ne couloir of the pfief round #3

Last spring I became a bit obsessed with the NE Couloir of the Pfief. I posted two reports of failed attempts by Courtney Phillips and I. Well we weren’t going to give up that easy.

Upper Red Pine Lake early in the am.

If at first you don’t succeed, fail and fail again. Not really a great caption for a motivational poster, but more of a reality in life and definitely for ski mountaineering.

Courtney Phillips and Andrew McLean

Confidence was high due to the fact that we brought the ringer along with us. Andrew made the first descent many years ago and spoke of it as pretty tame and uneventful.

Andrew on the saddle below the Pfief.

Conditions were firm, but we had full sun and the expectation that it would soften up into corn soon. We hung out on the summit for a bit waiting for it to thaw.

Geared up with helmet cam, McLean dropped in first.

It looked firm still and sounded really firm, and though he didn’t even leave any tracks he descended the upper chute and disappeared from our view. We waited for him to yell back that he was clear and we could descend, but that call never came.

Booting back up and out.

Instead we heard, “I’m booting back out”. Turns out it was still too firm and the snow formed a really steep narrow spine below the choke and above the 80ft rappel station. Not a very good place to be fk’n around.

Know when to say uncle.

As Andrew booted back up he said it was too ugly, but he would give us the rap gear if we wanted to give it a go. We looked at each other and laughed a little. Then one of us commented that it would be like running into a war zone after Rambo has just came running away from the scene . No thanks.

We skied down and out Maybird to Red Pine to the trail on good snow.

The obsession continues, but now I get to think about it all summer long!