Report from June 5, 2024

Yesterday was my last ski day of the Northern Hemisphere winter.

Ski day #190.

Ski day #463 of the past 546 days.

I’ve been skiing 6 days per week for 17 months straight (78 weeks).

I’m exhausted…

11,489′ American Fork Twin Peak, UT

“Pipeline Couloir”

Details

• Summit (actually a notch):  11,300′
• Car:  7,900′
• Vertical From Car:  3,400′
• Vertical skied:  3,400′ (1,000′ in the chute)
• Max Pitch:  50º 
• Avg Pitch: 42º 
• Aspect:  East Northeast
• Distance:  5.5-miles round trip
• Time From Car to Top:  3 hours and 15 minutes
• Car to Car Time: 4 hours & 6 minutes
• Recommended Equipment:  Crampons, Ice Axe x2, skins

Yesterday I decided to go for a classic.

Pipeline Couloir at Snowbird Ski Resort in Utah.

This chute is steep, it’s epic, and it’s almost never open during the winter.

The key to skiing this chute is hitting it after they close.

This was my 3rd time skiing this chute.

• May 18, 2019
• July 21, 2023
• June 5, 2024

Of the 3 times I’ve gotten up and in Snowbird’s main crevasse, yesterday was the best…

I started hiking at 8:30am.

It was already about 60ºF at the base.

I hiked in ski boots up patchy, soft snow.

I made it up to the base of Mid-Gad chairlift in about 1 hour (fast for me).

I was moving fast to make sure I didn’t end up in the chute too late.

It hadn’t frozen well overnight and I was concerned about the snow in the chute being yucky.

I kept my head down and moved well.

I hit the base of the chute after about 2 hours and 15 minutes.

To my shock and disbelief, someone had already skied the damn thing!

Great news.

This meant there was a bootpack and he would have sluffed and knocked down all the bad surface snow.

I could see his booter and a large pile of sluff debris at the bottom of the chute.

Perfect.

The only issue was that he was some sort of giant…

Huge footprints and ridiculously large spaces between steps.

It was also strange that he appeared not to have skins with him…

His tracks came in from above, switched to booting, and then his ski track disappeared hard skiers right in a traverse.

Made me wonder if he was an employee who used the tram.

Who knows.

It took me 45 minutes to boot up the chute and I arrived on top after 3 hours and 15 minutes of walking.

A moderate east wind kept me cool up the chute and nearly got me to don my ski jacket for the descent.

I lingered not.

The top layer of snow in the chute was a wet slop that sluffed top to bottom when disturbed.

Fortunately, the guy who skied it before me had sluffed nearly all of that nasty snow out of the chute and onto the apron.

The top was steep and I was a bit intimidated about the first turns.

I counted myself in and dropped in.

The snow was exquisite!

I blasted down the chute with no fear, no worry of sluff, and no apprehension.

Pure joy.

I skied the chute proper in only 50-seconds and came hooting out the bottom.

The apron was sticky.

So sticky.

I glided and pushed my way down to the lower mountain past the gad chairs.

I dropped below the road I’d taken up, sidehilled under the Mid-Gad chair, and found good skiing on the lower mountain.

The patchy snow was the highlight.

The wet grass skiing was supreme.

I giggled and snorted as I rolled across 100′ stretches of grass.

I was able to snow and dirt ski right to the parking lot.

I hadn’t taken my skis off since the very top of the chute 11,300′.

I was beyond stoked!

Last time I skied this chute I dirt walked from the base of the chute all the way to the parking lot adding hours to the voyage.

Pipeline was the perfect way to end the season.

Thanks, Utah!