel, etc.) in the dark followed by lounging at home, eating some pizza, and disinterestedly watching football. Friday I went up Eddies with Max and Mikey, and returned there again on Saturday with Andy. Friday was pretty deep, and it continued to snow through that night and all day Saturday, so both days were deep and wet with lots of faceshots.
Today, Andy and I were headed back to Turnagain and the sun was coming out, we really couldn’t believe our luck, but once we got out of the car at Sunburst we instantly noticed the wind, which battered us all day. It was also worth a laugh that after cruising past and overflowing Tin Can lot, Keille and friends were the only people parked at sunburst, and the next 3 cars all contained friends of ours whose first words were to remark on the crowd at tin can. It made for a kind of a class reunion fare as everyone caught up after the long off season.
So we headed up Magnum and braved the winds, which were of the super nasty sustained type, with gusts to 40 or so as well. As predicted they torched the snow in places. Luckily, Davis Creek is small and somewhat sheltered, so after a turn or two we found some extremely nice powder. I’ve only got a handful of pictures from today, with the heavy snow friday and saturday and the intense wind and cold today weren’t very conducive to picture taking. I also set off a non consequence windslab lower down by slashing on the crest of wind loaded gully. Picture bellow. Oh, and I have to mention Jamie Pierre, RIP. He’s made an appearance in each of our full length films, and talked shit to all of us back in the Utah days. Very sad news.
November 7, 2011
It snowed rather substantially Saturday night (I wasn’t expecting it) allowing for some fantastic powder skiing on Sunday. The sun moved in and out of the clouds, and despite the warmer temps down low the snow stayed nice and light. I even got a few Alta style faceshots. All this snow, this early in the year has left me feeling weak and out of shape, as my legs haven’t had a chance to build into the conditions, and everything looks so good it’s hard to hold yourself back and take it easy.
November 6, 2011
Crack Fix
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, Turnagain, video | Tags: Cornbiscuit, Superbowl |[2] Comments
Fall is an awful season, I’m so glad its over. As with every year, each fall season that I don’t leave the country my accomplishments consist of driving my self crazy over tedium, and boredom. The skiing has been pretty good the last couple of weeks though, and I’ve been feeling better, but today was absolutely fantastic, I feel like I got put back on my medicine. I went up to Goldpan with Andy this morning, and enjoyed a nice ridge walk along Magnum with the Viking before dropping in to Superbowl. Some other folks had beat us up there, but no one had skied the line I was planning on taking, so it was all good. A little wind affected up top, but absolute pow down bellow. I didn’t ski so well, as I’m not really in shape yet and embarassingly my legs were gassed halfway down. From there, Andy and I headed up Cornbiscuit and skied the corner-pocket chute before bushwhacking our way back to the road. Our run down Superbowl has had me in a permagrin since I got to the bottom. After last years horrible season it felt so so nice to finally ski something steep and interesting. Video bellow.
October 30, 2011
Early Season Tin Can Crowds
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing | Tags: crowds, tin can |[3] Comments
Andy and I tried to go elsewhere, but as we drove further the rain only increased, so we retreated and parked at Tin Can along with another 20 cars. I do love seeing the regional bro’s early season enthusiasm, which gets people out walking through creeks and post holing in the rain for some low visibility turns in some very super sticky snow. I guess it goes to explain why so many people are burnt out by march, but who cares. Great times, the circus like atmosphere and drinking beers in blowing snow on Tin Can really made it feel like winter was back. So pleased
September 12, 2011
Jewel Glacier Skiing
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, video | Tags: Crow Pass, girdwood, Jewel Glacier |[2] Comments
Friday I was out in Eagle River with Graham to work on skis and was surprised by the amount of snow on the surrounding peaks. Tentative plans were made to go skiing on Sunday, but I had very little faith that things would actually work out. However, Sunday turned out to be gorgeous, easily the nicest day in weeks, and Graham called early that morning to let me know he was on his way. The parking lot at Crow Pass was packed, but we were the only skiers, and after a little over an hour of hiking, and some serious doubts as to if we’d find anything worth skiing, we eventually came around a corner to find the Jewel with covered with a healthy blanket of warm wet snow. Getting some turns in under the sunshine was fantastic, it feels so so good to be skiing again. A little video bellow, not really anything special, but I figured I might as well put something up to commemorate the beginning of a new year.
May 16, 2011
Contingency Plan Granddaddy Chute Ski
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, Turnagain, video | Tags: Bertha Creek, Granddaddy Chute |Leave a Comment
Planning on skiing the north side of Byron, Max, Charlie, Spencer, Corky and I got an uncharacteristically early start leaving town at 6:30. We arrived to find Byron enveloped in pea soup clouds, and made a unanimous decision to keep driving in search of some sunshine. After deciding on Granddaddy, we sped up Bertha Creek, the frozen early morning snow making for super quick travel. The wind was pretty strong with occasional deep throaty groans and the clouds were racing with an artificial looking high speed that we decided against skinning up the ridge and chose instead to boot up the looker right of the chute next to the rocks. Corky led the charge, and despite a pocket of super firm snow we all reached the top without incident. With the clouds whipping by at a fantastic clip we thought it would only be a matter of time before a sucker hole blew in, but we all got cold and anxious before that had could occur and ended up skiing the line in a cloud. The snow was surprisingly fantastic, the wind had filled the chute with a couple inches of dry styrofoam like snow that skied great. Also, be warned, Max and I were fooling around with our cameras so the video bellow is a little strange.
April 15, 2011
Cunningham Couloir and Internet Avalanche Excitement
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, mitigated disasters, Skiing, video | Tags: airbag, Avalanche |Leave a Comment
I’ve had very little of interest to post around these parts lately and since I’m more likely to have more stories of minor league hockey then skiing I figured I’d spruce this place up with the work of my friends and internet randoms. The video above is from my buddy Clive in Chamonix skiing the Cunningham Couloir off the Midi bridge. And bellow is a clip of some unknown heli-skier in getting caught in an avalanche and deploying his airbag. Enjoy.
April 12, 2011
Explorer Glacier Tour
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, video | Tags: Explorer Glacier, Portage |Leave a Comment
I woke up Sunday planning on skiing, but with little motivation (due to our persistently unstable snowpack) and a chaotic Malaysian Grand Prix to watch I wasn’t expecting to get out the door too quickly as I was planning on skiing alone. But by the time the race had finished the sunshine had convinced Wilson, Max and Riley to all go skiing as well. After some brief discussion of the merits of Hatcher Pass, a short video convinced everyone to go explore near Byron in Portage. We initially parked at Byron, but with the valley, ridge and peak encased in thick clouds, we changed plans and decided to head up Explorer Glacier and see what we could find.
We followed the moraine to the foot of the glacier where we took the obvious ramp onto the glacier and continued up, angling right with the large crevasses to our right. Unfortunately by the time reached the top and traversed towards a couple of nice northerly shots on the west side of the glacier some clouds moved in and convinced us to bail without skiing anything with much pitch. The exit from the glacier was incredibly easy, as a wide pleasant skiing creek lead directly to some power lines that kicked us back on the road, all extremely visible from the bottom of the glacier.
So despite the lack of any steep turns I drove home very satisfied with the day. I’ve been staring up at this valley for so long that it was nice to know both what the view is like and that it is incredibly accessible. I was testing out my pole cam mount so I’ve got a little video, nothing too exciting, but it’s got a good view of the route over some snow bridges and the easy exit down the creek.
April 9, 2011
Harp Dog Avalanche
Posted by dongshow under alcohol, backcountry, Front Range, mitigated disasters | Tags: Avalanche, Eagle River South Fork, Harp |1 Comment
So, after suffering in the office all day, I’d made up my mind to get some front range skiing in this evening. While getting dressed Wilson arrived from Alyeska and decided to join Sue and I in our plan to head up to Arctic Valley. Unfortunately, the gate just past the golf coarse was shut, rendering Arctic Valley inaccessible so we went up Hiland Road thinking Harp would deliver some nice early evening light. Both Wilson and I were pretty suspect of the snow, and decided on a mellower shot that looked to have slid recently. It skied fantastic, both Wilson and I cruised to the bottom without incident. Unfortunately, Sue (the dog) decided to head lookers right into a rocky wind loaded area that popped. She swam to the lookers left and was all but out of it when it propagated further and she got slammed again. Thankfully, despite tumbling numerous times she kept up the doggy paddle and escaped to the lookers right just as the slide was settling and quickly ran over to us. We’re thinking this might be Sue’s last day skiing for the year. My shot of the slide from lower in the valley is posted bellow, sorry about the poor quality pictures, all I had was my GoPro and I didn’t have any video either.
(click for big)
April 8, 2011
Various Videos and Valdez Photos
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, Turnagain, video | Tags: Cornbiscuit, Thompson Pass, valdez |1 Comment
I have a bunch of bits from the last couple of weeks. First a couple of pictures form the conditions in Valdez while I was in Abaco.
And a couple of videos; first a Wilson and Max skiing some shorter lines of Easter Bunny in Thompson Pass
And a short video of retreating with our tails between our legs on Cornbiscuit this past Wednesday. Nothing to special but worth watching to see Max’s accidental air.
Oh, and the word on the street is that Hatcher is going off right now.
February 15, 2011
Random Clouds, Deep Snow
Posted by dongshow under backcountry, Skiing, Turnagain, video | Tags: tin can |Leave a Comment
- Н. Е. Тимков
Driving home after Saturday’s powder fest I was made to believe that Sunday’s forecast called for more sunshine and more cold, which prompted me to make around of phone calls and set some semi-ambitious plans for following morning. So I went to bed with happy thoughts, a stomach full of beer and thoughts of steep sunny powder to come only to be woken up early the next morning by both my planned ski partners calling to inform me that it was cloudy and they now had other plans. Which at the time wasn’t too bad as I was tired and going solo allowed me to sleep a bit longer.
After a customary late start I ended up meeting up with Jeff (recently back from New Zeeland / Antarctica) and Graham and took a couple runs off the south side of Tin Can. The snow was fantastic, and much deeper then the snow found on Saturday. So deep that I don’t have much video as the lens was usually covered with snow after a turn or two. The most interesting aspect of the day was Sue’s continued insistence on finding her own way down each run. Where as in the past she would normally give chase, now she seems to try to discern where I’m going, and then looks for a solid path to get their. It’s a bit unnerving when you get to the bottom of each run and the dog is nowhere to be found, but she always arrives after a minute or two so I don’t really know if it’s a problem. Anyway, on to some video
