Mt-Cheops/Ursus Minor

Finally the sun was out and the mountains were beautiful. One of those days when you want to take pictures of everything, each mountain looking its best.  

I spent a bit of the morning with the family and left around 8:30. It was such a great day that I had to go up Cheops since it allows such a fine view of Rogers Pass. Not to mention that I haven’t been up there this year.  So I toured up to Balu pass and went up towards 8812 for a view and some photos. A great 1400 foot shot brought me back to my skin track and heading towards Cheops.

  I charged up the ridge and was sitting on the sub summit enjoying the views by 1:00. I called Tracey and told her that I was 25 minutes from the summit. I was a little wrong as it took 45, I tend to forget the endless ridge walk that  finally leads to the summit. Facetted snow and deep boot packing and I finally made it. What a great view of everything. I cannot express how many possible ski lines you can see from this vantage, easily enough for a life time of ski touring.

I  followed my boot pack back along the ridge and then skied a great line down to the valley, decent powder which changed to dust on crust as I got lower.

I checked my watch and I was 3500 feet shy of my goal so doing the math I realised that if I summitted Ursus Minor it would turn my watch over. So up I went, the up track is all solar but it somehow was decent skinning, again the views made it all worth while.  By 4:00 I was on the summit and getting ready for a new descent. I h Skiing east north east off the summit  I had some fantastic snow, which brought me into a south facing couloir that was okay. Then out the fan and skiing home.

7 hours 10 100 feet