Trepidation

It's a little harder for me to get out skiing as frequently as when I was in school, however I've had some great days in the hills this winter. The snowpack is deep, and in typical Wasatch fashion the conditions have been really good all things considered. I reckon I'll take a few entries to report on some notable tours from the past few months.

First up: Trepidation. I'm actually not quite sure (geographically-speaking) of its real name, but I do know it was an incredibly fun and memorable line. My friends Sam and Aaron refer to it as 'Trepidation' so I'll continue the trend. Our group consisted of brothers Sam and Aaron, their cousin Isaac, and myself.

We had originally planned to hit the East ridge of Timpanogos, but we got got started a little later than anticipated and warming conditions persuaded us to switch over to Plan B.

We skinned/booted up a prominent ridge that splits Primrose Cirque from Cascade Cirque (North East side of Timp) and continued to the summit of the sub-peak. I had purchased some new crampons and a Whippet right before the trip and it was fun testing them out on the Primrose headwall.




It's always a pleasure hanging out with the Inouye clan, and I'm always blown away by how fast they are on the ascent. It must be a genetic thing, because they've all got it. They smoke me every time on the skin up, and I've accepted my role as the caboose. At one point on the upper ridge, the snow firmed/iced-up considerably to the point that I kicked off my skis opting to boot and kind of figured this would be standard procedure. Sam and Aaron had different plans, and were somehow able to skin the whole section sans-ski crampons.

When I caught up with them at the top, we took a few moments to pause and take in the incredible views, and I put down a Snickers. The Timpanogos massif is one of the more alpine environments in the Wasatch range and is pretty spectacular. The added snow in the winter only enhances it, in my opinion.

By the time we reached our intended line, the sun had softened up the snow on that respective aspect to a nice, soft consistency- resulting in an amazing decent.

As a side note, we strategically shuttled cars that morning to simplify our exit. This detail slipped my mind as we began, and I left my truck keys in Sam's car. Fortunately we were able to flag down a ride back without much trouble.