Sunday was another spectacular day with cool winds from the N keeping the sun from warming the snow surface too much. Starting with SK from the Taggart Lake parking lot in the park, we ascended the lower slopes of Shadow Peak admiring the view on the way up.
Avalanche Canyon
Teewinot
From a prominent knob at about 10,300' we ascended fine settled powder to a small basin.
This area was sheltered from the wind, and under the spring sun things were starting to warm up. We climbed out of the basin via a small gully.
This took us under the quite imposing NE face of Shadow Peak.
Skinning underneath the lower slopes of Nez Perce we went to a notch which led into Garnet Canyon.
Whilst aethetically pleasing, the top section had slid so it wasn't much good.
The lower section was mainly breakable.
Now in the flats of Garnet Canyon we could see the Grand prize!
As we ascended up the drainage the winds started to crank.
Another gust on its way down.
Close to the foot of the Grand, we cut left and started to ascend the Apron of the Hourglass.
The snow surface was a mixture of breakable and settled powder. Still we were at least out of the wind. The main couloir is the snow ramp on the RHS of the picture.
As the couloir was really filled in (less Hourglass - more Glass!), we decided to try and skin it to the top - a la Tanners.
This came progressively more difficult as it became steeper and we started to get hemmed in between a nasty feeling wind slab on the right and the rock wall on the left.
Eventually it got to the point where we were doing more kick turns than actual steps. Booting to the top was an option, but since that involved crossing the wind slab we decided to call it a day.
Looking over at the Grand and the Otterbody.
Time to drop in!
The descent was quite good - powder at the top making way to breakable at the bottom.
Turns on the Apron - one boarder and one skier. Should be obvious which tracks are which.
Exiting back down Garnet Canyon.
Skiing the now mushy lower faces.
Back in the lot at the end of a fun day in the Tetons.
