The Year in Pictures

Hard to believe another year is coming to a close. A lot happened in 2017. The following pictures barely scratch the surface. However, they do represent what stands out the most when I look back on the last 12 months. Enjoy! January The Japanese Alps. They were the craziest mountains I'd ever seen. It was cool being in such a surreal landscape. We were super lucky to score a bluebird pow day touring in Hakuba toward the end of our 20 day trip in the Far East. February Maybe the most asinine tour of the winter. Tanner and I decided to climb Mt. Olympus to ride one of the Memorial Couloirs. We hiked, scrambled over boulders, bushwhacked through heinously thick oak scrub, and were 20 minutes from the top of Tolcat's for about 2 hours. The views were all time and we celebrated with Frog Beers from Japan at the top. It was a fun day. March It was hot. It hadn't snowed in a week. And Zac swore that we would ride pow. I didn't believe him, especially when we were skinning up wet spring snow in our t-shirts. He was right, though! The Wasatch has her secrets. I'm glad Zac shared this one with us. It led to me getting this shot of his brother, Andrew, which is probably my favorite from the season. April April was actually an incredible month. Don't let this picture fool you! Literally the day after this was taken we started getting storm after storm, delivering some of the best pow days I've ever had. This day me and Tanner rode the Y still stands out the most. It was so miserable that it was actually a fun day. We had to wade the frigid creek twice, scramble over waterfalls, all while getting rained on. It would have been a good day to stay home and not do anything. But sometimes there's just nothing like a good ol' fashioned sufferfest! May The last true pow day of the season. The season that kept on giving gave one more time. We were not quite sure what to expect when we started skinning up Alta this day. It was snowing and felt like mid winter though. Tony and I were treated to a couple of awesome runs at the skier only mountain. One of my favorite days of last season for sure! June I spent most of June traveling around Australia and the Solomon Islands with my dad. It was our first big trip together. On Father's Day we got to dive on this awesome Hellcat Fighter from WWII. It was truly a special moment and something I will never forget. July 4th of July and Tourin' Tuesday...a winning combination. Main Chute held excellent summer corn and turns were possible all the way to the Collins mid-station. The hike was made much shorter thanks to Snowbird letting us on the tram with our boards. I can't think of a better way to spend America's birthday. August The coolest thing I've ever seen in my life. On August 21st, me and Zac drove up to Idaho Falls to witness the total solar eclipse. I would have driven much longer than the 3 hours it takes to get there from Salt Lake. It is something I feel everyone should experience at least once in their life. It got dark. It got cold. The stars came out. Then 2 minutes later it was over. Funny how the best things in life tend to be these very fleeting moments. The next one in North America is in 7 years...start planning! September Sometimes history repeats itself. On September 24, 2016, Alta woke up to about 17 inches of new snow. It kept our streak of consecutive months alive and we had a blast riding mellow pow in Greeley Bowl. Fast forward exactly one year later...Alta got about 17 inches of new snow. It kept our streak of consecutive months alive. And we had a blast riding mellow pow in Greeley Bowl. I guess it was just meant to be. October 24 consecutive months. In late October, Tony and I drove up to Wydaho to complete our 2nd straight year of snowboarding. We rode some hot pow then celebrated by spraying super cheap champagne. We also discovered that neither of us are any good at spraying said champagne. Still fun celebrating that milestone in the Targhee parking lot! The next morning we went for a really long tour in the Tetons but had to turn around before getting to our destination due to lack of time and a 4 hour drive back to Salt Lake. Shout out to Tony for always being willing to go on these adventures just to keep the streak alive! November No snow November...This winter will always be remembered as the season that Snowbird opened for 3 days before being forced to shut down due to lack of snow and record warm temperatures. We had a lot of killer sunsets in November. That doesn't really make up for the lack of snow, but it was still nice. Beaver Mountain had a good amount of snow on the ground around the middle of the month so we were able to tour up there. The weather was also great for hiking. Not the most exciting month for snow, though. December Death ridge December... Our misfortunes continued into December with the mother of all high pressure ridges parked over the Western United States. We had a good storm on the 3rd. Then nothing till the 20th. Before south facing terrain melted out again, Tanner, Mike, John, and I booted up Suicide Chute. We turned around 3 quarters of the way up due to questionable stability in the snowpack. Definitely something to keep in mind for when it does start to snow. There you have it. 2017 in pictures. Another chapter written, another one soon to begin. Excited to see what 2018 brings...hopefully some snow if we're lucky!