You may hate gravity, but gravity doesn’t care.
-Clayton Christensen

There are no quick fixes or instant gratification in backcountry skiing.  A day usually includes a long, slow climb from the trailhead, up the slopes that you will eventually be coming down.  Attached to the bottoms of your skis are what amount to strips of carpeting with an adhesive backing, known in the trade as climbing skins.  These skins are directional, allowing the ski to slide forward with limited resistance, but gripping the snow when the ski tries to slide back down the track.  Primitive, but effective.  Packs are loaded with  extra gloves, jackets, food, water, compass, first aid kit, headlamp, safety gear (shovel, probe, snow saw) and whatever random trinkets and knickknacks that accumulate in each of our packs.  Definitely not a catered trip to the ski lifts.

Saturday was no different.  It was a crisp -2 degrees at the trailhead.  Stunning blue skies.  And no wind.  Perfect conditions.  For some reason unknown to me, it always seems to be -2 at this trailhead.  But we’ve been here enough times to know that as soon as we get a hundred feet above the valley bottom we will be out of the temperature inversion and sweating heavily.

We have not been blessed with much in the way of early season snow, resulting in a fairly thin snowpack. This made the climb up a little more challenging as we negotiated our way around downed timber on the lower slopes.  The only way up is one step at a time.  This is contemplative time.  Each of us finding our own rhythm, a chorus of breath and heartbeat.  From the top there is a perfect view of the Grand Teton and surrounding peaks some 85 miles to the south.

Next comes the moment of truth.  The first ski turns of the year can be so sweet, though there is always a little voice somewhere in the back of your head saying, “Can I still  do this?  Will I remember how to turn?”  You get a lot of time to think about this in the backcountry on the long climb up the hill.  But eventually the climbing skins have to come off and put into the pack.  We had already dug two snow pits on the way up to assess the snow conditions and avalanche stability.  Plus there was no place else to climb to.  We were out of excuses.  Not that we really needed any, for this is exactly why we were here.  It was now time to push off and let gravity take over.  The snow slides effortlessly beneath the skis, a stark contrast to the slow grind of the climb.  The powder makes a soft swish as it flows around our boot tops.  My knee drops into the first powder telemark turn of the year.  Then the second, third, and fourth.  Muscle memory takes over and gives way to bliss.

In the end we make two laps of the upper and lower slopes.  We leave behind only our tracks in this little pocket of southwest Montana….nameless evidence of our efforts.