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It all started on Friday night around 8 P.M. Our original plan was to ski the Y Couloir on Black Mountain in the Absaroka Saturday morning, yet soon enough a friend informed us that The Grand had been skied almost every day in the past week. Whether or not this was true I still don't know, but it didn't fail to motivate us to make a spontaneous decision to try and bag a descent of The Grand via the Ford-Stettner couloir. Plus, since it was our friends 21st the following day we thought: what better birthday present to get than skiing The Grand in January?
The stoke was high--as well as our caffeine levels; by 9:45 PM our bags were packed and we were on the road heading towards Grand Teton National Park. We arrived at the Taggart Lake trailhead at approximately 2 AM and hit the skin track shortly after.
We "iced" the birthday boy by putting a Smirnoff in his boot.
Realizing partway up the skin track this his climbing bar was broken, we created a "bar" using a Sam split and a ski strap. It didn't work out too well.
We hit the col at the top of Teepee Glacier just as the sun was rising. Needless to say we were glad to be here; the skin track up the steep and exposed headwall was icy and unrelenting.
Aki with a nice stereotypical Asian tourist pose at the top of TeePee.
Things started to get weird at this point. Lack of sleep and exhaustion caused me to do something which I had never done: take a selfie. The crew looking more alive than we actually were.
The sunrise and alpenglow were beautiful. We immediately felt much warmer and there was no wind-- amazing conditions for the middle of winter at 11,000 feet.
Instead of continuing up to the Ford-Stettner couloir and to the top of The Grand, we decided to stop at the top of the Dike Couloir. We feared that if we kept going we wouldn't be as alert and aware as we should be if we were to make the summit. With a few inches of perfect pow and a beautiful couloir below us, we weren't too bummed out about our decision.
Standing on top of the Dike Couloir with the sun rising in the background.
Perfect snow and great conditions made the skiing extremely fun despite my tired legs.
The Grand Tittie!
Overall, despite not skiing The Grand the trip turned out to be a great one. More so, I now realize how feasible skiing the Ford-Stettner couloir is; I will definitely be returning in the spring to have a second go. We arrived back in Bozeman around 4 PM and slept for about 3 hours--the first sleep we had gotten in 34 hours. Then, we rallied and threw a bitchin' party for the birthday boy. Lack of sleep sure did make that whiskey hit me hard! Thanks for reading my TR. Keep up the good work backcountry enthusiasts of Newschoolers. Peace!
