July 2023: South Fork Cascade Canyon

Head of South Fork Cascade Canyon, July 2, 2023.

In 30+ years of living in the Tetons, I had only been in the South Fork of Cascade Canyon twice: Once when descending from Hurricane Pass in the summer of 1994, and once when traversing the head of the South Fork in order to gain the summit of the Wall in 2015. Although fairly unfamiliar with he area, I was pretty certain I would find plenty of options for an early July ski.

The approach to the head of Cascade Canyon South Fork is very long - about 11.5 miles to Hurricane Pass from the trailhead with about 4,000 elevation gain - but the trail is wide and smooth. Still, it took four and a half hours traveling over 10 miles before I got to the snowline. The trail is one of the busiest in the Park, and although I'm generally goodnatured about the strange looks and comments from hikers, after about the twentieth awkward exchange my patience wore a bit thin. I did enjoy hiking alongside a European couple for a while who were thrilled to see the skis: The woman wanted very badly to hike to snow and figured she was on the right trail when she saw me with my skis.

Shortly after the forks of Cascade Canyon the trail gets steeper until it plateaus out near treelike and I started to see potential options for my ski. But those potential routes lower in the canyon would have necessitated cumbersome bushwhacking above the trail to get to the snow. I figured that higher up the trail might take me right to continuous snow, and I was right.

My first "maybe" but it would have required a bridgeless creek crossing and a lot of scree-hopping.The Grand Teton is the summit in the background.

The couloir in the center-left was my second "maybe" and is certainly something I'd like to come back to.The center-right mountain in the background is the north side of the Wall; I skied the couloir seen coming down from the summit of the Wall with friends on March 1, 2015, accessed from Avalanche Canyon. The ridge I ended up ascending on this trip is visible at the upper right of the photo. The notch I refer to later in the narrative divides the Wall from the ridge I was on.

After a couple of miles of intermittent snow patches I reached a spot, at around 9,500 feet elevation, where the snow was (nearly) continuous. In a fit of wild optimism I had packed climbing skins, and for only the second July ski ever I actually used them. (By day's end the snow algae, visible in the picture below, had stained the skins red.) about 1,400 vertical feet of skinning and climbing brought me to the crest of a long ridge that marks the head of the Canyon, ascending to the east of Hurricane Pass.

Beginning of the skin, 10.5 miles in and 9,500 elevation.The ridge marking the head of the Canyon is on the skyline.

Looking south off the ridge toward Sunset Lake and Alaska Basin

Grand, Middle and South Tetons from the head of Cascade Canyon

The notch between the ridge and the Wall.

Alpine flowers on the ridge.

I mistakenly thought the ridge ascending to the East of Hurricane Pass continued uninterrupted to the top of the Wall, the mountain/ridge/cliff that makes up the head of Avalanche Canyon. In hopes of reaching the Wall's edge I walked eastward along the ridge for about a half a mile, but was thwarted by a sizable notch with what appeared to be fourth class scrambling on the far side to ascend the Wall. Since by this point I had already traveled nearly 12 miles and had a long way to travel back to the car I chose not to continue. Instead I turned around, but was able to ski a benign snowfield much of the way back to where my route dropped off the ridge.

Table Mountain from the head of Cascade Canyon South Fork: Leading contender for July, 2024..

Top of the run off the ridge.

Sneak route through the cliffs.

The 400 vertical feet through the cliffs off the top of the ridge provided the best skiing of the day by far; the suncups were small and the snow was soft. Unfortunately, it lasted maybe 18 turns. The remainder of the ski down was challenging as the sun cups were quite large for July. On the plus side, skiing down was a lot quicker than hiking down.

Suncups

Tall Boy (R) and Tall Girl (L) Couloirs in the evening light on the descent. The Tall Boy was the location for ski trips in July 2003 and July 2017.

Evening light on Teewinot, Mt. Owen and the Grand Teton at the mouth of Cascade Canyon.

A long and uneventful but pretty hike out brought me to the car at about 8:45 p.m., completing my 273rd consecutive month of skiing.