grand teton – ford/stettner

The Grand Teton is one of the pinnacles of ski mountaineering in the lower 48 states. It’s big, complex and iconic! It requires ropes and crampons and ice axes and all that shit that makes you feel like you’re doing something cool. It was on my hit list many years ago. I really wanted to ski it—like every other skimountaineerd, however, it just didn’t happen for me. Then it became a much more popular and often traveled route. The Ford/Stettner is a very dangerous place to be with other parties climbing and skiing above and below one another. So, I kind of crossed it off my list because the chance for cluster-fucks and the risks from other parties seemed hard to manage.

Sometimes I hate it when I’m right.

A few weeks ago Ben Peters and I decided to head up to the Tetons. We chatted with Adam Fabrikant, our good friend and local crusher. He had skied the Otter Body route on the Grand Teton the week before and the Briggs a few days after that. I said, crusher didn’t I?! Conditions sounded good up high. I convinced myself that the Otter Body was a better route since it sees far less traffic and we figured we wouldn’t encounter any other parties dropping in on it on a random Thursday this early in the season. However, upon speaking with Adam the day we were planning to head up, he mentioned there might be another party going for the Otter Body. We figured we would just head up early and try to beat the other party to the punch. We left SLC at around 7:30 and drove straight to the trailhead. All packed up and ready to go by 1 a.m. This seemed to be plenty early and there were no signs of other groups ahead of us.

Conditions had been stormy with wintery powder, but it was already balmy and warm as we got started. The sun was scheduled to pop out. This would be a transitional day when the snowpack heats up and sheds, we’d need to get off the slopes early. Our hope was to be skiing around 7 a.m.

The long dark 7,000 foot approach. We caught a view of some headlamps in the meadow and thought we could catch and pass them. Ski crampons were crucial as we climbed up to the Teepee Glacier and then switched to booting to gain the Glencoe Col.

Sunrise alone, was worth the walk. Ben Peters emerging from the dark all ski mountaineering AF!

(Photo Ben Peters)

We caught up to not only one, but two parties at the ice bulge in the Chevy Couloir. They were moving a little bit slowly and we ended up waiting here for 30-40 minutes. Another party of two came up behind us while we were chilling. Traffic jam. This is exactly the type of thing you can’t really control. Looking back, we could have and maybe should have bailed at this point. We had lost valuable time, but we weren’t too worried because it was still early in the day and we weren’t too far off our schedule—yet! However, we wouldn’t be dropping back down here with all these other folks, or so we thought.

Ben led the ice quickly and easily despite not having swung picks in over a year. I followed and we were quickly through the crux.

(Photo Ben Peters)

(Photo Ben Peters)

Pretty smooth sailing so far, but then things got interesting. We were each carrying one 60m rope and after stopping for a quick break, Ben was tossing his pack back on when his rope escaped. Despite the soft snow the rope slid down the Chevy Couloir and out of sight. The clip on the lid of his pack was broken and had opened up allowing the rope to release. Ouch!

The loss of one of the ropes made skiing the Otter Body a bad idea. We would have to create too many new rappel anchors to make it happen, this would take too long and may require more gear than we had with us. Skiing back down the Ford/Stettner was going to have to do. The snow was soft and good, so we weren’t too bummed with the forced new direction. With that one simple mistake we were right in the situation we had hoped to avoid. Ben was being really hard on himself and that’s good, but I told him he could do that for ten more steps and then we needed to move on.

There was still the matter of topping out. What a fucking incredible place! I mean really, look at that view. Not much that compares to that in these parts.

(Photo Ben Peters)

Turns out the lead group was going for the Otter Body, they were skiing down as we summited. That left us and two other groups on the tippy top and all planning on descending the Ford/Stettner. Summit buddies.

After some some summit chatting  Zeb Blais and Crystal Wright  kindly agreed to allow us to rappel with them which would save time by allowing fewer and longer raps. The other group in front of our newly formed team of four spent a good chunk of time on the summit, and we had to wait for them again losing time. It was still cold up high, however, so we didn’t think too much about how quickly the snow would warm up when we dropped in around 9 a.m. 

On a gear-note, the guys at Cilo Gear  hooked me up with a few new packs to use. I took the 45 Ski on it’s virgin outing for the Grand attempt and I’m really digging it! It’s light and durable with as many  strap configurations as you could want to add, or you can remove them all. It carries better than any of the Mountain Hardwear packs I used to have and it’s cool to support a great company that’s hand sewing these in Portland. Thanks guys! 

I don’t think the snow could have been any better for the ski!

Ben continues to impress with his skiing ability! What do you expect from a former Dartmouth alpine race team member? He was absolutely ripping.

I however, started skiing a few days a year when I was in jr. high. I didn’t get serious about it until after high school. No ripping for me, just surviving.

(Photo Ben Peters)

The Grand living up to it’s name.

I’ve talked to many friends who have skied the F/S route in spring with firm conditions. I can see how that would be very spicy! On this day it was just fun steep skiing.

(Photo Ben Peters)

The lead group was below us and we tried to limit the sluff pouring down onto them as we followed probably too closely behind. Then things got rediculously comically. Crystal had a rope stuffed under her pack lid, (similar to how Ben had been carrying his) and at almost the very same spot where Ben had dropped the rope, she dropped her rope! No joke. That’s two ropes dropped!

Luckily that still left two ropes.

We strongly communicated the necessary commitment to holding on tightly to the remaining life lines. Then we slid our way down through the Chevy on ropes and skis, but with a party of four it was still slow going. And, we were waiting for the party below. The snow was warming up really quickly and roller balls started coming down, so we tried to hurry it up.

Zeb dropped down and didn’t like the existing anchor that others had used to finish rappelling down the Stettner and so he started in on a v-thread. Suddenly and without much warning, a big nasty mushalanche came down right on top of him while he was out there exposed!! The snow was so big and thick and deep that he almost disappeared in it! The two screws he placed held him, but there were more wet avalanches on the way. We could hear some of them coming with plenty of time, but Zeb didn’t have anywhere to go. He worked on the anchor while the rest of us were tucked off to the skiers left and could only watch.

After the new anchor was in Ben and Crystal followed down and we regrouped.

We still had to get through the choke of the Sterner without getting blasted off the mountain by the next slurpee train that wanted to pass through. I rapped first and the ropes were just long enough to get through the choke, but there wasn’t a great place to hide. I slipped off rappel and hoped to ski further down to safety when a big wet one came through right behind me, slamming exactly into where I had just been standing! I tucked back as far as I could, but there was nowhere to go and my tips were sticking out into the heavy wet avalanche! I jammed one hand into a crack and held on tightly while expecting to get pulled off my feet and flung down the mountain. My skis held firm though and soon the slide slowed down and then stopped. I skied hurriedly further down and out skiers left into a nice big alcove. My hands were visibly shaking. It doesn’t feel good to fuck up in the mountains and get bitch slapped around. I haven’t felt that scared, or been that upset with myself in the mountains in a long, long time

The rest of the team all worked their way down quickly and no more avalanches fell on us. We had all worked well together and we got through with some really good scares and close calls, but without harm. All the time we had wasted waiting for other parties had really made a difference in the snow conditions. If we had been through the crux 30 minutes earlier it would have been a rather uneventful day.

Zeb escaping the gun barrel and exiting the Stettner.

Ben recovered the rope he had dropped. It was out on the apron of the Stettner where the slope angle decreased. Somehow the the wet slides hadn’t sent it flying off the enormous cliff below. Moving as fast as we could we traversed out onto the Teepee and skied down into the flats. Here we encountered the crew that had skied the Otter Body. They were sitting around with heads down in shell-shock. They had been on the final rappel when they were smacked by a big wet slide as well! What a day on the Grand! Everybody was shaken up and we tried to process it as we skied sloppy snow out to the trailhead.

We went over to Adam’s place in Kelly and had dinner on a picnic table in his backyard. This was a tough day to digest though. I’m hard on myself because the mountains are always harder and I feel like you only get so many get out of jail free cards. I’m very proud of my track record of safety in the mountains and I’d like to keep it that way.

Good food, great company and the views were Grand.

In the end, we fucked up by dropping the rope, not starting earlier, not turning around, etc. We put ourselves at risk. We had heard that there might be other parties heading up to ski the grand at the same time as us, but we didn’t KNOW. If we had KNOWN there were that many other groups ahead of us and one of those groups was going for the Otter Body then we probably would have chosen to go ski the Middle Teton, or something else. By the time we got to the Chevy though we were overly-committed to the route. We probably should have just turned around. Looking back, this seems like the best call since we knew the mountain would wake up soon and shed it’s winter coat. It’s hard to dissect it afterwards and say what we should, or shouldn’t have done, but it’s worth some serious afterthought.

This may sound stupid, but it seems like a voluntary sign-in sheet at the parking lot could be a nice thing, just so you know how many parties are ahead of you and what routes they are planning to climb/ski. This would aid in making an educated decision on whether to head up or not. Just an idea for the Spring ski season. Maybe I’m just over reacting after being spooked. Glad to be down safe and sound after an epic day on one of the most epic of lines.