Utah is the place where a lot of things began for me. First time away from home, first time skiing endless days of powder, first time backcountry skiing, first time I would seriously pick up a camera, oh yeah and I got a degree somewhere in the middle of skiing. I got married and have a little girl born in Utah. You have the idea. My prime early adult years of growth are planted in Utah as much as my childhood is planted in Seattle.
Living in Alaska has broaden my perspective of life and that which is important. In Alaska we are lucky that we get a good ski season all the way to end of June. It is much longer. Utah, every year is late November to April and done. So to try and fit in a career other than skiing is almost impossible. Now it is not necessarily snowing in June or even May, but the spring season is still in full affect and there is not a skier on the planet that doesn't like good corn skiing.
Two weeks ago I went back to Utah for a visit and was reminded once again of what a glory hole it is. Yes there are too many people, bummer. But it is literally in the middle of everything that has to do with the ski world. And the marketing is true, it really is the best snow on earth, it literally makes skiing easier, which does makes some people in Utah fair weather skiers. For example, "It is not sunny and we don't have a foot of new snow, wah, wah, wah." I can't remember having a bad day of skiing, worst case scenario I am out skiing.
JT Robinson and his lovely wife Christine put me up for the week, THANK YOU. Once Dave Magoffin showed up on Monday night it was on. After a rough weather cycle in Utah, and reports of 2 feet of snow in the Grand Tetons of Idaho/Wyoming, I picked up Magoffin at the airport and we drove up to the Tetons for 2 days of skiing at Grand Targhee. We stayed and were guided around by a good friend Vince, whom we fondly call the "Coach." Though it was hard to get a lot a film and photographing done do to massive amounts of snowfall and low visibility, the skiing was epic. Long and consistent powder runs all day. After a 2 days of skiing the reports in Utah were looking up. It had snowed close to a foot and everything was reset again in Utah. So we headed back to JT's.
The next day we hooked up with a great friend Ben Geiger for a good long backcountry day. The location itself I can not tell you, as Ben Geiger asked me to keep it quiet. What I will say is that it is the Northern Wasatch and that I was blown away being in the Wasatch Mountains without tons of people around. We skied 2000 vertical feet runs of powder X 4. Amazing! The next day, Friday, we headed to Snowbasin for a day of powder and filming seeing that the snow had started up again, and Snowbasin is my favorite resort in Utah. We hooked up with JT, Geiger, and Wes and filmed some deep powder tree skiing. That night we headed up to a friend Ben Johnson's house to hang out with his wife Katy and him. Life had made them busy all week with trade show stuff and Katy having very important interviews for a doctrate program she is up for. The are are the owners of Second Track Sports, the coolest ski shop on the planet. It is a consignment ski shop where people sell there used gear through the store and they take a cut. It is a good one because Utah is home to about 90% of the worlds pro skiers and snowboarders of whom all know Ben now, seeing that they can upload all of their older gear. Bluntly, Ben is a genius because he actually has high end gear as opposed to used crap.
Geiger, left. Magoffin, right. Hiking for the goods.
Northern Wasatch, Utah
The next day I was flying solo. So I went for a very mellow hike up the Grizzly Gulch area of Alta. Once again powder all day long. But to my suprise and elation it had gotten even deeper and I had it all to myself. Nice!! Sunday I was off to Minneapolis where the company I work for is based. Back to work. Though it was hard to leave, I enjoyed a great week of work at the home office where I completed a training with some of the best professional people I have ever met.
Wasatch Mountains from the air on my way to Minneapolis.
It is great going back to Utah as a visitor. It makes me appreciate the friendships I have there and the time I got to spend there. The journey turned into an unplanned storm chasing event, where Magoffin and I literally didn't ski any runs that weren't deep powder runs. So Cheers to Storm Chasing!
Dave Magoffin getting some pow.
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