We Got the Goods South of Mammoth
March 9th: a zillion North-Northeast slopes from 1 to 30 miles south of Mammoth Mountain and above 9,000 feet are (generally) in truly awesome condition right now. Aside from that, the corn harvest is on. Lovers of Mini Morrison, avoid Old Man's Bowl unless you want to help out with the honorable effort to develop a backcountry mogul field.
Day before yesterday I skied a giant canyon on a giant peak, descending from about 12,000' to 7,000' on mostly powder and some corn. To looker's left / skier's right were countless north-facing chutes, all full of dry powder, all untracked.
Yesterday I skied from the Pine Creek mine/mill up the Morgan Pass trail and to the south and west of there (i.e. south of Peppermint Peak) I saw heaven many times over. Undocumented big lines on unnamed peaks by the dozen.
About 2pm I was standing waist-deep in corn-on-powder admiring the ghost of a mine at 13,000 feet. A wooden railroad trestle led steeply downhill, like a ski jump, from a covered mineshaft to a single ore-dumper car still hanging on the ends of the rails, above a big wood & metal hopper to load the ore onto an aerial tramway, of which the cables are still hanging at the top end (then disappear under the snow) and a tramway car is still waiting beneath the hopper to be filled. 100 yards of snowy scree and a half hour later, we were standing at the top of a 6,000 foot chute leading directly to our vehicles. The skiing was shit but the scenery could not be beat.
