Conan and I headed out for a quick lap on Purple Peak’s S-Couloir on Tuesday. I first met Conan a couple of years ago while drywalling his house. We did a lot of talking on that job, since he used to guide Aconcagua and other peaks, but this was the first time we had a chance to ski together. Conan will be heading to one of the world’s 14 8,000meter peaks, Cho Oyu, in a couple of weeks, hopefully getting a chance to ski it. I’m not sure if little old Purple offered too much practice, but it was a fun day. Purple Peak and the S couloir (left) taken the following day from the Daisy pass area:
We took the easy route, climbing the S face to the summit. This tour was the first time I’d been out since the last devastating dust storm. The peaks were not looking good. Owen:
Rare photo of me on top:
Afley:
We didn’t get too many photos, since this route is better skied as a continuous pitch to the bottom. Despite the dust, this north facing couloir was holding some nice powder, although it was slightly variable in some spots. Conan exiting the couloir:
Some of our tracks can be seen here:
We did a quick skin back up to Scarp’s ridge and skied down to our snowmobiles. The snow on this S facing terrain was awful- 2″ thick trap crust. My turn here shows the snow in all it’s glory:
That’s about it- a quick little 4 hour mission on a pretty classic line. Bonus shot of my truck showing the dust. I hate dust:
The...
Frank, When are you going to ski that little spine on ownen?
[...] and the lines we’ve skied in the last couple of years. Schuykill Ridge, Peeler, Ruby, Owen, Purple, Afley, Oh Be Joyful, Hancock, [...]