When the snow starts falling in Jackson Hole, it is high time for the “crazies” to hit the thinly coated slopes of Teton Pass in search of knee injury adventure.
On one hand, it is hard to fault someone for having irrepressible motivation such that they will risk their season for dirty turns. But on the other hand, such risk lends itself easily to criticism by those who think that turns through brushy, rocky minefields are not worthwhile.
The Resolution: taking that motivation and applying it to something other than the low-hanging fruit.

There are plenty of lines to ski with minimal risk at this time of year; however, one has to go farther, using more energy, to find them. There are a handful of lines in the Tetons on which one can find mid-season conditions in early November. The road is closed at Bradley/Taggart and there isn’t enough snow to skin the normal winter approaches, but that just gives you an excuse to make it a multi-sport day: hop on the mountain bike and pedal your skis farther into the park.

Two ski partners and I did just that last Wednesday. After pedaling through an inch of snow and slush, which unfortunately feels like sand under the tires, we left the road, stashed the bikes and began post-holing a certain canyon’s summer trail.

Picture this: A maze of talus and boulders in which there was just enough snow to cover both flat boulders and gaping death holes that would swallow your entire body and break all four limbs. This led to a very slow and gingerly walk probing with poles, testing every foot hold and still sliding into some of the mini crevasses occasionally.

What in summer or winter would take about 15 minutes to negotiate, took us about an hour and a half. This section was, by far, the crux of the 12-hour car-to-car day.

After a climb made difficult by the worsening storm conditions, we reached the top of the couloir. While the run was not a long one, the turns exceeded all expectations, with thigh deep powder and dropped-knee face shots on November 5!

I don’t mention any formations or lines here because 1) I don’t want to direct someone to an area they aren’t familiar with and 2) I don’t want to direct the masses to one spot, which inevitably happens when they know it has been explored. I post this because I am happy to share with those who have an adventurous spirit and motivation to get away from the road. Those who are willing to be on the move for 12 hours simply for the workout, adventure, and 25 turns in bottomless powder, know that there are rewards to be found out there.
I don’t post pictures of the turns because, frankly, we were too cold and tired to take the camera out for shots in near white-out conditions.

The slog was arduous to say the least, but isn’t that what most of us in this valley crave (to varying degrees) anyway? The trail might not be broken for you and you might not be able to ski your way to the valley floor (in fact you might have to break trail on both the way up and down), but the satisfaction of hiking or biking back to the car and realizing that you had the entire range to yourselves is well worth the travail. Days like these feel like the anti-Teton Pass vibe: the valley is not overpopulated and these mountains are not skied out.

Peter Griffin lives in a rent-free gnome shack in Wilson.