Monday, April 05, 2004
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Just got back from a long weekend trip into Bear Basin in the Spanish Peaks. That place has some of the best terrain I've seen in recent years but is a trek to get into. I went in with two friends on tele skis, and I bit the bullet and huffed in on snowshoes.
We headed in Friday at 7:00 PM after work to get a little bit of a jump on the hike in. After about 3 hours in we decided to set up camp. we got up in the morning to Bluebirds skies and headed back into Bear basin. We arrived at a prime base camp location at about 10:30 in the morning. It ended up being about 75 degrees and sunny so we set up camp and sat in the sun for a while until everyone was good and fried. Almost the entire basin was wet sliding a little but there were a couple of good ridges that were well sheltered from the sun so we went for it. After a steep climb up we arrived at the ridge with amazing views in all directions. We all dropped in and rode a bowl with good but somewhat "variable" conditions. Rode back to camp and climbed into the tent as the sun disappeared behind the mountains. All in all it was a super good day. Sunday came and the clouds were rolling in. We climbed above camp and made a short run. Packed up and headed out. Bear Basin is pretty much a nightmare to get out of on a snowboard. It holds enough fall line to make you not want to put your snowshoes on but there are enough flats and uphills to make getting out a pain in the ass especially with a huge pack on your back. We made the decision to climb out of Bear Basin over into Beehive Basin. That ended up being a difficult route out due to the fact that it was another 1400 foot climb with added weight and the super slushy snow conditions. Every other step on the snowshoes resulted in sliding back five feet or sinking up to your chest. We arrived at the Beehive trailhead thoroughly worked and reluctantly started walking out to the highway. Brett seriously considered taking the keys off the back tire of a Subaru parked at the trailhead to run the shuttle, but we convinced him it wasn't such a good idea. A nice Minnesotan out for a joyride and a couple of beers just happened to roll by and offer us a ride all the way back the car down about a half hour drive down the Big Sky Road. That was my weekend.
