a Mary’s Christmas:

Having mentioned all of that, I believe it is time to move forward into another great season by shredding hard for Jamie, skiing our resorts with the idea that mother nature has decided to put our technical skiing skills to the test, getting familiar with and respecting the variable snow pack, enjoying the snow when it comes and the sun just the same!

Despite the sunny, dry, and cold November of the rockies, the Tetons and surrounding mountains are skiing surprisingly well.  Grand Targhee Resort, though it does have it’s share of unmarked obstacles, is showing signs of it’s true self with fresh pow lines still being found and reports of snow on the way.

So do your snow dances, know that it could be a lot worse and join me in enjoying what we’ve got, cause it is still not that bad!

Mikey

PS: To prove it I have put together a short vid of our “Nice Little Saturday” out on Teton Pass yesterday.  Enjoy!

Last but not leaset….a quick message from your friends up at the Ghee:

Beginning Monday, November 21, 2011, Grand Targhee Resort will be setting up and preparing the mountain for opening day. ALL uphill access will be closed due to avalanche hazard reduction work, grooming operations and maintenance and all in-area closures will be adhered to.

My roomy gettin some fluff!

Kicking off the season at the Knotty Pine!

I was fortunate to be able to kick off the Backyards tour right here in the Tetons.  The Grand Targhee Ski Patrol (my co-workers) were kind enough to let the Futuristic crew into our world and allowed them to show a glimpse into our daily ski patrol routine.  The day that we shot the ski patrol scenes the weather was pretty nasty and the lack of visibility prevented us from getting useable avalanche control/hazard reduction footage. This was really the only thing that we were not able to nail in the amount of time I was given to show off my Backyard.  Though it had not snowed for a few days and the windows of good light were sporadic at best, Pip Hunt and I were able to utilize some of my key hot spots to find freshies, steeps, and drops at both Jackson Hole Mountain Resort and Grand Targhee Resort.

As much as I’d like to tell you more about Backyards, I am going to have to let you see it for your selves on TV or right here via web.  Here are the three episodes of Futuristic Films’ & Marmot’s…..Backyards…..enjoy:

TETONS

WASATCH

ELK MOUNTAINS

A big thanks to Futuristic Films and Marmot for the opportunity, and Nat Patridge, Eric “EA” Anderson, Lincoln Farnsworth, Grand Targhee Ski Patrol, Grand Targhee Resort & Jackson Hole Mountain Resort! And a shout to the Marmot Freeride Team for a job well done! Hope this series gets everyone stoked for winter!!

Mikey

Michelle in command

This August I was fortunate to run the Middle Fork of the Salmon River (Idaho) for the second time is as many years. The permit to run this river during season is run by a lottery and to say the least, not common to pull. So when you or someone you know pulls one, its wise to make it happen, ha ha.

This year we had a solid crew made up mostly of Teton Valley, Idaho locals with a few others mixed in. At first I thought a group of 16 was going to be way too big for this river, and in most cases it would be, but this crew worked super well together and it was great! We were on for 6 days and five nights with a night of camping at the put in tacked onto the beginning of the trip.

Last year I wrote a detailed blog of our trip…. unfortunately this time since it has taken me so long to get it on my site I will just let the photos and video speak for them selves

Enjoy – Mikey

Photos: tetonfreeride.com/pictures/ or follow the link to “Pics” above!

Video: Down the Middle II

On course for Mt. Moran

We did have a bit of wind here and there, but I have to admit that we motored most of the way.  I was hoping for a bit of a wind for two reasons, one being for sailing, but most importantly to keep the snow temps on the mountain down.  Of course, with these wishes in mind, it was perfectly calm and warm most of the day, and through the night. The over night lows were just about at freezing at 10,000+ft.  This meant we were in for a REALLY early morning. We anchored the boat and unloaded most of our gear for the next morning onto land, much easier to do with the sun still up.

Boat camp

Shortly after eating dinner, Mark Fisher and a buddy of his showed up on a sick ski boat. We all sat around on the sailboat for a bit. Right as Mark and his buddy were heading back to their camp a black bear came out of the trees and was wondering around their camp and boat. In the words of Mark “awe shit man, we just set all of our food and stuff on the ground and came over here,” ha ha ha. The bear eventually left and they were able to get back over there. Now it was time to crash.

What a sunrise

The alarm sounded at 1:15am. It was time to get moving and was surprisingly easy to do so. We ate a quick breakfast, ferried across to shore, got our gear together, and started the seemingly endless bushwhacking to the snow field at the base of the Skillet Glacier. Nearing the base of the snow fields, the LEDs from people’s headlamps began to emerge from the trees.  About half way up the sun began to rise over the great state of Wyoming.  It was quite the sunrise.  This meant that we had been going for about 4 hours and also meant that we had limited time to get up the mountain before things began to warm up and create snow and ice fall.

Perfect corn

At this point we were all pretty well spread out on the Skillet.  Michelle and I took a bit of a detour up the wrong gully, once we made it high enough to see the rest of the crew, we realized we were about half a mile to the north of where we wanted to be.  We were already not quite covering the ground we needed to be to make it to the top before things got too warm, and the 45-60 min detour did not help the cause.

Nice shot by Michelle of Mikey

We made it to the top of the Skillet Glacier/bottom of the skillet handle (1,000ft couloir to the summit) at about 9am.  From here we could see the rest of the group spread out through the upper skillet handle and new that we would need to ski down soon, as things were warming fast.  Standing at 11,000+ft with ice & rock fall all around us was a good indication that it was time to ski.  Making it to with in 1,000ft or so of the top of a mountain and having to turn around is never easy, but sometimes very necessary.  We still had about 5,000ft of perfect corn skiing below us!

Brrrrrrrrrr

The crew eventually reassembled at the boats (after Mark, Mark’s buddy, Andy & ED summited) and thousands of feet of awesome spring corn skiing done by all.  We packed up the sailboat, un-anchored and met up with the ski boat in the middle of the lake for some waterskiing, swimming and fun in the sun.  All and all, a pretty rad adventure!

Sailing back to Leeks Marina

110507 Highest to Lowest from Teton FreeRide on Vimeo.

View from the Lone Pine Ranger Station

After driving late into the night, sleeping somewhere in the middle of Nevada, waking up to a truck incased in an icy blizzard, and driving through the high desert of central Nevada, we pulled into Cali (April 29th).  With the snowy white peaks of the southern Sierras in the not too far distance, I was reminded how damn big that mountain range is.

Our camp in the Alabama Foothills

It was only about 60-65 degrees in Bishop and Lone Pine, but coming from the Tetons it felt like 80-85.  Once we locked down our permit at the Lone Pine Ranger Station we headed on up to the Alabama Foothills to set up camp, soak up some sun, and get our gear ready to start heading up Mount Whitney the next morning.  The Alabama Foothills, I might add, make for some sick camping, hiking and bouldering…… definitely wanna spend some more time there.

North face traverse from the Notch

Though Mt. Whitney is the highest in the lower 48, it is also one of the most traveled because of its easy access during the summer season.  Its winter travel can be fairly easy as well if you take the standard route up Lone Pine Creek (Mt. Whitney Tail).  However, we were a bit more attracted to the Mountaineers Route on the northeast side of the peak that can be accessed from taking the North Fork of Lone Pine Creek.

Summit of Mount Whitney (14,497ft)

The Mountaineers Route is a 1500+ft couloir that ascends from Iceberg Lake (approx. 12,500ft) to an area known as the Notch (approx. 14,000ft).  From here, there are several options to the summit.  We took the more straight forward approach which consisted of traversing a few hundred yards across the super exposed north face of the peak.  After traversing, we met up with the ridge and made our way to the summit (14,497ft/April30th).

The recent winds and late afternoon/early evening summit did NOT provide the best skiing conditions.  Our descent was comprised of solid ice and frozen over boot tracks.  This made skiing down the ever long Mountaineers Route couloir quite challenging and super sketchy.  Ski Mountaineering is not all about the snow condidtions….right?  Well, is wasn’t on this peak.  I have to admit, there are far better places to ski in the southern Sierras, but we wanted to ski the highest peak in the lower 48 and thats what we did.  After descending the couloir we made our way back down to our camp at the Upper Boy Scout Lake (11,500ft).  The sun was setting and we made it just in time to set up our tent/tarp and get camp situated in the dark, ha.  It was freezing.

Sunrise at Upper Boy Scout Lake

As the sun came up over the mountains to the east (5:30am May 1st), I noticed the wind had calmed down and the temps were not nearly as low as the night before.  I also noticed that I was surprisingly awake for not sleeping at all the night before.  We popped up out of our bags and packed up camp.  After talking with a few other campers/climbers we skied down to the snow line and made our way back to the car.

Death Valley

Now it was time to find the warm weather!  After a huge brunch in Lone Pine we set our sites toward Death Valley.  What better way to wind down and warm up after reaching the highest point in the lower 48 than to go hang out at  the lowest point in the US (-282ft/still May 1st/less than 24 hrs after summiting).  Though it was much cooler (only 85 deg) in Death Valley than average (105 deg) for this time of year, it felt GREAT!!!

There are a ton of additional photos from the trip so go to “Pics” above the check’em out!

Mikey

Saturday morning we woke up….still not sure what or where to ski, but after a few trips back to the house to grab forgotten items we decided on heading up to Mount Sherman. Sherman is a 14er just outside of town and pegged as one of Colorado’s easiest 14ers, which was a good thing because the weather was not at all favorable for peak skiing. Going up the drainage to the base of an old mining pass the weather was pretty pleasant, not very good vis, but not windy or cold either (base of mining pass approx. 12,000ft). After slogging up the pass we reached the top of the pass and mining camp where the weather proved to be a bit worse. The wind was ripping and the vis was pretty bad (mining camp & top of pass approx. 13,000ft). From here we began the accent to the ridge line that leads to the summit. Unfortunately once we hit the summit ridge the wind, temps and worst of all lack of visibility forced us to call it good and head down from there (point of turn around approx. 14,000ft…..generously assumed). There was a fair amount of down climbing to find skiable lanes, but just below the mining camp heading down the pass there was good creamy snow all the way down. It was a fun quick adventure. Then back down to Denver to hang with Michelle’s family a bit more.  Here is an interestingly white Go Pro vid of our Mount Sherman adventure :

Sunday, our last day in Denver, was yet another very low key and relaxing day. Tom, Michelle’s brother-in-law gave us a few guest passes to the famous Denver Athletic Club or as they call it, the DAC. This place was amazing. Truly gave new meaning to going to the gym. Of course, after a long hard ski season, I did opt for a more spa oriented visit to the DAC……it was quite relaxing!

Monday it was time to head home. We took a little side trip through Boulder to stop in to the Scarpa headquarters and say hello to Chris Clark and crew. It was good to see Chris and to meet everyone there. A big thanks to them for having us!

Now we are back in Teton Valley preparing to leave Thursday for the southern Sierras. High peaks and big couloirs here we come. Stay tuned!

Mikey

Trevor & Mikey check out the sunrise on Glory

On Friday morning (April 15th) Gabe Rogel and I met the Trevors (Hiatt & Thomas) on top of Glory Bowl for a sun rise run Teton Pass style.

skier: mikey photo: Gabe Rogel rogelphoto.com

The sun rise was amazing and a nice surprise of about 6-8″ of light & dry pow was glowing in the dawn red light.

skier: Mikey photo: Gabe Rogel rogelphoto.com

Though it was suprisingly chilly, it was a nice spring morning in the mountains and was awesome to get out with Trevor and Trevor!

Here is a Go Pro vid of our dawn patrol run down Glory Bowl:  

Mikey

PS: Keep tuned to tetonfreeride.com for more spring adventures…..we have some good ones planned!!!!

pic: JASPER/FF filming: FRANK/FF skiing: MIKEY

This past week Pip Hunt and the Futuristic Films crew (in association w/ Marmot) came into town to shoot a segment of their upcoming production, Backyards.  Pip, a fellow Marmot athlete, has been a good friend for several years now.  We first met on the Freeskiing World Tour years ago while travel from stop to stop together with mutual friends.  When I was told that the Teton region segment would include me showing Pip around Targhee and Jackson, I was stoked!  I don’t want to reveal to too many details of the film, but what I will tell you is that it is going to be worth checking out!!!  The film will be aired on national television sometime in late summer or early fall, with the film release to follow.  With the weather not looking to be too accommodating we were able to take advantage of some great snow, pockets of sun, and some lines that I have been dreaming about skiing for quite sometime!!!!

The Futuristic crew w/ Get Awesome

I had a great time showing Pip my backyard.  A big ole thanks to Jasper, Frank, & Tom from Futuristic Films…..Andy, Tom & the crew from Marmot…..Nat Patridge…..Eric “EA” Anderson…..Lincoln Farnsworth…..Grand Targhee Resort & Jackson Hole Mountain Resort!  And Pip Hunt of-course

Sneak peak POV vid of the Futuristic Films/Marmot film, Backyards…..

Mikey