New Year, New Spines!
December felt like a month long storm, plenty of storm skiing and SO much good snow. However when we saw a brief period of high pressure begin to develop of New Years we were pretty psyched for a dose of vitamin D and to be able to cautiously poke into some bigger terrain. The squad for the day was Keeks and Ryan, Eric Dahl, and Bryan and Steve Wilson. Solid Squad! After a quick powwow at Tesoro we headed to the Eddies parking lot.
Once we poked above treeline we were able to see some dope alpenglow over the girdwood valley, and a beautiful full moonset on Seattle Ridge.
After gaining the ridge we were treated to sunshine on our cheeks and about a miles worth of untouched spines.
Our friends Julie and Emily snapped this cool picture of us on the ridge!
We brought up mini champagnes and clinked in the new year, good vibez all around!
After a couple crusty turns coming off the ridge, the snow turned pretty dreamy pretty fast. We all took turns and leapfrogged our way down, pleasantly surprised at the quality of snow and wanting MORE!
We were able to set a skinner back up to the ridgeline. Ryan looking dazed and accomplished after breaking trail to the top. He got too many compliments on his skintrack and let it get to his big head.
We ridge-walked for a bit until we found ourselves on top of our second line. Truly spiny and steep. Eric kicked things off, making it look easy.
Too good! We knew we had to come back! We spent New Years day repairing core shots and waxing skis (definitely not hungover why do you ask) and headed out for round two on the January 2nd!
This time we went out with Garth Schultz, but saw the usual suspects in the parking lot! We made better time to the ridge using our skintrack up the headwall from NYE and were able to time it perfectly with the rising sun. Truly a magnificent sight to behold!
Our first run was amazing. Perfect supportable powder, and not crazy steep so you could open up and rip if you wanted to!
We used our skintrack from before to gain the ridge again. This time we had out eyes set on the spine coming off of the sunny patch furthest lookers right on this ridge. This one would require a little more dicey ridge walking than before.
The final crux of the ridgeline was pretty dicey. We spent awhile deciding on the best way to approach this problem or if the line was even worth the exposure. We eventually decided to wrap around the backside of this knob putting us on the opposite side of the ridge where the snowpack was thin. There were a couple tricky bits of trying to stay upright on top of icy rocks with a thin layer of loose snow, but we made it across safely eventually!
Turns out we were in no rush, we got to the top of the line and saw Eric, Kakiko, and Drew booting up to the same line we were about to drop in on (great minds think alike!). A slower, but safer approach. We were happy to chill at the top and watch them wallow up the last 100′ of the couloir.
Eventually we were ready to drop in! This line took the cake for the weekend! Ryan skied the spine skiers right and Kianna ripped down the steep couloir skiers right. The pics rarely do it justice looking back at it from below but OH WHALE! It is rare for conditions to line up so perfectly.
On our way back, we skinned up to above treeline on Eddie’s for a bonus lap. Here we busted out our tiny snacks made with love from Kianna, drank our shooters, and celebrated an incredible weekend of skiing. Truly one for the books!
Best view of the day!!
A day for the books!
