Route: Cristo Couloir

Team: Ted, Jared Ettlinger

Late April—snow is everywhere, but the lifts are closed. It doesn’t always make sense to me, for example, why Aspen Highlands’ maximum base depth is often reached on or near the mountain’s closing day. There’s still so much skiing out there, yet everyone starts thinking of summer.

Jared agreed, so we went to Quandary Peak. In ten days, I was headed to the mountains of Peru for three weeks with friends, and I wanted to acclimatize before trying to tackle 6000-meter peaks.

This was a standard outing on Quandary. We skinned the East Ridge from the car to the summit, I can’t quite recall how long it took, but quick comes to mind. The greatest part of the day was eating lunch within petting distance of a whole pack of mountain goats. Jared was glad I had that disposable camera.

The weather was fine, and the snow in the Cristo Couloir was getting soft. The ski down was possibly the best I’ve had in this couloir. I’d show everyone, but the camera that captured it all, lunch with goats included, never made it back to the car because of my “chronic un-zippered pockets syndrome” (CUPS-self diagnosed). Bummer.

Does anyone else have an issue with this?

When we got home, I sold Christy and Jill on a trip to Grays and Torreys, which I thought looked good from Quandary today. We would leave in the morning.

Zip those pockets!