A desert experience
There’s some places you would never consider skiing, and a desert famous for it’s mountain biking fits the bill. The story goes that the Spanish missionary who named these mountains deemed it so unlikely that there could be snow in these parts, and so the mountains must be covered in salt, naming them the Sierra La Sal (salt mountains). It was this destination I rushed towards with local friend Kyle Toohee as soon as I made it out of my evening shift in Alta, Utah, at 11pm. Arriving to the trailhead at 3am with snow tumbling through our headlights we were quickly reassured the skiing was to be epic.
We woke to 15cms of fresh snow overnight, sun poking through clouds over a glorious hoar frost, and got off and away up the skin track. We reached Geyser pass early, and were greeted with the first view of the red desert we’d driven so far to ski in. We quickly scoped out our first lines for the day and headed off get in some turns. A quick pitstop was made to visit the Gold Basin yurt. It looked alluring enough for the skin track chat to swing to planning a trip back with a larger crew and a kid’s sled to drag our beers in. While the hut system in Utah isn’t as great as we’re blessed with in New Zealand, there are scattered yurts about the forest service land which offer some good opportunities for overnight missions.
Our skin track chat slowly died down to gasps and pants as we wallowed up our first chosen face. The reward was sweet though, enjoying the kind of blower powder we’d become so used to in Alta back down through the trees. A few more lines followed through Aspen groves and then our late night drive began to take it’s toll. However after spending months in the backcountry highway that is the Wasatch mountains it had been a treat being out alone in the backcountry, setting our own skin tracks, and enjoying fresh turns. Something we don’t appreciate enough in New Zealand!
The prior day finished off with a mexican dinner in Moab , and led into turning the car heater on multiple times over night to try and keep us slightly warm as we slept in the car at 2900m and -20C. This led to slow motivation for the morning, however on seeing the stars and realising it was clear and calm our enthusiasm lifted. We were off to try for one of the ‘50 Classic Ski Descents of North America’ as penned by Chris Davenport and co, Mt Tukuhnikivatz. We reached the base around 10am, and were greeted with a steep, exposed, and wind loaded face. Over some PB and J sandwiches we agreed safety dictated we bail on our intended line, but try and access up a tree covered face to the ridge of Little Tuk, Mt Tuks slightly smaller sentinel. An hour and a half later and we collapsed onto the ridge, only a few hundred feet higher, after suffering back and forth up the face. I gained a new appreciation for wind scoured ridges, as we made fast ground the remainder of the way up to the summit of Little Tuk. Our reward was a tight chute of dry chalky snow, into a final epic powder face, all looking over the Moab desert.
We were weren’t quite done with skiing though. On the first day we’d seen some local ranchers doing laps from the trailhead down the next few switchbacks on the road in their jeans and flannels with knives strapped to their hips. We took some inspiration from these guys, and took a turn each in the low angle aspen groves. It was such good skiing Tohee went far past the meeting spot, and I spent a while driving back and forth hoping he hadn’t wrapped himself around a tree in the woods. As we started the drive back to the Wasatch we popped into Arches National Park, and explored the desert that is teeming with hikers, mountain bikers and camera wielding tourists at all times but the depths of winter. On one side I could view the world famous red rock arches, and on the other our last line off Little Tuk. Most definitely one of the most unique places I have ever skiied!
