June Mountain backcountry 03/09/10

[knuckledragginsledneck]

What a great day. No clouds, five+ inches of new snow, not much wind and plenty of goodness to be had. Got an alpine start of 9:30am and were riding up J1 by 10pm. After a few lifts, one ducked rope and a split snowboard we were skinning around 10:30. Someone had already broken trail so we had a nice skin track to follow. Believe it or not someone had booted it up and a few were on snowshoes. Glad I have a splitboard but would rather be a better skier able to ski the steep and sort of deep.

Here's quite a few pictures.

The objective from just out of bounds



a skinning we will go



Just below a rock band before entering an easy bowl. It was cold as seen by my breath in the picture



close to the top looking back down the valley



not much further



on the summit ridge, looking at lines and getting ready to eat a few snacks



There's Mammoth



Some nice lines and Mono Lake



June Mtn looks small but has great bc access



Shevs about to drop in



The snow was firm at the top but softened as soon as you got in.











J chose another line down a nice steep chute that held some great snow.



















Shevs back in bowl. points for naming the movie quote.





My batteries died before we got to the bottom so I stopped taking pictures. We met a few Loopers at the bottom and watched Mike ski a sweet line. After splitting the board we traversed across the first lake, skied on the split down to the next lake, and crossed another lake before we began skinning up towards the Hemlock Ridge. We were a bit tired so we traversed left down to the bottom of the gulley below the top of the four seasons. From there we skinned up a few hundred feet and skied the treed shot above the Double Eagle Resort.

June from the plateau above the Double Eagle



Too bad I didn't get any pictures. It was pretty steep and deeper than expected. After a little poling we made it to the back of the Double Eagle.



Beer tasted delicious.