After a great month of spring corn skiing in April, May of 2024 brought out one more sneaky storm to fill out Utah’s backcountry terrain. Luckily for me, I had already planned a visit to Salt Lake City for a long weekend with the hope of exploring what the Wasatch and Ogden backcountry had to offer. Joining me on the trip was Ian Hokaj and Devin McCabe, the three of us making a group of inexperienced backcountry ski newbs. We had the goal of getting some ski tour volume under our belt while also making the most of the weekend’s great weather and recent snowfall. Despite high warming & generally low tide making for pretty tame avalanche conditions, the ~18″ of snow that fell earlier in the week made for some high consequence wind and storm slabs in the high apline. This manifested in a tragic accident, with three skiers triggering a slide on Lone Peak. All three members were buried and two did not survive, making for an incredibly difficult week for the utah ski community. This morbid atmosphere made us acutely aware of the ‘wicked’ nature of winter backcountry travel and set us on a mission to make the most out of a deliberately conservative hit list.
As soon as we set foot in Utah, stoke for a great weekend flooded back in. Friday was our first full day and we chose to tour some classic & simple terrain in the cottonwoods. First up was USA bowl across from Solitude and Brighton, which was a repeat for Ian and a pretty tame option in most conditions. Devin also had the privilege of making this his first tour with alpine touring bindings as opposed to bipedal locomotion in ‘alpine’ hokkas. A short hour and a half later we found ourselves on the top of the bowl, probably wishing we were there slightly earlier in the morning. After a quick carb replenishment (one Coors lite), we made a dozen turns in some dense spring snow and then quickly made our way back to the car. The day’s skiing was more about getting our bearings together and not getting in an avalanche, so we brushed off the snow as a one-off and headed to Alta across the canyon for another lap. This time our tour was joined by a few other locals scattered around and felt like we were getting in the swing of things. Off in the distance was an enticing view of main chute on Mt. Baldy, but we held ourselves together and focused just getting to the top of the lift. A speedy carb replenishment later had us ready for the descent and this time we were pleasantly surprised by some less-wet turns for the first half of the run. Overall we were feeling good and ready to scope out some new terrain for the rest of the weekend.
Friday’s definitive success put us in the mood for a night out in the town, but we still had our minds set on adventuring out to a new area come Saturday morning. In particular, Ian scoped out a mellow ridge hike on Ben Lomond Mountain lining Ogden Valley. Despite a hilariously late start, we knew we could still get a decent hike in a ridge that was all low angle and most likely void of any other kooks like us. Our kit that day consisted of cutoff jeans, Hawaiian shirts, and a speaker that was unreasonably large for some reason. Despite the ridiculousness of the day & gear, our hike was a complete blast. The terrain felt very safe, our speaker was tastefully motivating, and our carbs were nearing replenishment. All of us felt great in terms of pace too, which made for a super efficient tour to few hundred feet above the treeline. In front of us were some spectacular headwalls & spicy chutes far in the distance. Huge wet slides lined this steeper area and we new from the region’s guidebook that this area has a not-so-fun history of burials. Having little time and no desire to test those waters, we enjoyed an incredibly clear day on the top of Cutler Ridge. Skiing down was not to shabby either and soon enough we found our way back to the initial bushwhack and trailhead. To cap off the energy from the day, we took a dip in surprisingly refreshing Pineview Reservoir & a visit to the “oldest bar west of the Mississippi” name The Shooting Star Saloon. Although turns out there could not compare to resort skiing in any sense,
With one more day of skiing ahead of us, we spent Saturday night feverishly deliberating on what to do next. In front of us was a typical guidebook for the greater Wasatch range, but also a skinny blue book called the “Chuting Gallery”. Of course none of the lines within the gallery’s list were safe, within our capabilities, or good skiing with the current conditions, but we were feeling good and I had my eyes glued on the Wolverine Cirque chutes. These lines were clearly a bad idea to ski, but were also positioned right behind Brighton resort and perfectly close to the super mellow Wolverine Bowl. Our debate session lasted a tad longer and we finalized on this region with an early start for the next morning. After all, Sunday also happened to be nearly Solitude’s closing day, which would be a no-brainer for an end to the weekend post tour. So come morning, we began skinning up the Millie lift line and towards Mt. Wolverine. The first half of the tour was straightforward and make for a quick pace. Soon we arrived at the top of the lift and began to stare at the Millie summit boot pack – our first real avalanche risk of the trip. Since Ian & Devin had never taken an AIARE course (oof), we decided to practice a rescue on some flat ground. I buried my pack, made some fake dig sites, and then let both Ian & Devin go find & un-dig it on their own. Thankfully it went pretty smoothly and set a good tone for the rest of the bookpack to the summit.
Climbing Mt. Millie is super easy when there is a boot pack set and lifts are running, but something eerie persists when the slope is clean and no one else is around. While we charged ahead, both Ian & Devin had some second thoughts about the exposure of the steep slope. Realistically the snowpack was consolidated, cold, and at low risk of sliding given our position at the apex of the ridgeline. But that didn’t stop the us from feeling like we were on the edge, as most steep ridges tend to do. It didn’t take long until we finished out the hike and stood atop Mt. Millicent with a fantastic view of Mt. Wolverine, Patsey Marley, and the spectacular terrain on all sides of the cirque between them. Immediately it was clear from the hike we just came from and the school bus sizes cornices overhanging steep and narrow chutes that the cirque was not in for skiing. Instead we’d take the mellow 25 ish deg bowl to the north off Wolverine’s peak. To get there, we made a relatively each skin across the ridgeline and onto our 2nd summit of the day. From Mt. Wolverine, the entirety of Little Cottonwood Canyon is on display and it makes for a spectacular viewing point. We stood atop feeling accomplished and excited for the upcoming descent, having made a clear progression in the complexity of terrain we just crossed.
Skiing down was a bit lackluster. Even though we had the whole mountain to ourselves, the snow had soaked up the sun and we were struggling to carry speed in the wet conditions of late spring. After the main bowl, we traversed through a lake plateau and over a small ridge to get back to the resort. Skiing out into Brighton felt amazing and we were all immensely tired from the big morning. While getting to the parking lot, we shared a few beers and then got ready to meet up with some local friends for some victory laps at Solitude closing day. Similar to the day before, we dawned our hand cut jorts and ridiculous Hawaiian T shirts for party lap after party lap in bounds. Ending the day with an underwear lap for good measure, we found our way back to the lodge and celebrated a great weekend of mediocre spring touring as our introduction to the Wasatch.
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