Backcountry
Conditions Report
My crew and I ventured into the Central Wasatch backcountry twice over the weekend. Â
Friday morning Kyle, Jessie, Tom, Brad and I answered the 3:30am wake up call for dawn patrol.  After skinning up a couple thousand feet, we reached the point of where we wanted to drop, and were greeted by a stunning sunrise.
The sunrise lit up the sky with magical colors, leaving us at a loss for words as we peeled our skins off and prepared to ride.  After taking it in for a few minutes, we rode down, where there was still good snow to be found. Making surfy, low-tide turns we able to ride all the way back to our cars.
Sunday we returned to the Cottonwoods with a much bigger objective, drop-in from the peak of Patsy Marley. Eager to reach the summit, we gathered our gear and scurried up the skin track. As we reached the peak, picturesque 360° panorama vistas rewarded us for our hard work. It was a perfect, bluebird day in the Wasatch.
It felt more like May than the middle of December with the spring like conditions we experienced.  Since we skied north facing aspects, the snow was soft, even a week after the latest storm. With only 50″ falling so far this year, we had to stay attentive to avoid rocks and make conservative turns. A few rocks were scraped, but we still found some satisfying turns weaving through trees. The Wasatch definitely isn’t riding like it normally would in mid-December, but we couldn’t complain for the winter we’ve had so far.
