The ridge was beautiful with significant cornices and wind-loaded northern aspects and it provided great views of the surrounding peaks as well as across the valley to far off ranges jutting out of the desert. Isolated storms drifted across the flat land below us dragging their skirts of precipitation along the earth. After traversing the ridge and negotiating a narrow boot-pack section near the cornice we came to the "secret run". To Mike's dismay it consisted of a very steep and short drop to a flat bench. He concluded that google earth had misinformed him by showing an average of the two slopes steepness combined. The good news was that there were plenty of great options from anywhere along the ridge including open bowls and slopes with evenly spaced fir and pine trees.
We skied the north side down into Holbrook Canyon and while we had planned to return via our approach we opted to try to ski out Holbrook and catch a ride back to my car. The bottom of Holbrook had a trail and was fairly navigable on skis for the most part, although at one point I thought Mike was going to dive into the creek head first during one crossing.
All in all we probably covered 7 or 8 miles and 3,000+ feet of vertical. The weather and views were spectacular going from sunny and warm one minute to windy, cloudy and cold the next. Mike saw a snowshoe hare and we followed fresh moose tracks on our way out Hollbrook.
