Monday, January 26, 2009

1-24-2009 Chocolate Peak Circumnavigation

After heading up the South Lake Road with Porter the day before and with the excellent suggestion from my friend Jed, we (Jed, Annie, Paul and I) decided to head up towards Chocolate Peak out of South Lake. The tour was more for the scenery, snow depth evaluation and thrashing Paul than it was for turns.

Fresh tracks and a silly photographer! The drive required a reasonably decent 4x4 with some good tires. There wasn't much danger of getting stuck, but there was a little excitement.

Hurd Peak came into view pretty quickly. The classic steep ski decent lies on this north face. It looked like it may be coming into shape with a bit more snow.

Jed and I were dueling photographers. That's Picture Puzzle Peak in the background.

This is Jed skinning across Ruwau Lake with Mount Goode in the background. The weather moved in and out all day.

Here's Jed skinning across Ruwau Lake with a subpeak of Picture Puzzle Peak behind him.

Alas, we reached our highpoint, the saddle between Ruwau Lake and the uppermost Chocolate Lake. The arrival was cause for a celebratory pose by Annie while Jed carefully stowed his skins.

We did manage to enjoy a few turns off the saddle. They were delicious.

Jed even managed a face shot, or was that a head plant? No matter when your having fun!

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