Mammoth Lakes Basin Ski

This morning my buddy Dave joined me for a tour up in the Mammoth Lakes Basin.

First, we skinned up to McCleod Lake. The slopes in the shade still held nice snow. Above was more wind affected.

The Mammoth Crest granite was beaming this morning.

Looking north to our next destination - the south slopes of Mammoth Mountain.

Dave on his way.

We found fine corn skiing on this slope at around noon.

The Lakes Basin.

Took a good long run on the nice corn, skinned up again and shot out to Twin Lakes.

Stellar day. Surprisingly good skiing.

Peaklet

I really didn't have much of a plan this morning other than to drive up the Buttermilk Road and hope to check on the possibility of south facing "corn" skiing.

Thankfully the road is driveable almost to the regular parking in the aspens. The creek crossing is ok. The sidehill section just past was a little scary owing to the early morning icy conditions.

I skinned up the road through the pretty Aspens.

The east bowl of Peaklet ended up as my target. The steepish entry was the crux of the day.

Above the throat the bowl opens up. Dark and moody over Wahoo way.

Sunny granite features near the top of the bowl. 

Looking down. Looking good!

Looking up to the summit of Peaklet and the top of the northeast couloir.

By noon the clouds were fleeing and the sun was bright. Mount Locke and the Wahoo gullies on the left and Peaklet with the bowl I skied to the right.

Beautiful afternoon in the upper Buttermilks.

The skiing was fair to good in the bowl. I started on faceted/wind eroded mostly soft snow then moved onto more south facing slopes. The best cooked snow was also quite shallow, but skied well. I liked the fast and easy exit too.  Solid fun!

Hammil Trees

Yesterday I joined my friend Chris for a tour up in the Mammoth Lakes Basin. The last time we skied together was about a decade ago and he has spent much of that time living up in Juneau. He kindly looked me up, got in touch, and the next thing you know we're skiing!

Our timing was good. Mammoth reported three inches of new snow the previous day, so we were counting on conditions being "refreshed." We found anywhere from a skiff to 8+" over the day.

We both reveled in the great winter scenery on the way in.

We headed up towards Hammil Bowl but as we got higher we found most open areas were fairly wind affected.

So, we opted for plan B which was to seek out trees where the snow had been sheltered from the wind.

We gained the same ridge I attained Thursday and soaked in the scenery.

The skiing in this zone was terrific!

So good that we headed up for a second run! 

 More sweet views.

More sweet skiing.

We both very much enjoyed the brilliantly beautiful day, the terrific terrain, and the splendid snow!

TJ Bowl Zone

Knowing there was good coverage in the Mammoth Lakes basin and hoping for good snow above treeline, Ann and I elected to go to the TJ bowl zone.

We got a fairly early start and soon reached Lake George with Cystal Crag above right.

Easy travel on a previous skin track brought us on up to TJ Lake.

Ann breaks trail near treeline.

We figured we'd keep heading up as long as the snow was good and the travel wasn't too arduous.  Surprisingly the conditions never deteriorated and we found ourselves up in a nice chute where we switched to boot travel for the ascent to the top. Ann motors up.

She took this photo of me coming up behind.

Glorious views from the top northwest to the Ritter Range.

and southeast along the Mammoth Crest.

Time to ski! Ann got this shot of me dropping in.

The snow was slightly wind affected and there was a thin melt/freeze crust in spots, but overall the skiing was quite good.

Ann found some nice faceted snow over here.

The zone! Our chute was just left of the big block on the right.

We then skinned back up, took a decent run through "Tree J" then out via glades below - which skied quite well.

Just an amazing day. Exceeded all expectations by a substantial margin! 

Mammoth Lakes Basin

This morning I got up fairly early and headed up to the one zone I was fairly certain would have good snow coverage, the Mammoth Lakes basin. I really enjoyed the peaceful early morning  vibe.

The jagged mini peaks along Mammoth Crest soon appeared.

I broke trail up this treed ridge east of Hammil Bowl.

The snow in these north facing glades skied well. Much of the more open areas are pretty wind affected though.

Nice views from my high point. Took my time to soak them in.

Beautiful day with some fun skiing. Grateful to be back at it!

Patricia Bowl Kinda

Today I headed up Rock Creek to check on conditions up there. I got a nice early start and skinned up the road with no particular goal in mind.

After an hour plus of skinning up the road I was ready to explore, so I hopped onto the Hilton Lakes Trail and hoped to wind my way up into Patricia Bowl.

Rock Creek Lake and Mount Morgan.on the way up the trail.

Some moderately arduous skinning brought me to the entrance of the bowl with this fine crag above.

Looked a little thin in the bowl proper.

I elected to traverse out onto the SE slopes of Pointless Peak to a a shallow gully. Found good skiing there.

Good skiing lower down too. A subtle change in aspect made all the difference between sun crusted funk and sweet powder.

Another fine day in the hills!