…Continued from Part 1

There are eagles everywhere in Cordova – including on the skin track – they are a testament to the strength and biodiversity of the area.

From the start, Rachel and the wonderful people of Cordova were happy to show me around. The access here is incredible. You start skinning 3 minutes from the house.

You hit treeline at 400 meters.

And quick bootpacks bring you to the top of big faces.

Rachel slaying one of said faces:

Of course, the other side of Cordova is the weather. It will dump 50 cm of snow in 12 hours then pour rain for the next week. But, as long as it finishes as snow it doesn’t matter. 

Because when it’s not raining Cordova actually does have great storm riding.

Another incredible part of Cordova is the “ski area”. For $5 you get a ride on Mount Eyak’s one-man chairlift to some of the best sidecountry in the country:

A 45 minute hike brings you to this:

In April I met up with the Crested Butte contingent in Anchorage. I personally think that Anchorage is one of the best ski towns in the country – you have three totally different areas: Hatcher Pass, the Front Range, and Turnagain Pass – PLUS there are jobs there. If it’s cloudy at Turnagain, it’s probably bluebird at Hatcher. If Turnagain is sunny it’s probably stable. If you have 3 hours after work, you can be skinning up the Front Range 20 minutes after you leave your desk. 

We started out with a day at Hatcher Pass:

Hatcher Pass isn’t like a lot of skiing in Alaska: it’s rocky and colder; powder lasts longer, but so do persistent instabilities. 

After Hatcher we headed to Turnagain Pass. Turnagain is filled with classic lines and far less wind than Cordova and Valdez. Valdez is plagued with fierce outflow winds because of its proximity to the interior; Cordova often has bad “gap winds” because it gets sandwiched between high and low pressure systems.

We started our first day on Turnagain with some classic Alaska adventure:

Followed some wolverine tracks:

And finished it off with a big face of spines and flutes on TT43:

Rachel joined us for a long weekend.

We skied more Turnagain…

Turnagain gets hit harder than any backcountry zone in Colorado. On weekends it looks like a ski area, so we headed over the pass to the Twin Peaks zone.

Where we had big walls of powder to ourselves:

We headed down to Whittier to check out some of the lines we’d seen from the ferry. The skiing outside of Whittier is as spectacular as it gets. Unfortunately, Whittier gets crushed by gaps winds. 

But, it sure is beautiful there!

It also has amazing terrain and easy access. 

After Anchorage I brought the Crested Butte boys to Cordova. It started out by dumping 40 cm of snow in 24 hours.

Then, like the truly magical maritime climate that it is, it stabilized!

Danny Spencer racing his slough down a local face:

With long Alaskan daylight in full effect, we snowmobiled 30 km out to the Scott Glacier. The Scott is filled with a lifetime of lines:

A bit more window shopping on the Scott:

High on the Scott Glacier, poaching the Points North Heliskiing terrain:

A week later, on April 25th, with rain in the local mountains we tried to head back up to the Scott Glacier. The parking lot wasn’t promising:

A lot had changed in a week; it took us three hours of bushwhacking and river crossings to make it up to the ski zones. Even at 1,500 meters there was a rain crust.

Since then the temperature has not dropped below freezing around Cordova. Huge glide avalanches and wet slides are coming down everywhere – skiing is done here until a well-drained isothermal snowpack develops.

Cordova has the best of the best and the worst of the worst; when its bluebird, the maritime snowpack, access, and terrain are world class. But, it’s easy to forget about that when it rains for a week straight. Then again, down days in Cordova are pretty special in their own way:

This January my longtime girlfriend Rachel was surprised with a job offer in Cordova, Alaska. So, she took it and flew up immediately. In March I quit my job in Denver, packed my car, hooked up my snowmobile, and got the hell out of Dodge. I started with a bit of a detour to see the good people of Crested Butte and to get in a day of touring in the incredible backcountry there:

From Crested Butte I headed north towards Jackson Hole. Looking back towards Crested Butte from Delta:

Driving into Jackson always gets me pumped:

I spent four days in Jackson with my good friend Erik Mehus. We skied the resort, the amazing Granite Canyon sidecountry, and the sled skiing terrain of Phillips Canyon. Erik took advantage of one of the few moments of good light over the four days to take this cliff on Teton Pass really really deep:

From Jackson I headed for Idaho and Montana:

After repacking my car outside of Butte, the SubaLodge was born!

The next day I was through the border and into Canada.

Alberta reminded me a lot of Colorado’s Front Range – plains to the east and big mountains to the west.

At Calgary I turned west, headed for Banff and Jasper. After a beautiful night in Jasper National Park, the world’s largest dark sky preserve, I continued on the Icefields Highway. Falling snow obscured some of the views, but what I could see was beautiful.

By Jasper SubaLodge was running on fumes and I was relieved to find a gas station…it was in French…s’il vous plait???

After Jasper I drove west into British Columbia and towards the Stewart-Cassiar highway. The first day in BC was through mountain valleys shaded by tall peaks. The next day I crossed the Skeena River and turned north onto the Stewart-Cassiar highway:

Things immediately got more interesting:

I began to worry that I was going run out of gas when the “town” I had planned to fill up at turned out to be simply an intersection in the road; 100 kilometers later I found gas at Last Frontier Heliskiing.

The S-C highway is a bit wild: there is no shoulder, it’s largely unplowed, and everyone drives down the middle of the road at 50 kph over the speed limit.

This is a bit nerve racking when the visibility is usually like this:

After entering the Yukon I rejoined the ALCAN (Alaska-Canadian) Highway. In retrospect, following the ALCAN from Calgary would have been far less stressful: I wouldn’t have been constantly in fear of running out of gas and being stranded along the cold deserted highway. Also, I missed the Liard Hot Springs, which sound rad. But, the S-C highway sure was an adventure!

I continued north on the Alcan Highway; passing the Kluane Mountains which harbor the highest mountains in Canada:

Soon I was back in the US, this time in Alaska; falling asleep on the side of the highway in the SubaLodge I saw the northern lights for the first time in my life. The next day I made it to Anchorage where I met up with my good friend Lauren at 6 PM for a sunset ski in the Front Range:

From Anchorage I drove to Whittier to catch the Cordova ferry. Whittier is, to say the least, a weird place. It’s accessed via a one lane tunnel and most everyone lives together in a tower. But, the beauty of the mountains shooting straight out of the water is unparalleled.

Looking back at the tower which also houses such things as the grocery store, police department, and clinic:

The ferry ride across the Prince William Sound was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life: huge mountains, glaciers, and whales. Everyone should do it at least once! Montague Island, which separates the Prince William Sound from the Gulf of Alaska:

Cordova greeted me with a week of high pressure and beauty:

Continue on to Part 2

The East face of Pyramid had been gnawing at my brain ever since reading about a possibly unskied and undeniably beautiful line. April of 2000 wasn’t my first attempt, but it was my first successful one. Were we the first to ski it? Perhaps, but you never know, some Aspen local may very well have skied it back in the 70′s. We approached, as is so often the case, on bicycles:

From the tralhead, we hiked, then camped. In the morning, we hiked some more, until we reached continuous snow. At that point, we switched to our ski boots. Nope, no AT boots- there just weren’t any back then that I’d want to ski in- no Scarpa Denalis for me. Check out the giant headlamp which isn’t anywhere near as bright as a cheap little one today. Skis? Olin Outer Limits, around 90 underfoot (same ski as the K2 AK Launcher). And first generation white Fritschis- those were scary since the bar was known to break. My Dana Designs bomb pack was actually pretty sweet, though.

Then we climbed- in alpine boots.

Our route doesn’t go clean to the summit- instead it ends roughly 150′ short to the looker’s left of the Landry line. Even though it isn’t a summit descent, it’s a great, classic line and comes highly recommended.

The great thing about the ski down was, well, we were in alpine boots. AT gear may have gotten better since then, but there isn’t an AT boot out there that skis as well as a 15 year old alpine boot. And that’s a fact.

That’s it from this old geezer. Thanks for reading!

Does this gear look overly familiar to you? It might be a good time to do some shopping:

There is nothing like a beautiful skin through a forest.

Of course, we maximized our skinning potential when possible. Just 2 days earlier, Pete had been able to skin up this entire section.

Proof that the animals are out to play for the summer.

We drooled over this, but decided it was best to save it for another day.

We rounded out at treeline to this view, not knowing that we were actually going to be skiing this a half an hour later.

As we ascended the ridge, we began to really notice the signs of warming snow and increasing clouds. Our original plan was to ski two different lines, one east-facing and the other north. But, on the summit, we all agreed that the north-east facing Mega Face was our best option. (No, nobody has ever called it the Mega face- but it’s obvious where we were). We were still hoping for a second lap on the North facing spade, but in the end it just wasn’t a day to be out all day long while the temps spiked.

John Jasper, Pete Sowar, and Frank on top.

I think it was a pretty good choice Frank.

Pete.

Jasper.

Me.

We stopped to admire the face and all the options she had to offer.

But, we still had over 1500 vertical feet of skiing left

And we stopped to admire old mining ruins along the way.

The snow continues to transition. This week has brought some incredibly warm temperatures with minimal freezes. Let’s hope we can get some solid freezing at night to open up the possibility of even greater adventures

Matt, with the east face of Pyramid behind.

Yesterday, Matt summited Snowmass and skied into the history books becoming the 11th 14erskier/snowboard finisher- Quite the feat for someone who is about twice the age of many of the other finishers!

During my own fourteener skiing project, I met some of the most amazing people and continue to maintain strong friendships with them. Bonds experienced in the mountains cannot be broken. I didn’t meet Matt until near the end of my project, on peak # 47 to be precise.

The day we met - Matt, Frank, and Pam, on the summit of Little Bear (April 2010)

I was sick as a dog. I shouldn’t have been climbing a fourteener at all. But, there I was, climbing Little Bear, with Frank and my good friend Pam. Somewhere amidst the rocks and snow mix before the couloir, I turned my head back and saw two wandering hikers, also with skis on their backs. Eventually they caught up to us and introductions were had – it was Matt and his partner, Ben Conners.

Matt climbing Capital (May 2010), the harriest of them all. Photo courtesy of Jordan White.

Meeting on a 14er creates an instant bond. And that bond has carried through years. Matt and I have shared some of the most grueling 14ers together – Pyramid and Capital. But, we’ve had some other great adventures too – Ice Mountain, Mount Hood, Mount Adams, and St. Helens are only a few of the places we have ventured together.

After calming me down on the knife edge on Pyramid.

It was Monday morning that I got the email. Matt was going to finish his project the next day. He invited Frank and I, but we could not drop our commitments on such short notice. Matt and Jordan White began in Marble and camped at Geneva Lake. At 2:00 am they began their ascent. They skied the west side of Snowmass and good turns were had.

Jordan White, Frank, Me, and Matt after finishing the Landry Line on Pyramid (May 2011). Photo courtesy of Jordan White.

Matt on White Rock, a ski before Frank & my wedding day (June 2011).

Matt finished his 14erskiing project two years, exactly to the day, after I finished my own project. I am sorry I could not be there to join him on this celebratory day, as he was there for mine. But, my congratulations could not be any bigger.

Matt on Mt. Hood (June 2012)

Congratulations, Matt! Now, let’s go have some more adventures

I wonder what would happen if Gunnison County were to open Schofield Pass early- say around the same time as Ouray County opens Yankee Boy- in April. Would skiers and climbers flock to the area the way they do in the San Juans? I’d like to think so, but then again Crested Butte is a bike town with precious little affinity for skiing, so an open Schofield Pass would probably only see bike tracks rather than ski tracks.

In any case, Pete Sowar, Brittany, and I hoped that last week’s snow would make Slate River accessible one last time, so that’s where we headed. Alas, we were wrong and we decided not to subject our snowmobiles to what appeared to be miles of dirt road. We quickly came up with a plan B and headed towards the Kebler Pass trailhead for a quick tour on the North bowl of Peeler. It wasn’t quite the steep skiing that we were hoping to do, but it’s still a great tour in a spectacular basin. Access to our first run wasn’t exactly what anyone would call difficult, as you can see based off where we parked the sleds:

I needed to get a better look at my landing:

It was a big cliff, but I totally stuck it, you can see my bombhole at the end of the arrow:

OK, I’m not sure why I thought that was funny, but thanks for the indulgence. I did get a nice angle from the cliff of Brittany:

Peeler basin was the sight of a number of massive slides over the past couple of months, and we could see a number of them, both new and old. It’s actually pretty typical for this area for cornice failures to initiate large slides.

We quickly found ourselves on the north facing terrain of Peeler itself. It looks smaller than it is- it’s actually well over 2,000′ down to the valley. Pete:

Frank:

We had some powder up top, but also some corn in varying degrees of readiness. Brittany:

The view of Purple Peak from here is pretty spectacular and gives a good view of the S- and C- couloirs:

Things were already warming up and we had to carefully pick our way back up to Scarp’s ridge. From there, a bit more skinning and skiing led us back to our sleds. Brittany approves:

It wasn’t exactly what we had in mind, but it worked out well and neither Brittany nor I had actually skied that part of Peeler, so we definitely made some lemonade out of the lemons we were given down at the Slate River trailhead.

We’re glad to have a new affiliate at 14erskiers, Bent Gate, from my hometown of Golden, CO. Check them out:

The West Side- Purple, Owen in the middle, Ruby on the right.

Our day started early at the Kebler Pass trailhead. We met up with our new friend Jenny and snowmobiled to eastern base of Owen. We skinned to the south ridge, greeted by flying ptarmigans along the way. Yes, these seemingly-lazy birds fly sometimes, and beautifully too!

The cornices on Owen’s ridge are abnormally large this year, a testament to the winds we have had. Because of this, they are calving away, leaving terrifyingly large holes as they peel themselves off the mountain.

Needless today, we stuck close to the rock

In quick time we summited Owen and enjoyed a windless morning on the peak before dropping into one of the couloirs on Owen’s west face. Frank.

We had variable conditions, but we liked the moments where we could milk the pow. Yes, powder skiing in May does not suck. Jenny.

Frank.

Me.

The back side of Owen doesn’t look that big from here….

Until you have some scope. Can you find Frank and Jenny?

Frank tearing it up after the ice fall huck.

After admiring a view that we don’t often see, we began our way back up the mountain.

We summitted Owen for the second time that day and dropped down into some north facing lines. Frank.

Jenny.

Me.

Even the turns out on the basin were a blast.

The west side of Owen certainly makes for a longer day. But, it’s worth it to venture to a lesser known place, to ski a fairly long steep line, and to drop down into the deep. Thanks to Frank and Jenny for adventuring further than normal

Chris Miller, Pete Sowar and I headed out from Washington Gulch, which is still snow covered from the winter closure- just barely. The standard ascent route looked pretty melted out, so we made our way to the looker’s right of the spoon to ascend what some people call the knife.

With some high clouds, we had plenty of time to enjoy the summit before Pete jumped in:

Chris:

Pete:

Frank:

Chris:

Pete:

Normally, you ski right down the upper face and into the lower choke, but that route was fairly melted out. So we traversed to the right a couple of rock ribs over- which is a terrific route in its own right.

Frank:

Chris:

The apron was great corn skiing, though the dust layers were definitely out, as you can see from our tracks. Happily, we’re getting snow again, so the dirty snow is getting covered up once again.

Approaching Gothic from the south.

They set out skinning in the morning light.
Despite the cloudy skies and short freeze at night.
They skinned over snow and some patches of dirt
Before switching to booting, which made the lungs hurt.

Bootpacking up the south side.

The snow was still firm and held them up well
Though a few parts were soft and gave them some hell.

View of the west side chutes of Gothic.

The south ridge to the summit.

Four Fabulous Females stood on the summit that day
Dreaming of the mountains where they might play.

Four Fabulous Females: Susan, Me, Danielle, Jenny.

Where to play?

The ski area looking nice and white a month after closing.

But soon enough, it was time to ski
Brittany exclaimed, “It’s perfect! Yippee!”

Jenny.

Danielle.

Brittany.

Four Fabulous Females enjoyed a full run of corn.
And were happy they woke early that very morn.

Susan.

Jenny

Susan approaching the bottom of the line.

At the bottom they looked back at the mountain they skied.
And headed out swiftly with thoughts of a good feed.

West chutes of Gothic.

The Four Fabulous Females had a blast in the snow.
The skiing is still great in places they know.

Heading out!

It’s not bike season yet, can you all not see?
Brittany thanks the three ladies who came out to ski

Carl climbing Crestone Needle, smiling of course!

Carl skiing the Needle to complete his fourteener quest. Photo by Matt Kamper.

We at 14erskiers extend a huge congratulations to Carl, and we wish the the best of luck to Marc and Matt in completing their fourteener skiing endeavors.

Carl made a video from the Needle, check it out: