It hasn't snowed all week which means Turnagain is bumped out. Summit hasn't let me down all year and today was no different. There was a huge wind event in town this week and I was concerned about the snow quality down south. This concern turned out to be unfounded. There hasn't been a whisper of wind all week. Our tracks from last week were still visible. Cold, clear, calm: Summit has been turned into a facet factory. Good news for today, but bad news after the next storm.
The skinner was still in great shape from last week despite some rouge snow-shoer's (Palin?) attempt to destroy it. We gained the summit of Tri-Tip 1 (of 3) and continued east to a sneaky pocket couloir.
Hubert Leading the Charge
The couloir faces north and peaks in the low 40's with a nice run-out high in the Tenderfoot Creek drainage. There was about 6" of recycled powder on a hard crust. Turning was loud, but conditions rapidly improved throughout the 1,800' descent.
Looking Back up the "Pocket Couloir"
(click for a better view)
H led the charge again this time to Tenderfoot Ridge. Before long we were relaxing up high, chowing down, enjoying some "adult" coffee, and basking in the sun. December 19th only has 5 hours, 28 minutes of sun up. It rises and sets in the south and only gets 6° above the horizon. This factoid played no role in our selection of our 2nd north-facing couloir of the day. This one started much rougher, but true to form, rapidly improved as we descended to Butcher Creek.
Daylight was running short, so we opted to to call it a day instead of looking for a 3rd north facing shot. The run back to the lake rewarded us with a couple of miles of high quality low angle love.
Sunset over Summit Lake III
One of about 20 Moon Rises / Moon Sets on the Drive Back to A-Rage
Summit gets high marks again, but the next storm will be interesting to say the least. For now, the workers at the facet factory are putting in some serious overtime.
-Banksy
