Getting a Snow Fix in July

Last Wednesday, while I was stuffing boxes getting ready to move into my new place my good pal Phil was turning 25 and feeling adventurous. To celebrate, Phil planned on taking on the tallest peak in the Wasatch, Mount Timpanogos. Here is Phil’s story... 

This past Wednesday I turned 25 and wanted to do something special that involved a big adventure and the one thing I love more than anything: snowboarding. The one place that would have the longest field of snow would be a glacier like snowfield below one of the saddles of Mt. Timpanogos. I inquired pro skier Brody Leven about his thoughts on the snow up there since he is hiking the Wasatch daily. Sure enough he sent me this reconnaissance picture, which yields a pretty good size snow patch below the summit of Timpanogos. Saturday a couple friends and I decided to make the trip and spend the night at Emerald Lake. 

The hike up yielded beautiful views and plenty of waterfalls. It took us about 4 hours to reach Emerald Lake with packs and ski gear.

We set up camp right below the snowfield and immediately threw the skins on to get some evening laps.

We skinned as far as possible, then took our skis off and hiked the last steep section. I hiked all the way to the saddle to get a great view of Utah Lake.

Here is a panorama (although squished in this view) from the top of Timpanogos showing our line. I did 2 laps totaling around 1600 vertical. Not bad for July!