Savage has been busy putting away meat for the winter, settlin in, and word is Thompson Pass is already pushing a 200” base!

Word also is that folks in Valdez have been scoring epic early season laps. I can imagine its hitting south-side down in Amerika too; wish I was there. Holed up in the sticks at the moment; lookin for the escape plan. So while I got a moment I am going to start this season’s TR’s off with some September splittin in the southern hemisphere, where I recently found myself on a solo bus ride in the middle of nowhere.

After hour upon sweaty hour, the bus finally pulled into the alpine, stopping at a beautiful blue, sparsely forested lake.

After soaking it all in for a few, one of those ‘meant to be skied’ lines suddenly popped out and it all became obvious.

The notorious Patagonian winds were blasting heavily, but it was as blue as could be with a fresh dusting of spring pow. I geared up and was quickly in route.

On the way I came across this wicked looking face, set off in the distance. I was definitely tempted, but it was far away and pretty serious looking for solo deep in the Andes.

I pushed onwards towards the original objective and with some serious skinning and booting work, some blind route finding on a ridge in what must have been 60 mph winds blowing snow to the point of 15 ft. visibility, I ended up summiting a peak called Cerro Piramide. As I got to the summit I got in front of the winds and was able to figure where out where I was and see some views.

I was unsure of exactly where the couloir entrance was, but I needed to get off the summit and out of the winds. I dropped into the backside of Piramide into a beautiful powder filled bowl, making some glory turns and keeping my eyes open for the couloir entrance on the left. Six hundred feet or so down I cut over and booted it up to the ridge to what I decided must have been the col. Perfect: hundred steps uphill and I ended up right on top of the line;

Yep, I’m in Patagonia and this will definitely work; stoked.

Snow was a little wet, springy pow on this North aspect (I almost wanted to say South), however, this was an absolutely beautiful line, amazing pitch, buttery turns, Andes volcanic rocks, and quite sustained too. Awesome, so amped I did not even stop for a photo. As I hit the lower elevations it turned to corn and I entered the Monkey Puzzle forest (Aurucania tree) and stopped to take a few photos (note wind gusts and blowing snow coming off the ridge line).

From here I mellowed out next to a flowing river in the forest , admiring the trees and my line, and ate some lunch.

The Aurcanias are a lot like Ponderosas, but more like a cross between a Ponderosa, a Palm tree, and Yucca; very cool lifeform.

At first the ride out was like being on another planet, but then I decided that this place reminded me off the Sierras a heck of lot.

For the remainder of the run I kept running into stellar waterfalls, and more stellar terrain.

Here it is; my Patagonia couloir on the north east flank of Cerro Piramide;

That night the winds died down, and the sunset on the lakeside was something straight out of paradise. It was no doubt one of those epic ski days, a one of a kind experience.

More from South America coming soon.