Uneva Peak Ski

Only in Colorado can you get snowed on twice yet come away with a sunburnt face.

Ian joined me for a quick tour of Uneva's slopes. It was Ian's first backcountry tour.

The endless slogging through the trees. I made a mistake and took us off the ski track too soon. We climbed up a ridge before having to drop back down to a basin floor. I like to think of it as our warm-up.







Our destination was the sparsely treed slope in the foreground. We reached about 3/4 up for our high point. I stopped us there because the effort required to go the final 100 feet was not worth the extra 10 seconds of a run. I really got to get me some ski crampons!





Some gladed steeper slopes -- which would be fun yo-yo runs even in sketchy avy conditions -- led us to more trees before the final steep slope.








After a quick bite, I dug a snow pit to determine if we were going to either slough snow or cause a soft slab. Other than some weakness around features and angle changes, it seemed the snowpack was settling nicely. Still on the open slopes we used caution and went down in stages.

Ian's timid first stage of his run