SE Shoulder of Basin Mountain

Been awhile.

Needing to get out an tour , I hooked up with my friend Brian for a tour up to the Southeast shoulder of Basin Mountain.

The good news is you can drive the Buttermilk Road up past the Horton turnoff about a half mile. Might even be able to push if further, although the drifts were getting up to a foot deep.

The bad news is there isn't much snow to ski on once your there.

Looks a lot like a normal November!

We persevered anyway.

We skinned on a variety of snow types and surfaces up to the shoulder, where we got this terrific view of the North Face of Peaklet.
And a pretty nice view of Bishop & the O valley too.

Brian is ready to go, rock garden city here.
To our modest delight the skiing was decent on wind eroded wintery snow.
It skied pretty well down to this point. We both were pretty lucky in avoiding rocks for the most part.
Ribbon of death back to the truck.
Nice to get out.

Hard to tell what the big lines were like.

Wahoo was filled in pretty well, but the apron looked thin.

Didn't get a good look at Basin or Humphreys Couloirs.

North winds have been high and were howling over the peaks.

Long, funky approaches for ???!!!