Rocky Mountain Winter Camping

[dogbrain]

I thought I'd share some pictures from our annual ski camping trip to the Republic Creek Basin near Cooke City, Montana. My friend Dave and I have been doing this for 30 years, mostly in the general area around Yellowstone National Park. We ski hard each day but also enjoy being comfortable in camp at night, especially during the short days. It might look sparse to you, but we have everything we need. We take more of a mountaineering approach on our trips, and bring along high loft down bags and parkas and booties and have no fires with the exception of our white gas stove.



We leave behind some of the last cabins going out of Cooke City and enter the North Absaroka Wilderness as we cross into Wyoming.


Through some open meadows and we can finally see our destination, Republic Pass and Republic Peak, in the distance.




A late afternoon ski tour with views looking north towards the high summits of the Absaroka - Beartooth Wilderness. Granite Peak, off to the far right, is the high point of Montana at 12,808'. Our camp is down below near a clump of trees.

We had good weather on our first day. It started out at a little below zero in the morning but warmed up into the teens. A bit of a wind on the ridge, but not too bad down at camp.

Mark

 

[Pringles]

Well howdy neighbor! Have you done the Beaten Path? Was that ON the Beaten Path? That's a trail that's on my radar for next summer. I was on the Beartooth Highway this last weekend, by the Chief Joseph. It was chilly, but not snowy. It's soooooo beautiful up there. Thanks for sharing.

Pringles

 

[southcove]

Stunning scenery...awesome trip! First thing that comes to my mind when seeing the meadows and road area is the potential wisdom of pulling a pulk or toboggan and taking some of the load off your back until you get more into the forest or the steeps. Do you mostly ski to your ultimate destination or do a base camp, stash your gear and do some exploring from there?

 

[Mason]

My kind of trip (when the canoe is napping)! Tetons, 1991 (Teton Pass to Cascade Canyon), since we're in the GYE. My more recent trips have been in Alaska.

 

[dogbrain]

Well howdy neighbor! Have you done the Beaten Path? Was that ON the Beaten Path? That's a trail that's on my radar for next summer. I was on the Beartooth Highway this last weekend, by the Chief Joseph. It was chilly, but not snowy. It's soooooo beautiful up there. Thanks for sharing.

Pringles

Hi Pringles, I've been up that way many times. I did hike the "Beaten Path" through to the Cooke City side with my wife a couple of years ago. The Beartooths have become discovered, so be prepared to see lots of people on that route, and almost any route through the Beartooths nowadays. We were directly south of Cooke City, the beaten path is north. You must have come up from Cody. The road has been closed over to Cooke City for some time now.

 

[dogbrain]

Stunning scenery...awesome trip! First thing that comes to my mind when seeing the meadows and road area is the potential wisdom of pulling a pulk or toboggan and taking some of the load off your back until you get more into the forest or the steeps. Do you mostly ski to your ultimate destination or do a base camp, stash your gear and do some exploring from there?

There are a few meadows along the route, but mostly we're on narrow hiking trail. The trail does a bit of sidehilling and ultimately we end up camping up out of the bottom to a warmer spot on a slope. We've used sleds before on trips across the Yellowstone plateau where the terrain is more gentle. We generally ski in to a known place, usually half a days travel, set up camp and stay for at least 2 nights. Then off to explore as you'll see in the next post.

Mark

 

[dogbrain]

On the morning of the second day we made hot drinks, had a good breakfast and did a number of ski runs up behind our campsite. Republic Basin has some beautiful glades and some steeper terrain when the conditions warrant. We dug a pit and found the snow to be stable and dense all the way to the ground.



The snow was 6 feet deep with a good 10 inches of light powder on top.


After a good lunch back at camp, we turned our attention to the big bowl below Republic Pass.


The conditions were pretty good, so we made our way up towards the pass.


The snow was a bit wind blown and crusty near the top of the pass, but we were headed for the sun after being down on the cold side of the mountain.


We reached the pass, which is the border of Yellowstone National Park. Luckily the wind died down and we took a long break in the sun. Hey Mason, can you ID those peaks in the distance?


Looking back to the north towards the main ridge of the Beartooth Mountains before we descended into the bowl below Republic Pass.


We climbed back up to the ridge and made another couple runs before sunset.


We finally returned to camp and changed into our evening attire: Down parkas, insulated pants, down booties, hot toddies all around.

The two of us were pretty tired after the last run, a big day for us this early in the season. Since it gets dark so early we make a point of being out on our skis until the last hint of light on the peaks. Once it gets dark, we make a multi course dinner that takes a while to cook and consume, interspersed with various hot drinks, then we do everything we can to stay up as late as possible. The target is 8pm before we retire to our bags. Any longer and it's too much time in the bag. Another way to kill time in the evening is to stomp out a hiking trail in the snow, usually to a place with a view we don't have from camp. We're good at motivating each other to "go for another hike".

 

[dogbrain]

Day 3


Nice sunrise on the peaks to the north. The wind had picked up overnight but by morning it was dead calm. Lots of bird noises even though the temperature was a little below zero F.



We made a few more trips up to the ridge to track out the few remaining untouched glades before returning to camp to pack up. A couple skiers showed up while we were packing up our gear, obviously disappointed at our work.


Looking back to Republic Pass in the distance. Since we got no new snow, it was a relatively quick ski out. The valley bottom is flat enough that skins are required on the way out for a mile or so before getting to the final downhill run that takes you all the way to Cooke City. Another beautiful day of skiing in the Rocky mountains, and probably the best weather we've had for an early season trip.

Mark

 

[Pringles]

Beautiful. I'm surprised to hear the snow's that deep. Do you worry about avalanches? Did you see mountain goats?

I did get to the Beartooth from Cody. I live near Cody.

 

[dogbrain]

Beautiful. I'm surprised to hear the snow's that deep. Do you worry about avalanches? Did you see mountain goats?

I did get to the Beartooth from Cody. I live near Cody.

The snow is only 12-16 inches in Cooke City, but gets a lot deeper very quickly as you go up in elevation. Lots of early snowfall built things up in the high country. We do worry about avalanches, so we stay tuned to the avalanche report, dig pits and do stability tests, minimize exposure with smart route finding and ski conservatively. I've been skiing with my friend here for over 30 years, so there's lots of conversation about routes and exposure when we're out. We have nothing to prove to each other. There are lots of goats in the peaks to the north, but I've never seen a goat where we were travelling. I have seen some tracks up in the nearby crags though.

 

[lowangle al]

That looks like my kind of skiing, but I don't think I'll ever go winter camping again without a hot tent. BC skiing in the Yellowstone area is on my bucket list.

 

[dogbrain]

Hey Al, my brothers and I started backcountry skiing in your neck of the woods. We moved to Anchorage in the mid-70's and lived at the back of the subdivision east of the big Tudor/Muldoon curve. At the end of our block was that foothill country on the military base.

 

[lowangle al]

^^^ I'm familiar that area and do most of my skiing just a little south of there.

 

[dogbrain]

^^^ I'm familiar that area and do most of my skiing just a little south of there.

Campbell Creek area? We used to fish for trout, hunt and harass the salmon over there. I think your idea with a hot tent would be perfect for a ski tour in Yellowstone Park itself. We've thrown around the idea of such a trip ourselves for a number of years. I've considered doing a loop around the park in the winter on the snow roads with one of those setups. In the winter the backcountry office used to give you a permit to dispersed camp as long as you're a certain distance from the snow roads. I'm not sure if that's still the case. Winter wood would be an issue in Yellowstone since technically you're only supposed to collect dead and down wood.

Mark