A Weekend in Dry Gulch

"Go to the mountains and get their good tidings"
-John Muir

As Loveland closed last weekend (sad) I finally had no excuse to go skiing at a resort and instead had to drag my lazy ass back up the hill to the life of a backcountry ski bum. Sweet. As the weather looked iffy all weekend with Saturday as the close winner, Mel and I decided to try (second time this season) for the collar line on Citadel. I made sure to prep myself by watching the movie Steep earlier in the week to get excited about some steep climbing and skiing. We'd been up to this line in March during a Low Avy danger bit but had been chased down off the ridgeline by a considerable amount of wind. The weather this day seemed to be saying either wonderful corn descent down this incredibly aesthetic line that is bounded in by huge rock walls, or that it would be so bad we wouldn't make it past the trail head (there was a 10% chance of the second so we thought we'd give it a shot.

We were greeted by blue skies and slight wind at the trailhead, so we decided to give it a go and made the bench that leads us to the line at 1000 feet of climb in record time. I was totally set and stoked about the fact that we were going to get to ski this line. All the clouds in the ski were moving heavily east and not towards the north which is where we were. Ah life in the mountains. As we gained the saddle that marked the 2000' mark and the ridge line that we would follow we were forced face down onto rocks by 60 mph sustained gusts of wind. We hung around for 20 minutes face down on the rocks hoping that the wind gusts would die down. Just as we started to discuss climbing further, a gust came along and ripped Mel's sunglasses straight off of her face and down into the bowl. We realized there was no climbing further and we had better ski the face below us, which was rock solid bulletproof snow.

Sometimes the mountains tell you yes and sometimes they tell you no. Citadel that day was screaming a big fat no at us, and I'm glad that we listened to it, even if the skiing sucked. I was especially glad when we got a view of the line that we had wanted to ski and there was avy debris of a recent wet slide on it.
On to Sunday......

Citadel (3rd times a charm!)

Being that it was mother's day, Mel had to run off to brunch with her Mom. I had been wanting to continue some backcountry exploration and found a willing partner in my buddy Owen who I'd done some skiing with last season. We headed up late with a couple of potential plans as the weather forecast was way dicey. We were greeted near Loveland by a ton of snow coming down and so plan B of heading back Dry Gulch with an attempt at Hagar or one of the other bowls at the back of the gulch in mind, it was. A longer tour but always good to get the exercise, except when my skins suddenly start carrying an entire glacier uphill with me. This got so bad that by the time we reached the real ascent I was moving at a pace of maybe a quarter of my usual. After halfway up the ridge line and above treeline, I decided to eschew my skins and packed the skins and skis and booted it up the rest of the way (hardly as enjoyable). We reached a beautiful cirque full of wonderful lines, bowls, rocks and drops. Next season I plan on spending a ton of more time in this area. The terrain looked AMAZING and the access out of a gate in Loveland would be incredibly easy to access. Needless to say I'm stoked and here's some stokeage to share.

Owen charging down into the bowl


where'd this knee deep powder come from?


into the blue yonder!



and the beautiful tracks...

chargin' the line.

There really is nothing I like more than an unexpected knee deep powder day :)
Stereo-Groove Armada-Suntoucher