Opening Day: Powder Season

Opening Day: Powder Season
Togwotee Pass
November 12th, 2006

Matt Lloyd punches a trail through fresh powder on our way up Two Ocean Mountain. This would be my first time out since August. I was busy hunting horns in September and October. Already, my hunt for powder was looking like it'd be quicker work.

Matt nears the top of our first run.

Matt rates the conditions at the top of our first run.

Matt scopes out the first run.

Decides it's a go!

Since the pow was deep, the base was firm, and the weather was good, for our second run we decided to head for the upper bowl. Those are the Tetons in the background.

Matt chills on the south side.

Matt puts the sneak on the north side and approaches from behind.

Shad, brings up the rear. You can tell by the look on my face, I've been here before. Mmm... yummy!

Even Tallulah's excited!

Shad eyes the prize... a bowl full of untracked, fresh powder.

Matt launches his attack!

Charge!!!!

Awesome pow! No scrapes, never touched bottom- these bones got meat on em'!

Shad and his powder eating grin. I lucked out, hearing tales of last weekend's snow conditions- I brought the bargain sticks, expecting to scrape bones on every turn. Not so. Trully great powder!

Matt rocks on down the rest of the mountain.

Tally does a great impression of the look on my face when I saw this...

Whoosh!!! Holy crap! Powder's on. Powder's really on!!

Not without caution though. Going up the western side of the bowl on our fourth run, Matt triggers a pretty decent little 3-4 inch soft slab. The crack ran down to me, fifteen yards or so. We got on the ridge above the rest of the slope after that. Had we decided to play with it, I'm sure we could have cut loose a sizeable slab.

We decided to play with the pow though instead. Matt puts down his third line on the bowl. All of those lines are ours. What a day! Logged nearly 4000 ft before we ran out of light- and gas. Not too shabby for my first day of the season.

One last look back at another great day on Two Ocean. Powder season is definitely open.