Friday, February 23, 2007

Jackson Hole 2007 - Thursday, 2/22/07

Today was our first ski day without new snow. After the great powder skiing yesterday, my legs were tired today and I spent most of the day in the back seat letting my skis run away with me. In the morning we hiked up Pepi's Bench to the Headwall and skied down another short chute into Casper Bowl. Fortunately, the Sublette chair was running enabling us to start higher on the mountain, so the hike was not as steep or as long as Tuesday's. Nick went first and totally ripped his way down the short, steep chute. He also took away much of the snow, exposing lots of rocks. Michael went next and got intimidated by the rocks and ended up sort of side slipping down the chute. That set the tone for the rest of us and I also looked the total loser in the chute. Fortunately, the terrain opened up and we all had a great run down into Casper Bowl. I think Frank caught most of us on video.

At the bottom of the bowl we had three videographers set up to catch the action as the kids tried to do helicopters off the cat track. Nick went first and almost made it around, but ended up doing a 270 and crashing in an explosion of powder. Tonight he has a headache, probably lingering aftereffects of his failed jump. Michael looked good in the runup, but aborted at the last minute and just did a straight jump. Charlotte went next, but again came up 90 degrees short of a 360 and made a crater to match Nick's. The next movie action was lower down the mountain near Casper lift. Nick took the jump over the little evergreen bush and through the stand of aspen twigs. He landed back on his skis but pulled off a great recovery. Michael got big air over the bush, but landed on the uphill part of the dip and had a big wipeout, all caught on tape. I'm much smarter this year than in the past, and didn't try any of these jumps.

A bit before noon, we said goodbye to the kids and Mimi, Frank, Julie, and I left Jackson Hole Resort through a gate at the base of Rendezvous Bowl for a little back country adventure. We hiked up the short, steep Paranoia Ridge and skied over to the much longer (but thankfully, not too steep) hike up to Four Pines. Even with no coat, hat, or gloves the sweat was pouring off me. At the top we enjoyed the spectacular views of Rock Springs Canyon and the Buttress, then we put our skis back on and got a couple of decent powder runs, and a bit of sun crusted snow that tried to grab our skis and send us cartwheeling.

The forecast is for lots of snow tonight, so tomorrow could be another powder day. Hope my legs recover.

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