3-7-2009 Solitude Canyon/Banana Chute

Friday night came around and both Steve and I were feeling pretty beat from a long work week. I hadn't given much thought to ski ideas, but he threw out the idea of Punta Bardini and later that night a little, somewhat dim, light bulb went off - the "Banana Chute" in the Solitude Canyon area, just around the corner from Punta Bardini.

Somewhere up in Solitude Canyon I lost my camera. Ack! A blogger's nightmare! Fortunately Steve had his camera and jumped into photographer mode. Thanks to him we have some great photo memories of this very fine day.

Here's a pic of the area. The "Banana Chute" is the long curving gully on the left. Click to enlarge.
Snowmobile tracks up Solitude Canyon made for easy traveling the first two hours, then we broke trail to the top of the chute. We were once again rewarded with fine views.

This is me with Mammoth Mountain, Ritter & Banner peaks in the center background. The Minarets are the dark mountains on the sky line left of center.
Here's the nice view out over Long Valley. Those are the Glass Mountains stretching across the pic with the White Mountains on the far right. The white splotch in the trees below us is one of the Sherwin Lakes.
We entered the steep little bowl at the top of the chute to find firm windboard for the first few turns, but we moved out of the chute to skiers left and found excellent powder in open trees.

This is yours truly enjoying himself immensely.
Where's Scott? He's floating on fluff in the crotch of the tree.
This turned out to be one of the best ski days in a good long while. The long work week was a distant memory. Thanks Steve, I needed that!