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Back To Our
Roots - Our Backyard
Snow fell
this winter in the Sierra Nevada. On the weekends we did not travel with our truck and camper, and it was
not a blizzard, we took advantage of traveling over this layer of white with
our backcountry skis.
A storm
dropped a few inches of snow on Saturday March 9th. With clearing overnight,
early Sunday we headed into our local area. The Lady and I played a big role in
the creation of a marked ski & snowshoe trail out the ridge line south of
Loon Reservoir called the Orion Trail.
Note: My
friend Marcus Libkind authored several ski touring guide books. He was asked
by his publisher to update the guidebooks with new editions. Instead, Marcus decided to offer his
updated information for free through a website he created. Marcus is that kind
of guy, incredibly generous.
The morning
was wonderful as we skied east toward Brown Mountain. There was around six
inches of new snow.
As we neared
Brown Mountain the views opened up to the south and the northwest corner of
Desolation Wilderness.
We skied up
onto the west shoulder of Brown Mountain, a plug of columnar basalt.
The low
pressure system had moved over the Sierra crest into the Great Basin. With the
change in the wind direction as the low pressure passed, we had cloud build heading back over from the
east.
We took a
quick snack break after pulling on layers and looked back our route in.
As we ate I
realized we had a confession to make.
We no longer use 3 pin ski bindings - the source of the name ski3pin. A year or so ago I
mounted G3 cable bindings to our skis.
The
temperatures were warm and the new snow was getting heavy. Although not fluffy
cold powder, it was still very turnable as we cut teles down slope on our
return. With most of the terrain downhill back to the trailhead, it did not
take us long to get back to the car. The storm returned - wrapping around from
the east - as we drove home.
We were back
out to Loon two weeks later on Sunday March 24th. Cathy, the trailer woman, was
along with us.
Another
marked trail we helped create, mark, sign, and maintain is the Van Vleck Trail. This was our route today.
We were very
pleased to see two back country ski patrollers at the trailhead, our
friends Dave and Craig, going into service with our local interagency dispatch
center for a day out patrolling.
This was
very rewarding for the Lady and I because we helped with their
intensive training to get them to patroller status. Good job you two!
The women
were anxious to get going.
The Lady led
the way on trails she knows so well.
Here is an
idea of the snow depth with a covered campground vault CXT toilet.
The Van
Vleck Trail took us south from the reservoir.
The trail climbs after
crossing the South Fork of the Rubicon River.
We arrived
at the Van Vleck Winter Storm Shelter. Here's a photo from February 2008.
With the incredible
snowpack this season, we found the shelter completely buried.
The Lady
& I went to work digging. My avalanche probe found the peak of the roof
down about 3 feet. We continued down to reach the top of the high door that
allows access to the inside with a bolted on ladder. We keep a stash of emergency supplies stashed inside - wool blankets, sleeping bags, MRE's.
Here is a
photo from March 2009.
And one from
several years ago of me with our friend, Marcus.
You may notice that the top of a CXT outhouse building was used for this shelter. It is tough, solid, and damn near indestructible.There is no vault underneath. It's affectionately known as, "The No Shit Shelter'.
Julie and
Cathy argued a bit over who was tallest and pushed each other deeper into the
snow.
I thought it
was time to relax and illustrated how to accomplish it.
Cathy pulled
a baggie of moose nuggets out of her pack, at least the Lady and I were pretty
convinced, from all our experience in the Rocky Mountains, they were moose nuggets.
Cathy
explained that they were chocolate covered espresso beans, very good for us,
and a staple of her backcountry skiing diet.
The Lady led
the way back down. The new rocket fuel may have been involved.
There was a
few inches of wet slop on top of a buried breakable crust. The Lady and Cathy
did not break through. I did, I weigh more, especially when weighting only one
ski. A mistake and a lesson in basic science and inertia, as in once a skier is
in motion he will remain in motion even when his ski is suddenly stopped.
"Slapped down like a wet noodle," is the technical term we use. The
snow was soft under the crust allowing me to go deep after punching through.
The women
greatly enjoyed my sudden stops and subsequent burials but still treated me
pretty darn well.
We had one
final hill to climb before reaching the trailhead.
March moved
aside for April. We received a few days without storms that, we hoped,
may bring spring snow conditions. Sunday April 21st we headed out for a quick,
longer ski tour.
Julie is
always happiest when outside, especially when on skis.
We used the
Orion Trail to ski out to Brown Mountain.
We came upon
fresh tracks - this morning's - left by two small bears.
This was a
glorious spring day in the mountains.
We left the
Orion Trail and skied past Brown Mountain to explore the basin to the
southeast.
We
encountered two more sets of fresh bear tracks, this time from big bears.
We enjoyed
our explorations on skis.
We took a
break near one of our favorite old jeffery pines, a split top "old
soldier" as the Lady likes to say.
We enjoyed a
nice break.
We did a
quick short loop around the area among the glacial erratics before skiing back
past Brown Mountain.
It was not
quite noon but time to head back before the snow turned too soft. The corn snow
was perfect for some telemark turns.
This slope
on Brown Mountain is marked up with our turns, washed out from the photo by the
bright midday sun.
The Lady led
the way back, often climbing high to take advantage of the several short, steep
downhill sections along the ridge back to the trailhead.
This is
where we live and where we love to play, lucky to have all this close by - our
backyard.
