Ski Bum Poet

On March 7th I had the pleasure of introducing two great people to Alta skiing and Little Cottonwood Canyon. Whenever I describe to folks the difference between Alta and other Utah ski resorts it sums it up nicely to simply say “On a storm day everyone in line knows one another”. It has a true family feel. Alta means a lot to me so I really enjoyed showing Mike Doyle, your About.com Guide to Skiing, and his daughter Katie around. We went on a complete mountain tour. It was a morning with bright blue skies and great visibility, so it made my job of pointing out features much easier. They carved the place up, asking questions and smiling all a long!

© Mike Doyle

The next day Mike posted a great write-up about his morning at Alta, and they also carved it up at Snowbird in the afternoon: Skiing Alta and Snowbird on the Same Day?

Also, linked up from Mike’s ‘Skiing Alta and Snowbird on the Same Day?‘ blog post, there’s a specific article he wrote highlighting all they took in at Alta. This is the first hand account from a new Alta skiing fan! Skiing Alta

Being a passholder means, in general, the cheapest way to ski the most at a place you like. Here at Alta it means a lot more – at Alta it means you are family.

Read entire article..

I also posted a thread to the AltaCam Ski Forum about these great articles. Check it out: Alta Featured on About.com

Over and out, Gary M

As soon as I got on the hill today I realized that yesterday was the day and I missed out! BUT…today was pretty dang good, too. And I made the most it. I even found some soft, deep, untracked turns. It cooled off quite a bit last night so that could have made for even fluffier untracked snow then what the gang had on Monday. But they had a lot more of it, especially early on. As she goes, there wasn’t much untracked left out in the open…but I can find it and I did find it today.

It’s looking up a little bit finally. We’re in the right pattern now. We just have to be patient for the big one(s). Alta.com is showing a 71″ inch base now and the weather should remain unsettled through the week. Check the Cottonwood Canyons Forecast daily for the best summary. Just now as I was typing this I faintly heard from the other room a local weather anchor say something about snow developing on Friday in the Salt Lake Valley. Eh? That sounds good to me.

So today I took a few runs with Darren Marshall and BJ Brewer early on. They were both working for Clif Bar for the day distributing samples around the ski area. I then met up with Rob ‘To The Wall or Not At All’ Rowley and Hardcore for a few, too. Those guys are a riot when they get to bickering on the lift! To end strong I paid the price (skied Highboy) three times solo. Found what I needed on the left side and in the Church. Over and out for now. Next ski bulletin should be Saturday, Feb 17th (maybe Friday).

We got the perfect 10%+ density snowfall we needed in Little Cottonwood Canyon this past weekend. It was literally like starting all over again with a November snowpack. It wasn’t a major Wasatch pounding by any means, but when said and done, we received over a foot of heavy snow that blew and filled in the cracks of our former 58″ base nicely. The snow started to get lighter as the day progressed, and at our house in Timberlakes it definitely cooled off last night. I won’t be making it over to LCC today, but the Alta Snow Report posted another 5 inches new since lifts closed yesterday. That new 5 inches should be blower, and with the foot of heavy snow underneath, those skiing will have a good day.

As far as our day on the 11th. The High Traverse that was treacherous on my report from the day before (Feb 10th Alta) was 90% improved. Most of the exposed rock was caked over by the high density snowfall. Made the trip to piss pass a little less demanding and the skiing out there was real nice. Buttery smooth, arching turns with an occasional blast in the face is what I found. I fired up my sniffer and poked around in a few places I knew would offer me run outs full of wind deposited snow…the kind of drifts I knew you could dig deep into. Danette destroyed the fall-line of High Boy with the grace and style she’s always had. I think we skied about 8 runs, from Fred’s Trees, to Highboy, The Nest and out to North Rustler. Didn’t get up into Eddies, though. Next time.

I’m passing on skiing today to get a bunch of work done and then I’ll be in Alta Tuesday morning for some web business. After my meeting I’ll be out for a bit. Til then…

Yesterday it was warm. Around 40 degrees. Groomers were soft and pretty fun, but most of the time there were a ton of people so you had to pick and choose when to open the throttle. Off-trail (Highboy) was pretty harsh. Well getting there was harsh, not necessarily High Rustler itself. The High T was bad as usual this year. It wasn’t frozen and you didn’t feel like you were going to slide for life all the way to the bottom of West Rustler, but it was dang rocky. Rode some old Volkl fat skis (white wizard exsplosivs) namely because they’re a little smaller than the Gotamas and in fact a lot more responsive then the haggered Gotamas I have mounted. I have a sparkly clean new pair but haven’t dared mount them up this season yet for obvious reasons.

Skied a handful of Groomers with Johnny B and Jesse. Johnny and I also paid the price twice on Highboy. When those guys left I had more of an itch so I went back and skied three more Highboy’s in a row solo. Last three runs I went into Windy Point and knocked some snow over the rocks. It was…ok. The best part about skiing yesterday was the workout. BUT Cottonwood Canyons’ snow report says 7 last night, 2-5 today and possible 7-11 tonight so we’re looking up.

I am a little hesitant to write this post because I don’t want to jinx a predicted change in the weather taking place in and around the Western US. From what I understand, we’ve had a high pressure ridge sitting over California/Nevada/Utah for the past 45 days…effectively blocking any Pacific storms that may have in years past unleashed on Alta. I can’t remember where I heard this info but I think it was from one of the fine meteorologists at the National Weather Service - Salt Lake City.

At any rate, the report mentioned that this ridge should start to breakdown later this week. The first storm lining up on us is warm, with a Southwest flow, so it’s not the best of storms…but at least it’s from the Pacific and not the arctic North. The good news is, if this huge high pressure system that has frigged things up all winter is gone, then the gates are open for the goods to make their way in from the Pacific Northwest for the remainder for our winter. We hope..

I’ve been a huge Wasatch advocate this winter, not a Wasatch Wussie -haha: I’ve focused on making the best of my skiing days this year no matter what the snow stake reads. Fortunately, I’ve been around Alta long enough to know where I can get at least a few good turns even 10 days after it snows. Plus we moved to Timberlakes in the Uintas, so it’s quite a drive and I don’t get to LCC as much. Perhaps that’s why I’ve managed to keep a good attitude about it. I also have haggered Volkl Gotamas that I don’t mind trying to destroy Maybe if I still lived in Sandy at The Old Man’s house I would be a little more bitter.

Keep an eye on the Alta Snow Report. I truly believe Little Cottonwood can and will deliver this winter, still!

Now this is good to see! As I mentioned in the Lee Cohen Interview post the other day, Johnny B has been producing some killer AltaCam-exclusive podcasts with living legends in and around Alta. Powder Magazine Editor Derek Taylor caught wind of what JB was up to and had him interview Rob ‘To The Wall or Not At All’ Rowley for a Powdermag.com feature. As of the time of this post, Johnny’s interview of Rob was FEATURED ON THE HOMEPAGE of the Powdermag.com website. Nothing like listening to a couple of good friends talk shop about skiing and life experiences in Little Cottonwood Canyon. These are two of the most well-known and unique personalities at Alta. Turn your volume up, sit back and enjoy this podcast!

“Most Alta locals have a good luck charm that is guaranteed to bring snow. Many times, this charm is a person. It’s not uncommon to hear normally sane people (or sometimes obviously insane ones) use phrases like, “It’s going to snow next week. Uncle Leo is coming to town.” Rob Rowley is one of those people…”

Listen to the entire MP3 interview: Rob Rowley: The Fresh Prince Of Alta

Side note: ‘To The Wall or Not At All’ is our nickname for Rob. That’s because dude will side-step ‘to the wall’ on Devil’s Castle no less then a few times a day when the skiing’s good. In fact, he’s done it six times in a day. Anyone that knows this side-step is thinking ‘WTF are you kidding me?!’ right now. Oh, and he’ll wait at the gate for hours in the morning for that fresh, spiritual wall shot he wants.

Whatcha think? In case you’re reading this months from now in a distant archive you can click here to see the v1.o header graphic I built. Here is the descriptions of the photos from left to right:

1. Classic GravityFed.com cover photo circa 2002 (or thereabouts). Johnny B took this picture in Westward Ho. Click Here for the large version of this photo in the GravityFed archives.
2. Photo taken at the rope line on the shoulder hiking up from Wildcat chairlift. A friend of mine Erik Gauger took this photo on a ski visit to Alta. Check out Erik’s award winning travel/photography site: Notes From The Road.
3. That’s me digging out a room at the Alta Peruvian Lodge the morning it was hit by a Toledo avalanche in March of 2003. I was in the lodge and felt her shake on impact.
4. My season pass picture for the 2002-2003 season. I was looking to the sky for snow. Slow start but ended up being a killer year.
5. Powder explosion photo when I was skiing early AM with Andy and Jeff from WaHsatch Powder Productions one early morning. This is a still taken from a digital video recording of some dang good powder.
6. My claim to fame. Haha. It’s me on the the fall 2005 cover photo of Bike Magazine. Photo by Keith Carlsen in Albion Basin, Alta, Utah.
7. Another cool photo Erik Gauger took while in town. This is the little shot off the knob at the bottom of ‘The Church’ proper…skier’s left of High Rustler (in the trees).

Of course, all photos are from in and around Alta, Utah

You may remember the infamous column ‘Ask Johnny B’ in the early days of GravityFed. When we first launched the site back in December of 1999, Johnny single handedly drove 100% of the traffic through his wit and sense of humor. I still have most of the archives stored away on an old PC box (that I plug in twice a year to extract old content and charge), and I’ve vowed to dig them out and re-publish one of these days. Actually, there’s one classic now on GravityFed: Johnny B’s Mexico Thrashing

At any rate, we’ve gotten Johnny involved on the web again and this time he’s producing podcast interviews with some of Alta’s best known personalities and living legends for AltaCam.com. The most recent, was his 3-part interview with ski photographer Lee Cohen. Here’s a snippet of the transcript:

Johnny B: Let’s take it back. Who was your first cover shot? Bring us back to the day. Who was it? Where was it?

Lee Cohen: It was my buddy, Steve Garrett. It was kind of…

Johnny B: Oh the legendary old man.

Lee Cohen: The legendary old man. It was in 1988 and I remember when it came out, it was at Alta, I didn’t even know I was getting the cover and somebody in the Rustler… I was in the Rustler hanging out, going to the bar and one of the employees said, nice cover shot! February ‘88.

Johnny B: No way!

Lee Cohen: I was totally surprised and blown away.

Johnny B: That’s awesome, man! That’s great. I’m sure that really propelled the old man to greatness himself.

Lee Cohen: Yeah, the ancient one, he’s still out there turnin’ em.

Johnny B: Yeah.

Lee Cohen: For the crotchety of old dude that he is.

Download and listen to this full interview (you can also read the transcript). Very entertaining. Nice work Johnny B! I’ll keep ya posted on any old Ask Johnny B archives that come out.

Over and Out, Gary M