Yesterday I got the chance to say goodbye to a friend in a very fitting fashion. The friend was JR Jenkins, the fashion was skiing the Sentinel Couloir in Grand Teton National Park.
Noah picked me up at a casual 8am. JR was dropping a friend's car at the airport, so we picked him up on the way. We got skinning around 9:15 AM and were at The Meadows in Garnet Canyon in around 2 hours. Upon gaining the flat ground at meadows, the wind increased significantly. Snowfall had increased as well.
We basically followed the summer trail lookers right of Spalding Falls. Where the trail would normally cross the drainage to the Petzoldt Caves, we tossed our skis on our backs and started booting up to the base of the "South" Sentinel Couloir. The booting was easy enough, although a breakable crust was slightly annoying. Stopping every so often share our thoughts on the situation, we made our way up the chute. While turning around was of course an option, none of us wanted to ski a nasty breakable crust in blowing snow and high winds. Our hopes hinged on decreased wind and increased visibilty once we dropped into the Sentinel Couloir proper.
Once we gained the top and crossed onto the north side of the couloir, the winds decreased and visibility increased a little. The snow seemed wind affected but very skiable. None of the breakable crust that the south side had. Noah dropped in first, then me, then JR. We skied it to the moraine above Delta Lake, then got some nice powder turns down to the lake itself. After crossing the lake, we traversed skiers right to the East Face of Disappointment We were surprised to get some AWESOME pow turns down the face until we had to traverse right again to Bradley Lake.
After the standard kick in the nuts skin/sidestep back to the car, cold beers were enjoyed and tired, clumsy high fives were given. A good end to another good day in Jackson Hole. Claaassic Jackson. Take it easy out west, JR.
VIDEO HERE: Skiing the Sentinel
_BY
No comments:
Post a Comment