Maybird in Spring

I'm sorry I have no pictures for this one. The camera never came out of the pack as the clouds prevented any good pictures.

The skin into the pine and maybird canyons is always a bear. All three of these are hanging canyons and it takes a little activation energy to get out of hyway hell and into shangri la. We have all done it and concede that it is worth it. I tend to like little conttonwood drainages better than big for views, besides mill B south of course, and the Broads fork cirque... Ah hell they are all pretty. I take that back. What I do like is the openness of the red pine, maybird, hogum drainages. I love looking up at the phiferhorn above. Today however the phife was in cloud cover. Ben and I got near the pass into hogum but neglected to go there as there wouldn't be much of a view. We stuck to the trees on the east side of the drainage. Up high the powder was not too heavy by spring standards and the underlying crust didn't cause any funnybuisness till we got lower down. Ben and I had a great decent through the trees on moderate angles and out of harm's way as far as avalanches are concerned. I actually felt relatively comfortable on skis for the first time in the backcountry! I thank Rob for the lesson at alta last Saturday. By the end of last Saturday he told me I did not look quite as bad as I did in the morning.

-w