Thursday, March 26, 2009
Thursday, March 19, 2009
St. George
Well, I finally made it down to St. George to see a few friends and they ended up being out of town. Funny how that happens.
unfortunately this trip started off just like any other trip I've been on: interesting. Ashley flew to Vegas so I drove down to pick her up. When I get there I call her to find out she's just off the strip, so I head straight for the strip and the road I think she's on. Although I'm close, they both started with the same letter, I definitely wasn't on the right road. In fact I was on the wrong side of the strip. So, I then start heading the other way only to find that she thinks we've gone too far, when in fact we hadn't gone far enough. So I turn around and try to head the other way, only to find I'm still not finding her. Well, after circling the strip about four times we eventually figure out that we both think we're on different ends of the strip. That was fun.
So once I finally make it to her we finally start heading back to St. George to find a place to camp. Well, after an uneventful drive, we make it to St. George just a little before 4am. That makes it 17 hours of driving. Yeah... sweet.
The next day we were awoken to a crew cutting trees and shrubs right next to where we decided to "camp". So after a good couple hours of sleep we get up and made our way to a coffee shop to get the day started. Good stuff. Our first destination was Chuckawalla Wall right outside of St. George. It might be a 30 second walk on the high end. Pretty good access.
After one climb I started not feeling so well. I eventually took a break in between climbs and was on the verge of puking. I was just a little too wasted from a week of writing the thesis and driving 17 hours. I started feeling better the next morning but it was a bit touch and go there for a while.
Well, that night we all camped next to the prophecy wall which we were going to climb the next day. Again we woke up to some cold temps, but it always warmed up nicely. Unfortunately this wall is in the shade until just after noon. Climbing the first couple of pitches was a bit cold, but once the sun came around we were quite hot actually.
We camped at the same site the entire trip so we wouldn't have to keep moving camp. It was pretty nice to come back to the tents already set up when we were tired. Anyways, the next day we took a day off to go cruise around Zion. We first went and hiked Angel's Landing, then went over to the end of the Narrows for a really easy hike. Basically this hike was all flat. It's a good thing too, because Angel's Landing is a ton of vertical over a few short miles. We spent the rest of the day wandering around the park and finally made our way back to St. George for dinner. Luckily there is one restaurant there that has a liquor license so we could actually get beer above 3.2%. It was amazing!
The next day we made a trek towards the Arizona border and climbed some limestone. It was extremely sharp, but incredibly fun stuff. The first couple climbs were uneventful, other than our hands bleeding a little bit from the sharp rock. After lunch we went and checked out a different wall that was in the shade. I got on a climb that was shutting me down, and when I took my second lead fall, my right heel landed right on a bolt. It didn't hurt at the time, but the next day it was swollen and I definitely couldn't walk on it. So, this is where the trip ended for me. Luckily we were heading out the next day, but I was still bummed, because the climb Ashley did the next day was one of the routes I really wanted to do while I was down there. Oh well, I'll have to make another trip down there.
When Ashley and I got back to Bozeman, my foot was hurting enough that I actually went to the doctor to check it out. Luckily it wasn't broken, but just bruised. The doctor told me that a bruised heel hurts as much as if it were broken and takes just as long to heal. That's fun.
Unfortunately this also puts a hold on skiing since I can't necessarily walk yet. I'm a little bummed about that, but not horribly bummed because we came back to warm weather. I imagine the snow is a bit on the bad side anyways.
In a few weeks I'll be back on the foot and will have more trips to report, but for now I'm going to have to rest. Really not excited about that.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
A week of adventures
Ashley came over to Bozeman the other week and I ended up renting a cabin out in Hyalite (everything seems to revolve around that lately). Anyways, I thought there was only one cabin back there, so I rented the one that was in Hyalite. Apparently it was a different cabin than I thought it would be and we were off on a wild goose chase for a cabin none of us knew existed. It was a classic adventure with the TEAM. Anyways, we took the wrong road (apparently the right road was about half a mile before this road) and hiked in a few miles to find that this cabin, and the road we were supposed to turn on were nonexistent.
After a few miles of hiking we turned around and ended up going back to Brandt and Tess's place. We ended the night there eating food, drinking beer, and resolving to never go anywhere I made plans for again.
After that Ashley and I got up to Big Sky for some skiing and managed to hit it on the best day of the week with about 6 inches of powder! And it was a bluebird day! pretty sweet ski day.
The last adventure was up to Big Sky again just this last Friday. Amy, Cole and I went up to hit the almost 10 inches of powder that just got dumped from the latest storm. It was quite good. Oddly enough, though, there were a ton of people up there and it was a Friday. Apparently Bozeman shuts down after a good storm. And on the up side I didn't hit my head again so the noggin is doing great.
Well, that should bring everyone up to date on the endeavors, but hopefully i'll be getting out again soon either on the ice or out skiing.
After a few miles of hiking we turned around and ended up going back to Brandt and Tess's place. We ended the night there eating food, drinking beer, and resolving to never go anywhere I made plans for again.
After that Ashley and I got up to Big Sky for some skiing and managed to hit it on the best day of the week with about 6 inches of powder! And it was a bluebird day! pretty sweet ski day.
The last adventure was up to Big Sky again just this last Friday. Amy, Cole and I went up to hit the almost 10 inches of powder that just got dumped from the latest storm. It was quite good. Oddly enough, though, there were a ton of people up there and it was a Friday. Apparently Bozeman shuts down after a good storm. And on the up side I didn't hit my head again so the noggin is doing great.
Well, that should bring everyone up to date on the endeavors, but hopefully i'll be getting out again soon either on the ice or out skiing.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Hyalite Peak Story
Usually I get in a few backcountry tours with Tom each winter, and we hadn't done anything yet. Since the weather has been warm, we decided that high elevation was in order. Hyalite Peak has some good vertical between the 7 miles in, so we went for it.
We woke up early and were at the trailhead by 7:30 kind of ready to go. We were only kind of ready because neither of our coffee's were wanting to work. Well, we threw the skins on the skis and took off up trail.
Luckily the first few miles of the trail are pretty flat so things were easy going the first little bit. The last 2 miles, on the other hand, start to get a little bit of an elevation gain. Around mile six, we come straight up to a small saddle and are in the bowl to get to Hyalite Peak. Once we got into the bowl, we could see lines everywhere. It's this amazing cirque of peaks that has chutes and wide open lines.
We made out way up the safest way possible, since avalanche danger was considerable, and ended up right below Hyalite Peak. We both wanted to summit, but we thought that might be a bit too dangerous. So we turned around and checked out some lines on the other side of the cirque. This is where we saw a few good chutes and decided to go for it.
I put in the first skin track angling up the side and stability seemed to be pretty good. Tom then followed up and we found ourselves on a ridge between two huge cirques. We were essentially between these two bowls standing on the ridge. It looked like there were great routes no matter where we went. Unfortunately if we went down the back side, we probably would have cliffed out and been screwed. Therefore we stuck to out side and lapped the chutes a couple times. These things were just open enough to get a few good turns in and either go over the cliff at the bottom or b line it between a couple of rock faces. When I dropped into my chute, I found myself on some badly windblown crust and therefore decided going off the cliff was probably a bad idea. I B lined it through the rocks and skied down to some great powder.
After we left the cirque, we skied the trail all the way back to the car. A good seven miles of skiing!! What a great run. We found ourselves around great powder and even managed to hit a few cliffs. Since I'm somehow obsessed with cliffs, I decided to go right off one and got rocked on the landing. I essentially landed it, but my weight was going forward too much and I proceeded to land on my head a little ways down the slope (pictures are below). After that we managed to hit another cliff that was even bigger. I say we, but I mean me. Tom didn't really want to hit a 20 footer. I can't blame him, but it was pretty sweet. By this point, though, my legs were incredibly tired and I just flopped down when I landed. 0 for 2. Oh well, I'll get em next time.
Well, the rest of the way was skiing practically on the skin trail so we could go fast enough on the flat parts. That made for some exciting skiing through the trees trying to pick up speed.
The next day was a very bad surprise for me. I apparently had hit my head a bit harder than I thought. When I woke up I went to the office to do some work and kept misspelling words. It was horrible. I kept having to think really hard and even managed to find myself just sitting there staring at the computer not knowing what I was doing. I figured these were bad signs. The next few days I spent with a massive headache and no ability to concentrate. I imagine it was a minor concussion, but since I never went to the doctor, I can't be sure. I know I should have gone, but it's just not fun going to the doctors. Especially since they were going to tell me something I most likely already knew. Why would I pay someone to tell me something I already know?
Well, after about a week the headaches went away and I was mostly back to my normal self. Apparently wearing a helmet doesn't mean you're invincible. Bummer.
We woke up early and were at the trailhead by 7:30 kind of ready to go. We were only kind of ready because neither of our coffee's were wanting to work. Well, we threw the skins on the skis and took off up trail.
Luckily the first few miles of the trail are pretty flat so things were easy going the first little bit. The last 2 miles, on the other hand, start to get a little bit of an elevation gain. Around mile six, we come straight up to a small saddle and are in the bowl to get to Hyalite Peak. Once we got into the bowl, we could see lines everywhere. It's this amazing cirque of peaks that has chutes and wide open lines.
We made out way up the safest way possible, since avalanche danger was considerable, and ended up right below Hyalite Peak. We both wanted to summit, but we thought that might be a bit too dangerous. So we turned around and checked out some lines on the other side of the cirque. This is where we saw a few good chutes and decided to go for it.
I put in the first skin track angling up the side and stability seemed to be pretty good. Tom then followed up and we found ourselves on a ridge between two huge cirques. We were essentially between these two bowls standing on the ridge. It looked like there were great routes no matter where we went. Unfortunately if we went down the back side, we probably would have cliffed out and been screwed. Therefore we stuck to out side and lapped the chutes a couple times. These things were just open enough to get a few good turns in and either go over the cliff at the bottom or b line it between a couple of rock faces. When I dropped into my chute, I found myself on some badly windblown crust and therefore decided going off the cliff was probably a bad idea. I B lined it through the rocks and skied down to some great powder.
After we left the cirque, we skied the trail all the way back to the car. A good seven miles of skiing!! What a great run. We found ourselves around great powder and even managed to hit a few cliffs. Since I'm somehow obsessed with cliffs, I decided to go right off one and got rocked on the landing. I essentially landed it, but my weight was going forward too much and I proceeded to land on my head a little ways down the slope (pictures are below). After that we managed to hit another cliff that was even bigger. I say we, but I mean me. Tom didn't really want to hit a 20 footer. I can't blame him, but it was pretty sweet. By this point, though, my legs were incredibly tired and I just flopped down when I landed. 0 for 2. Oh well, I'll get em next time.
Well, the rest of the way was skiing practically on the skin trail so we could go fast enough on the flat parts. That made for some exciting skiing through the trees trying to pick up speed.
The next day was a very bad surprise for me. I apparently had hit my head a bit harder than I thought. When I woke up I went to the office to do some work and kept misspelling words. It was horrible. I kept having to think really hard and even managed to find myself just sitting there staring at the computer not knowing what I was doing. I figured these were bad signs. The next few days I spent with a massive headache and no ability to concentrate. I imagine it was a minor concussion, but since I never went to the doctor, I can't be sure. I know I should have gone, but it's just not fun going to the doctors. Especially since they were going to tell me something I most likely already knew. Why would I pay someone to tell me something I already know?
Well, after about a week the headaches went away and I was mostly back to my normal self. Apparently wearing a helmet doesn't mean you're invincible. Bummer.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Hyalite Peak
I'll have to add a little story later, but the short story is Tom and I both got hurt and the skin in was 8 miles. My injury was my neck and head (my helmet works... it's official) and Tom's was a toe injury. Sounds like weak sauce but he definitely had blood in the sock when we got back. Tomorrow I'll get to the details. Have fun looking at the pictures.
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