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A long hiatus from IGT probably brought on by the lack of snow has concluded with our beautiful tour of AltA 11/11/10. I had the crazy idea to head to the Devils Castle in my pursuit of untouched snow. The fact that there was a 30 inch base probably kept Devils Castle (one of the rockiest zones in the wasatch) off peoples radars. But what I was learning about the 30 inch base was that most of it came at once from a 50 inch dump. When that happens everything with a mellow pitch gets covered in 50 inches of snow, even huge rocks.

The Buffalo and I set out from a crowded parking lot in Albion Basin and headed up the summer road, leaving the crowds on the summer road and surrounding areas, we did not see another person until after we were done skiing and it was a good friend Chris who patrols Alta. The day was a beautiful mix of snow showers and sun showers. The skinning was great, and I finally felt like I could breathe at altitude again after 3 weeks on the east coast.

Approaching the apron

As the Apron of the Devils Castle grew closer (the original objective) we took brief note of how perfect the conditions were. 6″+ of ultra blower on 10″ of high density on a stout 20-30 inch crust / old snow w/ structure from the first dump. The lighting was surreal at moments and is the best part of being outside in snow showers. We blazed a skin track all of the way to the top of the apron. After a game of rock paper scissors, which I lost, I was forced to watch the buffalo open up the apron for the season. Luckily nobody was on our tails and we had the place to ourselves.

Skinning up the Apron

The final switchback

You can ski anything really if you are safe, Ive seen people skiing dirt. Safe turns, my personal favorite are also some of the most enjoyable, instead of the mountain flying by and you flying by the seat of your pants, you get to slow it down and really enjoy the mountain you are on. The turns down the skiers right were not consistent but longer than skiers left. We chose the right side then the left on the next lap. After the second lap, which was perfect midwinter powder skiing we decided to head to the bottom, then back up the Castle Proper.

Buffalo opens the apron for the 10/11 season

No gunpowder, slough piles or anything else you run into when Alta is open

Amazing snow

Buffalo roams under the castle

The Castle was really, really deep it was a snow pack that rivals most other resorts mid winter. We topped out took a rest on top then dropped in and meandered down the castle, avoiding the large humps, and DID NOT hit any rocks. Comfortable powder skiing, in an extremely rocky zone early November, can’t beat it. Chase it with a Buffalo home brew, and its a day to remember. Many miles, vertical and beautiful snow sounds like an amazing day to me.

CASTLE

First turn down the 'Castle Headwall' again here no slough piles or bomb holes

PERFECT

The aftermath of a grate Alta tour. Buffalo is underneath the 'Apron' looking up to the right at the 'Castle Headwall'

Sometimes you can see life getting busy, and you have some stuff that needs to get accomplished. Skiing in August is one of those things. The snow is dwindling, and another silly goal to ski a different patch of snow for every month meant I couldn’t ski Timpanogos in August because that’s what I did last year, I was on a serious time crunch with work, work and work, and vacation. I have been very busy with work, and in fact today I got home from work at 8pm. Luckily on my way home I planned to go home and run inside and  grab my skis, so out the door I was by 8:15pm. I parked in Albion Basin in Alta and headed for the Devils Castle Apron. One diagonal line of the last (barely)  fully connected piece of snow in Alta, August 2nd 2010.

8:15pm sun is getting low, time to go skiing. August 2nd Alta

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Waiting till the latest possible day to ski a mountain really paid off today. With a few inches of new snow at higher elevation meant the snow froze last night. This meant the skiing went from blah to YEA, or so it would seem.

UP = DOTS..... DOWN = LINE (DUH)

I wanted to take a new route up the mountain, so I did. On the route I found a 2010 model ski in the middle of nowhere. I’m sure someone who will see this knows someone who lost a new ski on this face and wants it back, the funny thing is the ski has resort bindings on it message me and claim it…….

When I got to the top 2.5 hours after leaving the car 3,000 plus feet under me I immediately made the decision to drop in. I found my chute, which looked a lot friendlier than I thought it would. I skied perfect re-corn to the bottom of the middle snowfield, hiked 50 feet up and hit the suicide chute connector took that to suicide, and skied all the way out back to my car.  The most fun part being that you have to walk farther at snowbird to get back to the tram, then I had to walk on a south face top to bottom in mid June.

EXTREME

LOW LIGHT. You can see that the snow pretty much hits the road still 3,000 vertical feet away

CRAPPY SELF PORTRAIT, COMPLETE WITH RUBBER ARM

If you want to ski this you probably have one more day……..

We headed west from Utah Lake Sunday around 11. Our  destination, Great Basin NP.  Home of stunning Mount Wheeler. I knew nothing of this area, and my Buddie Brett had been there once. The drive was about 4 Hours through multiple basins, past the Little Sahara Sand Dunes that are south west of Salt Lake City on Route 6, and its one of the largest collections of sand on EARTH. It was hot, and it felt like summer. I had left from snow, but about 3 miles from home was green. The idea of winter totally escaped my mind quite fast. Past the Sand Dunes, the drive continues through vast basins. Like Salt Lake Valley, but 2-3 times in size, and no buildings anywhere in sight for most of the time. You pass through semi deserted towns, and beautiful Delta, UT. West of Delta, about 100 miles is Great Basin National park. The summit of Mount Wheeler stands 8,000 feet off the valley floor with an elevation of 13,063. There is a National Park road that heads 5,000 feet up the mountain. At the top of the road is a beautifully maintained campground that sits at a stones throw from the base of Mt. Wheelers upper cirque.

One basin in Western Utah, the drive goes through many of these.

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***PLEASE ALLOW A FEW MINUTES FOR THE SITE TO LOAD. ITS FULL OF MASSIVE VIDEOS AND PHOTOGRAPHS RIGHT NOW.

Mt. Nebo stands at 11.928, the highest peak in the Wasatch Range. Accessible from Mona, UT, majestic Mt. Nebo is a true gem.You approach via 4×4 road which you drive to the snow line. The climb is big 5-6,000 feet, so what better time to start hiking than 10am. The weather called for cloudy conditions so we were banking on that to aid our ascent and safe ski decent. We got our hands on a truck, with one kicker, it had summer tires. We made it up the steep 4×4 road then got shut down at the first inch of snow. We parked having no idea how far away from Nebo we were. We packed up our gear and expected the worst, potentially a massive approach on a muddy road. We walked for about 10 minutes and realized there was alot of snow on the road at this point. We put our skins on and our hopes blossomed.

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