April 8, 2006
Echo to Tallac - Chuting, Sloughing and Suffering our way from Point to Point
Joe, Toby, Buddy
Buddy chilling in between Indian Rock laps, with the big church in the background still to go - 4/8/06.
March was the best month of powder skiing I've ever had in my life. Only problem being that the steep adrenaline inducing lines had to be put on hold every weekend because the consistent deep and fresh snowfalls made avalanche conditions too high for the steep stuff......not much of a problem actually, cause we just kept skiing that sweet pow! Toby, myself and others also had been craving a point to point car shuttle, but the consistent deep and fresh snowfalls made long distance trail breaking prohibitive......not much of a problem though, cause we just kept skiing that sweet pow. But like all good things, the deep pow came to an end on the weekend of 4/8 (sort of). So with the fattest snowpack in recent memory hanging on the familiar faces, Toby, Buddy and I set out to take care of a few lingering ambitions. We left a car at Spring Creek Road and Highway 89 and another at the Echo Peak starting point. With an 8:30 AM California start we were positioned to pull off a pretty lengthy point to point, and we knew a few steep and adrenaline inducing lines to nab along the way.
We started off with a mellow skin up Echo Peak. The lines in between Echo and Flagpole are filled in like I've never seen before. It was tempting to just stay on this ridge and slay a few of those beauties. It was good to know we had skied one of those fat lines (below, right) earlier in the year as reported here.
On top of Echo Peak we were made aware of the potentially massively wind loaded slopes. How long will this cornice Hang 10 before it falls off?
The day was spent with one eye on the strom clouds to the West. Fortunately they never made it past the Crest of Desolation. The winds, however, hammered us without mercy.
Our first lines of the day were the Halls of the Gods chutes. Toby and I had dropped into the top of these chutes twice already this year, only to climb out both times due to icy and quite suspect conditions. Here are pictures of those two attempts:
January 21, 2006: March 18, 2006:
We were pretty determined to not be denied a third time. We were quite thrilled to see beautifully filled in chutes without any significant wind loading. Toby and Buddy dropped first into the middle chute of the three:
I dropped into the skier's right chute (a new line for me). The line was a direct shot at the base of the biggest cliff face in Tahoe (Indian Rock). The narrow choke at the convergence of the 3 chutes was a very manageable width of 10'. Here is a shot I snapped later of my tracks dropping into the top of the skier's right chute:
More Toby and Buddy in the primo middle section of Halls:
Looking up:
Looking Down:
It was so damn good we decided to skin back up to the top of Indian Rock and see about another lesser skied line called Fallen Angel. The skin took a bit of trail breaking and careful route selection:
Not as dangerous as it looks:
Back to the top of Indian Rock. We made the sketchy traverse above the top of the Halls and towards Fallen Angel.
We spied a view of Halls that gives a true indication of their steep nature. Toby's tracks (mine were out of view):
Now let's go see about that Fallen Angel:
Toby grabbed the camera and snapped a few pictures of me dropping into a steep and slougholicious line off the top. It was a little daunting skiing such a steep line and not being able to see what was directly below me....turns out it was the top of one of the finest chutes I'd ever ski. Once again the camera angle doesn't really do the steep pitch justice. Further down the page a longer distance shot shows the true pitch, and exposure.
Slough was trying to rinse me!
Fallen Angel was a long and heavenly line with puffy clouds of snow over lurking demon rocks. Otherworldly.
With the camera back in my hands, Toby and Buddy enjoyed their own religious experience with the Angel:
Now a long ski through the trees, with a right hand traverse towards the East side of Lilly Lake and the Glen Alpine TH.
We enjoyed lunch on the quiet bridge that bustles in the Summer. The view back towards Indian Rock and Fallen Angel was nice:
With a lot of satisfaction and 3,000' of skinning and chuting under our belts, we headed up the long and consistent South side of Tallac for the final 3,000'. A few bad ideas on route finding made it harder than it should have been in the beginning. Eventually we beat the bush and arrived at the base of the long open slope. That pesky wind was finally our friend on this open face as it kept the south facing slopes from mushing out and becoming a serious avy danger. We booted a bunch and skinned even more. Exhaustion set in, but the views of our earlier lines were good:
The plateau to the summit of Tallac was a test of wil power, pain management and devotion to monotony. Eventually all three of us succeeded.....albeit lacking grace and style. Toby collectively reaches insanity and the summit of Tallac at 5:30 PM:
Although we had ambitions of skiing Babycham or the Elevator Shaft entrance to the Cross, we opted to listen to our bodies and small amount of remaining wits, and passed on both of them. Seeing tracks headed towards Babycham and a suspectfully wind loaded Elevator Shaft also encouraged us to check out the lower elevation Hanging Snowfield on the Front Chutes. It was also a line neither of us had skied before.
Our lines on Indian Rock looked very distant (left), the storm clouds had stayed away (top right), and now it was time for Toby and Buddy to drop our 3rd and final line of the day (bottom right).
North Bowl was first:
Toby looking pretty damn good on the hanging snowfield after 6,000' of climbing and steep chute skiing:
After the $$$ snow on the hanging snowfield, it was time to drop into the chute on the right side before the cliff out:
I love this picture of Buddy charging another wild line.....but what's Toby doing down below?
Our 3rd adrenaline inducer of the day from below:
The North facing trees down to the top of Sweat Hill still held some great pockets of pow (left). Sweat Hill was a miserable crucifying experience of breakable crust on broken legs. Here's Buddy feeling whipped at the bottom. Our hanging snowfield is visible at the top of the picture (right):
Finally back at the Echo Peak starting point, 6 hours and almost 11 hours later. These dudes need pizza and beer! The biggest bullet dodged on the day was when I barely made it back in time to take Nora and Sophie off of Jodi's hands prior to a previous engagement at 7:00 PM.
Routes (Red is Ascent, Blue is Descent):
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