Cody flew in for a couple of backcountry ski days. After a rain event that settled the snow, we then received 6 to 12 inches of fresh stuff that has created awesome conditions for this early in the season.

We started the first day heading up in the tranquil basin drainage. This is a great little area that I have skied many times, but was Cody’s first winter trip. Although we’ve had significant snows this drainage was still pretty brushy. A very enjoyable ski day, but would be better with a few more feet of snow.

When we were leaving the trailhead that morning we visited with 3 skiers that were obviously very experienced. They were planning a trip up the drainage separating snowslip and running rabbit mountains. This is an area neither of us had any knowledge of, so for our second day we elected to follow their tracks for finding the route up the mountain.

As with most of the drainages in this area we were greeted with steep inclines and heavy woods for the 1st half of the route in. When we emerged from the trees we were in some awesome snow conditions and open terrain.

Cody wanted to make it to the very top of this drainage which would have landed us on running rabbit mountain, but we ascended into heavy clouds and visibility wasn’t great for our first trip up here. Coupled with the fact that his old, out of shape dad would have been struggling severely to reach the summit, we elected to stop about 600’ short of the ridge line.

After a lunch break and admiring the views we made our plans for the descent. Cody wanted to continue up a short distance and then catch a contour line that would allow him to cross over to the snowslip side of the drainage. I would ski down the area we ascended and meet him a few hundred feet below. We figured about 1/2 hour additional for Cody to join me at our meeting point.

This is where our lessons learned came to play. As Cody started his descent, he popped his bindings after a hard turn. He lost both skis on the steep downhill. He didn’t see them get carried down with the snow wake and assumed they were buried where he fell. He spent the next hour and half digging with his avalanche shovel attempting to find them buried deep in the heavy snow. Meanwhile I’m waiting at our meeting spot with thoughts of my youngest injured or worse lying up on the mountain. Cody could actually see me waiting, but I could not see him. After much internal debate I felt I had to attempt to make another ascent up the mountain. I reapplied ski skins and headed up the switch backs, which when Cody realized what I was going to do, panicked him. He knew his old dad was in no shape to make another trip up the mountain. I made it close to our lunch spot elevation when I realized that there was no way I was going to be successful in following Cody’s route without exhausting myself and risking both of us being in danger on this mountain. Common sense told me to return to our meeting spot and give him till dark before calling for help. I reached our meet point and was greeted by a woohoo hollering up the mountain. As Cody saw me descending the 2nd time he gave up his search and was attempting to hike down. I’m not sure if his woohoo exhilaration was his happiness of seeing his dad return or the fact that he found his skis stuck in a tree a few hundred feet downslope! I got some nice video of the rest of his descent while cursing him under my breathe for removing some of the color from my hair.

We still had a long ski descent to make before dark so we headed out, both of us thankful that tragedy had been averted. As we visited on the way down Cody was adamant this would not happen again. Next outing we will have radios and ski tethers! He had the items on order before we even arrived home, lessons learned for sure.

Although we had a little scare this ski outing was fabulous. Terrific snow conditions with very little avalanche danger allowed us to ski some very vertical terrain. We are both dreaming of returning to this drainage for future outings, and maybe with some cooperative weather (and me being in better shape) we will make the trip to the top!