Whitetail Couloir, Beartooth Range, MT

The phrase “iconic line” gets thrown around perhaps a little too much in the climbing and ski mountaineering worlds, but it still never fails to elicit an immediate response from me. Images of the Ford/Stettner on the Grand, the Skillet Glacier on Mount Moran, and many others flood my mind, including the site of our most recent adventure, the Whitetail Couloir on Whitetail Peak, close to home in the Beartooths.

My original plan was to do it car-to-car on Monday, using my four-day-weekend schedule to take advantage of a good weather window. However, an almost coincidental mentioning of the trip to my friend Simon (who I assumed would be working on Monday) got him pretty fired up. He managed to get Monday off work and come along, as well as convince me to do the trip as an overnight. As always, the blessing and the curse of the overnight is the giant pack, burdening us on the way in but allowing for a more leisurely pace on the 10 mile approach and sparing us from a 4 AM start time the next day. And more time spent in the mountains is never a bad thing.

Preppin’ at the West Fork trailhead

Simon and I left the West Fork trailhead at about 1 PM on Saturday. We quickly made it to snowline above Quinnebaugh Meadows, where we battled isothermic snow and rock walking on the skis to a more consolidated snowpack about 2 miles below the base of Whitetail. As an aside- special props to my friend Ben ( who’d been in the drainage the day before us. He’d forgotten his skins and postholed through isothermic shit an incredibly demoralizing distance towards Whitetail. We kept seeing the tracks and thinking it must’ve been some crazed fisherman, looking to “get away from it all” or something. Anyway…

Snowline near Quinnebaugh Meadows, near first views of the line

Further yet…

Skinning into the upper reaches of the West Fork of Rock Creek blew my mind as the ski terrain kept revealing itself. I’d never been in here before and was amazed to find that once you get into the basin below Whitetail, the peaks open up and become less plateau-like and more reminiscent of terrain around Goose Lake. As with most areas around here, I arrive with one line on my mind and leave with 5 more added to the list. We found a nice little melted out hummocky area to throw down on, made some dinner, drank a bit of tequila, and crashed out under a beautiful starry sky.

Camp

Temps felt good on Monday morning. Things had definitely frozen at our camp elevation of 9500′ and the day dawned clear, so Simon and I were fired up about our prospects in the couloir. A strong wind blew at all elevations. I noticed white plumes dancing along the high ridgelines, indicating cold temperatures but also windloading of the new snow from Friday and Saturday.

After a quick oat breakfast, we began rallying up to the base of the couloir. The firm surface saw us transition from skinning to crampons almost immediately, and we made good time up the first 1500′ of the couloir.

Terrain near Castle Mountain, lots of great lines visible

Simon climbing

At a certain point, we began to punch through an obvious windslab. This was disappointing to say the least, and we pulled off to a sheltered alcove to assess things. Our results indicated an active windslab varying from 6-12″ deep poorly bonded and actively propagating on the melt/freeze crust below it. Not overly important if you’re in a 600′ line in Hyalite, but certainly more consequential 2000′ up a giant, exposed Beartooth gully.

The problem

A small sluff from above ran past us as we were contemplating our options, indicating rapidly warming temps and seeming to affirm the decision to bail. With the crux (the essence of the line in my opinion) and about 500′ of beautiful couloir still above us, the decision was not an easy one, but our observations made the reasoning clear. Besides, as my friend Ryan Minton likes to say, ski mountaineering is a lifelong pursuit. As long as you come home safely, there’ll always be another shot. We chopped out platforms to strap in and rallied 2000′ of windbuff and corn back to camp.

Always psyched

Excellent riding conditions

Heading out truly tested the limits of our “Teton Style” approach (wearing boots car-to-car). Probably not a decision I’ll make again.

Can’t wait to revisit this beautiful valley.