Phelps Lake to Death Canyon

Today I went for a hike around Phelps Lake and into the bottom of Death Canyon.

Not far from the car, the dirt ended, and it was mostly slushy snow for the rest of the hike. Last June, we detoured off the Great Divide MTB route and into Jackson for a day. We met a cool group of med school students on vacation, who brought us hiking up to Phelps Lake.

Phelps Lake

The Lake was pretty cold in June, but it wasn't covered in ice.

Death Canyon

 Death Canyon is fascinatingly steep. I hiked up it for a little while, but the weather looked like it was changing, the wind was picking up, the snow was getting deeper, so I turned around.

Not gonna jump off the rock today!

Neat to see this place in a different season. And I am looking forward to getting back out here and further up Death Canyon once the snow melts and it dries out a bit.

Sand Dunes

Saturday my housemate had plans to go to the St Anthony dunes in Idaho to ride dirt bikes with some friends.  Not being a motorsports guy, I wasn't sure if I should go.  But shortly before he left Friday Saturday afternoon I decided to go check it out.

The views when we got there were pretty nice.

Sunday morning, one of the guys we met there offered to let me use his daughters 4 wheeler to ride with them. I was happy I did. The dunes are something special.

My riding buddies

It took me some time to get used to riding a such a device, but with some patience from my friends, we finally made it to the big climb, Choke Cherry.

Get it Jeremy!

I didn't try to climb Choke Cherry with my underexperienced self on the undersized and underpowered 4 wheeler, but it was fun to watch the dirt bikes have a go at it.

Camp, and more friends

 On the drive home, Jeremy took me by the amazing place. I will go back!

The End of the Season

Jackson Hole Mountain Resort closed for the season April 5. April 7th, snow started falling again, and kept falling for a few days, so we took advantage, and hit some new lines.

Wednesday, Rachel, Brant, and I went skinning off the pass. Visibility wasn't great, but it was a great time.

Top of Mt Elly

 We skinned up to Mt Elly, and then descended Avalanche Bowl. Pretty cool line.

Avalanche Bowl!

 You basically follow an avy path, and under other avy paths (The Claw) all the way down. Good thing the conditions were pretty safe.

Towards the bottom we hooked up with Old Pass Rd, and took it down almost to Wilson.

Rachel showing us how its done.

Still dumping snow....tomorrow anyone?

Thursday? Time for more. Brant, Jess, and I went for the bootpack side of Teton Pass this time.

 Unsure of where we would descend, we looked at a few lines from the top of Glory.

Tuckermans?

We finally settled on a favorite, Calvert's Ridge to Big Piney (aka Major Jim).

Major Jim

 Interesting snow lines as we dropped into Major Jim. And then the always beautiful Coal Creek bobsled course out to the road.

Friday, Looking for one more good one, Brant I went after it again.  Brant was leaving town Saturday morning. so this was it. We opted for Little Tuckerman's.

We weren't sure where to drop and how to run it out. We scoped as best we could, came up with a plan...

Trying to scope out a line.

And then Brant dropped in!

A few minutes later, I saw him pop out at the bottom and I went for it. And it was awesome.

Getting out to the road was interesting, but we made it. And what a way to end the season.

I had hopes of another go on Saturday. Even though Saturday didn't work out, it was an amazing ending the the winter. 

Now WHAT?!?!

Baldy Yurt Trip - Day 3

We woke to light snow on Day 3. After a relaxing morning and a killer breakfast, we packed up our stuff, cleaned up the yurt, and left.

Time to head home.

To get back to the car, we first skinned up Blady Knoll

Top of Baldy Knoll

 And then boarded down the where we started 2 days before. The descent was pretty adventurous with the low snowpack and dusting of snow on top.

Snowboarding with poles.

Back to the river crossing, about a 1/2 mile walk down the dirt road, and we were back at the truck. 

Damn that was fun!