Costa Rica plus
travel days plus 2 days in Dallas visiting my grandparents on the way down
equated to a 2 week hiatus from skiing.
Well worth it but I was certainly excited to get back on skis once
home. A few evenings up at the bowl
refreshed my legs before spending the MLK holiday skiing up blodgett creek with
Brian and Jeffrey.
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| climbing high above blodgett creek (photo: brian) |
After a
dishearteningly rainy drive, we departed the trailhead just after first light,
and made good time up the canyon, past the bridge before beginning the big
climb up the bowl just W of Hauf Peak’s S gully. We eventually crossed the rain/snow line and
through good routefinding and communication, forged our way up to the ridge and
on to the summit.
 |
| looking E to mill 2 |
 |
| sunshine, powder, friends and smiles |
Concerned about the
touchy storm slabs, we opted to ski the low angle E face of the peak about a
1000ft down to an obvious bench. The
skiing was great so we couldn’t resist doing another lap.
 |
| scouting and weighing our options |
 |
| the upper half of hauf's S gully |
 |
| myself, enjoying another great bitterroot tour (photo: brian) |
We then climbed
back to summit while weighing our options for the descent. We elected to carefully make our way down the
main 3800ft S gully of the peak. We
found great snow and skiing in the upper half, wet heavy snow for the next
thousand feet and an adventurous mix of alder brush, slab and thin snow for the
bottom few hundred feet.
 |
| egress, before the alder got thick |
We persevered and
eventually hit the trail, where we slapped on race skins (better glide than our
regular skins) for the egress, returning to the trailhead shortly before
dark. An excellent “welcome home” tour
for me.
Stats: approx. 6700vert in 9.5 hrs car-car
Rose: great snow in
a new-to-me zone
Thorn: dark and
rainy drive in the morning
Bud: returning for
the cleaner slide paths further up blodgett creek
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