8/31 & 9/1/2011: 11 Months Skiing at Mammoth

It was too tempting to join Patrick in the ranks of official "nutcases" this week. I had seen Mammoth pictures from the end of July and even read that Mammoth prepared some terrain for the local racers as recently as Aug. 18:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid= ... =1&theater
Only 1983 and 1995 had as much documented snow in late summer, so I figured this was a unique opportunity. Also, a couple more days experience on the AT gear before November wouldn't hurt. I arrived in Mammoth ~6:30PM Tuesday and drove up past Main Lodge for recon. Cornice viewed from Chair 2 parking lot:

View from Minaret Vista shows snow in Gremlin's Gulch but only detached patches below in St. Anton:

I also drove the dirt road to Red's Lake by chair 14, so in the mornings I parked just off that road between chair 12 and St. Anton. On 8/31 I started hiking before 8AM and reached the bottom of the snow in Gremlin's 49 minutes and 600 vertical feet later.


The sun is lower than June/July so the snow is still well frozen ~9:10AM.

So as on Shasta ski crampons prevented any slippage here.

View up Drop Out

This line was continuously skiable at the end of July.

Halfway up Gremlin's


Near top of Gremlin's, looking up to Hangman's and Cornice.

From the strip just ahead it's a level ~50 foot walk over to the bottom of Cornice's snow.

While skinning up Cornice here's the view up from its narrow section.

Looking down from the same spot 9:50AM


Above here Cornice became steep enough to make skinning more challenging. I needed to zigzag more, plan ahead to change direction in flatter spots, etc. to avoid slipping. So it took another 1/2 hour to reach the top. View from the top of Cornice's snow, almost identical spot as 6+ years ago.

There was more snow up here this year even though the choke was much narrower.

At last, skiing down Cornice 10:43AM

That snow strip at left heads toward St. Anton, but ends soon so it's better to walk from the right strip over to Saddle Bowl/Gremlin's.


A couple of other tracks visible from bottom of Cornice in addition to mine


Looking back to short walk from Cornice to Saddle Bowl. Cornice had the same 480 vertical feet skiable as 6+ years ago.


Looking down from same spot


End of Gremlin's, 10:59AM, another 540 vertical on 8/31.

Another sign of the weaker sun is that Gremlin's snow was still on the firmer side of ideal this late in the morning. Cornice gets more direct morning sun so the snow surface was good there.

6 years ago on August 7 Gremlin's extended ~150 vertical feet farther than this.


After hiking down the 150 feet the lower snow patches come into view.

Below the broken snowbridge in foreground, another 80 vertical of skiing, then a short walk to the last patch of 70 vertical feet. Grand total 1,170 vertical feet from top of Cornice. View up from the end of skiing.


I found TWO cell phones on the cornice and turned them in to Mammoth's Lost and Found.

This makes me wonder what Snowbird looks like right now.

My first ever September ski day in the Northern Hemisphere was of course very similar to the previous day. I started out 20 minutes later, knowing that the snow was softening more gradually than I had expected. With an extra night acclimatization the hike up to bottom of Gremlin's was 10 minutes faster. Past the choke point of Cornice I made the error of deciding to hike up the steeper part next to the snow. The surface was loose gravel and scree, so it was quite strenuous. I managed that OK but forgot I would have to put skis on on close to a 30 degree slope. The snow was firm enough that I was forced to prepare a flat platform in the wet gravel, put the skis on there, then walk onto the snow. So when I got to the same top of Cornice as the day before I had to spend some time cleaning mud off my skis and bindings with loose snow. This morning I took a hose to all of the ski gear to complete the job. AT lesson learned: stick to the skins/ski crampons as long as possible, and if too steep for that it's better to climb in snow with boot crampons than on loose scree.

The skiing was better 9/1 with later timing. I started down Cornice at 11:18AM.

I think the choke narrowed a bit from 8/31 and will be severed later this month. But I do expect some of the snow on Cornice and Gremlin's to survive into the upcoming season.

From the bottom of Cornice I decided to hike up ~200 vertical to the top of Saddle Bowl behind chair 3 to allow more softening in Gremlin's. From there, a view up Climax.

Like Drop Out this would have been skiable in early August.

View of the construction of the new high speed quad replacing chair 5.

FYI its base is being relocated to the bottom of Coyote to avoid the traverse from Upper Dry Creek back to the old base.

I skied Gremlin's about 11:40 with a much more pleasant snow surface than the previous day.


After skiing the same 2 lower patches as on 8/31 I finished with 1,340 vertical due to the extra in upper Saddle Bowl. Hiking down, view of the top of chair 11, creek flowing down lower St Anton and Main Lodge.

rfarren":2w65lg7v said:

This makes me wonder what Snowbird looks like right now.

Click to expand...

A few patches here and there - nothing particularly contiguous. Some of the north facing protected chutes and couloirs elsewhere in the Wasatch have some snow. Gunsight at Alta is still being skied, but it's down to maybe 300 verts or thereabouts. So if someone really wanted to tick off September turns, there are enough scraps to do so, but...

Here's a shot of the Ballroom at Alta from last week (despite my incorrect copyright date), taken from the top of the Collins lift. Yes, those are a lone set of fresh tracks in the center of the image:


While there's still snow in Main Chute, it's way past prime - very narrow in places with a distinct pair of breaks making it discontinuous.

rfarren":1ycotwob said:

This makes me wonder what Snowbird looks like right now.

Click to expand...

My guess is that Mammoth high-density and wind packed snow is more suitable to summer survival. Another point in Mammoth's favor is the massive deposition in Gremlin's Gulch, which shortens the approach and lengthens the skiable vertical to 3x what MarcC says is still there in LCC. It's a fair question why I would hike runs I've skied hundreds of times vs. finding something new in the backcountry. On Wednesday afternoon I drove up to Saddlebag Lake to investigate that possibility.

Yes there's snow up there, but maybe 400-500 continuous vertical with a much more arduous approach than Mammoth.

So now for some editorial commentary. I took Snowbird to task for its spring skiing management vs. Mammoth. It's only fair to point out that my opinion is the opposite with respect to summer operation. Mbaydala and BobbyD used the Snowbird tram to access early August turns in LCC this year, presumably signing appropriate waivers, as I did with Mammoth's gondola in 2005. Unfortunately legal paranoia must have have taken over at Mammoth since then, as I was denied use of the gondola this year. Most of you may think only the hopelessly addicted would be up there skiing this past week, but check out the pics Becky took on July 31.

Minaret Vista view, same as 2nd pic of my first post above.


Cornice from base of chair 2, same as 1st pic of my first post above.


And finally, the continuous line from the top of Drop Out.


Add in Climax to the above, and surely there would have been interest among numerous expert skiers for late July/early August skiing, signing the appropriate legal releases recognizing unmaintained backcountry conditions. With the gondola you could have done 2-3 runs up there in a day even with the short hikes out at the bottom. :evil: :evil: :evil: Lawyers suck!

Good job, Tony! =D>

We will be hoping for an October opening.

Way to stay thirsty Tony! I hope your trip to Antarctica is awesome. I know Doug and his peeps will take great care of you!

Bravo! Skiing the Mammoth 'Glaciers' in Sept. That's one way to beat the crowds.

Im curious to see the new chair 5

:lol:
I guess something could be worst than 11 months of skiing at Mammoth. Something like 11 months skiing at Edelweiss. :-D

Congrats and have fun down under. Don't forget those sea sick pills.