On Tuesday Portillo was at its blue sky photogenic best, and the skiing while not fluffy powder was still high quality.
Early morning view from our hotel room:
You can pay more for the lake view, but we had that from breakfast.
We got out a bit before 10AM and headed for the Roca Jack opening.
One skier is at lower left. Just above right center are three people riding the slingshot poma.
So we had a 10+ minute wait and saw this skinny avalanche looker’s right.
We were in the second group when they switched up to full capacity of 5 people. About 2/3 of the way up there was big snow chunk on the right so someone said “Move left!” to dodge it. Liz and I were on the far left and there was a dip in the snow where we lost our balance and fell off. Liz did not lose a ski but she buried a tip far enough it took a couple of people to extricate it.
The new snow on Roca Jack was very supportable, similar to the Plateau Superior packed powder on that first run. Liz skied it fluidly but did not want to go back up Roca Jack.
I got back in line for a second ride. I realized at that speed going up a steep slope I needed to grip with both hands. I got off at the top cleanly but the ride was as strenuous as skiing Garganta and I needed a suck wind break before heading down.
Partway down I moved skier’s right to get some untracked flowing into the Juncalillo groomer.
View back up with my track in there somewhere.
The snow got heavier closer to the groomer with elevation decline and likely more rain during the storm. This is probably why the CaraCara slingshot poma did not open.
The longer runs are reached traversing looker’s left from there, but they descend to lower elevation where the off piste snow was surely unpleasant. A few people traversed from Roca Jack into the CaraCara drainage but I saw no one go any farther.
When I got down to Juncalillo I connected with Jeff, Rick and Evelyn, whom we met at the hotel in Los Andes. Rick Wyatt and Evelyn Lees are around my age but were elite rock climbers and backcountry skiers to 20,000+ feet in Peru and the Himalayas in their younger days. They have been in South America for over 3 weeks and this was their last ski day.
They had just arrived so we all rode up Roca Jack together. By this time ~11:30 the poma track had turned to spring snow in the morning sun so the ride required much less effort than before. I didn’t recall Roca Jack being strenuous in 2007, but Portillo was in full-on corn mode then.
The direct line between the two Roca Jack pomas had some chunks from skier traffic but they were soft and the underlying surface was still smooth skiing. I took one break on the way down for pictures. View NE:
The Lake Chutes flow down to that tongue of snow at the lake. The exit path cut through the rocks is hard to see from this distance. The Plateau sector and edge of the hotel are at right.
View straight down Roca Jack:
The road and Chilean border facilities are in the background.
View close to north:
The Three Brothers are the peaks at upper left. You can barely see that path through the rocks from the Lake Chutes now.
You can throw down for heliskiing here too.
It’s $540 for first run and $270 for each extra.
We met Liz and since Rick, Jeff and Evelyn were daytripping, we had a leisurely lunch at Tio Bob’s.
View from Tio Bob’s:
A bird came by to scavenge. I took a few pics and lucked out with this one.
After lunch all the slingshot pomas were closed for wet slide risk above on the warm day with the recent heavy snow. So Liz and I ran several laps traversing out Plateau Superior. Here’s Liz in some of the gradually softening packed powder.
If you went far enough it was still untracked.
I could still make big turns with the demo Kastles here.
We skied 11,300 vertical but it was overall a memorable day.
Early morning view from our hotel room:
You can pay more for the lake view, but we had that from breakfast.
We got out a bit before 10AM and headed for the Roca Jack opening.
One skier is at lower left. Just above right center are three people riding the slingshot poma.
So we had a 10+ minute wait and saw this skinny avalanche looker’s right.
We were in the second group when they switched up to full capacity of 5 people. About 2/3 of the way up there was big snow chunk on the right so someone said “Move left!” to dodge it. Liz and I were on the far left and there was a dip in the snow where we lost our balance and fell off. Liz did not lose a ski but she buried a tip far enough it took a couple of people to extricate it.
The new snow on Roca Jack was very supportable, similar to the Plateau Superior packed powder on that first run. Liz skied it fluidly but did not want to go back up Roca Jack.
I got back in line for a second ride. I realized at that speed going up a steep slope I needed to grip with both hands. I got off at the top cleanly but the ride was as strenuous as skiing Garganta and I needed a suck wind break before heading down.
Partway down I moved skier’s right to get some untracked flowing into the Juncalillo groomer.
View back up with my track in there somewhere.
The snow got heavier closer to the groomer with elevation decline and likely more rain during the storm. This is probably why the CaraCara slingshot poma did not open.
The longer runs are reached traversing looker’s left from there, but they descend to lower elevation where the off piste snow was surely unpleasant. A few people traversed from Roca Jack into the CaraCara drainage but I saw no one go any farther.
When I got down to Juncalillo I connected with Jeff, Rick and Evelyn, whom we met at the hotel in Los Andes. Rick Wyatt and Evelyn Lees are around my age but were elite rock climbers and backcountry skiers to 20,000+ feet in Peru and the Himalayas in their younger days. They have been in South America for over 3 weeks and this was their last ski day.
They had just arrived so we all rode up Roca Jack together. By this time ~11:30 the poma track had turned to spring snow in the morning sun so the ride required much less effort than before. I didn’t recall Roca Jack being strenuous in 2007, but Portillo was in full-on corn mode then.
The direct line between the two Roca Jack pomas had some chunks from skier traffic but they were soft and the underlying surface was still smooth skiing. I took one break on the way down for pictures. View NE:
The Lake Chutes flow down to that tongue of snow at the lake. The exit path cut through the rocks is hard to see from this distance. The Plateau sector and edge of the hotel are at right.
View straight down Roca Jack:
The road and Chilean border facilities are in the background.
View close to north:
The Three Brothers are the peaks at upper left. You can barely see that path through the rocks from the Lake Chutes now.
You can throw down for heliskiing here too.
It’s $540 for first run and $270 for each extra.
We met Liz and since Rick, Jeff and Evelyn were daytripping, we had a leisurely lunch at Tio Bob’s.
View from Tio Bob’s:
A bird came by to scavenge. I took a few pics and lucked out with this one.
After lunch all the slingshot pomas were closed for wet slide risk above on the warm day with the recent heavy snow. So Liz and I ran several laps traversing out Plateau Superior. Here’s Liz in some of the gradually softening packed powder.
If you went far enough it was still untracked.
I could still make big turns with the demo Kastles here.
We skied 11,300 vertical but it was overall a memorable day.
Last edited:
