Last Friday, Greg, Alex, Yeuhi, and I skied the Duchess--a run I've been dying to ski top to bottom for years now.
Skinning up the Sherbie, a good view of Dodge's Drop. We made good time up from Pinkham, not much more than an hour.
We booted up Hillman's under perfect, clear blue skies. So lucky. Then walked down the talus to the groove in the buttress marking the top of Dutchess. Here's Alex skiing the upper section.
The feeling is great up there--way above Hermit Lake, in a slight gully on a buttress sticking out from Hillman's on the one side and the Bowl on the other.
HoJo's and the Sherbie down below.
Greg in the uppermost funnel. Falls frowned upon.
Boott Spur in the background.
The old "stick your ski tails in the snowpack to make a platform" trick is a good way to get secure without stepping out of your skis.
Me in the lower upper section.
Alex pointing 'em to negotiate a choke.
Greg:
Yeuhi carves a trench below the choke.
Smiling day.
On left, the Duchess after we skied it. On right, someone else's photo from a different angle, in winter. I think it's very beautiful.
For the next run, we decided to go up Dodge's and see if it had softened up. Several people had skied it earlier and it sounded chattery.
Good thing we checked it out, because there was some major ice at a choke point. I was the only one who apparently missed the memo about bring crampons and whippets, so I had to do all sorts of wallowing through krummholtz to get past this.
However, above the ice, conditions did not improve. It was coming into shadow and becoming very sketchy to climb without crampons. This was a couple hundred feet above the ice. I said goodbye to the guys and very carefully downclimbed, wallowed back down through the brush, and skied down to Hillman's. The rest of the guys topped out and descended Hillman's, where we met up.
We went back up for one last run on Hillman's.
The Sherburne was in good shape, and, making use of some of the side paths through the woods, we were able to ski about 3/4 of the way to Pinkham before shouldering the skis and hiking down the TR trail.
Once in the parking lot, we were greeted by a very friendly group of car-neighbors--a few middle aged dads, a mom, and a couple teenagers--and they shared their beers with us in exchange for a good bull session and some beta about the west side.
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