Targhee Skiers, I Have a Question

WoFIowz

WoFIowz

Active member
Tldr: how do you navigate the double black terrain off sacajawea?

So I tried to venture through the gates off left side of sacajawea lift (skier's right). Is it difficult to find a good drop in at the cliff line? All I noticed were arrows along the ridge pointing left. Is it easy to find yourself above a larger than expected cliff until committing to the line? In general the cliffs look really nice with good run outs but at the top, I found it more difficult to assess the size or even where I was at along it.

I wasn't really looking to drop any cliffs taller than 6-8' considering they only had about 4-6" of snow (in retrospect it was much deeper below the cliff line tho). I struggled to find a good line and kept traversing til I found what appeared to be a decent chute but ended up much rockier than expected.

Here's the route I took:

1033377.jpeg

It's kinda difficult to learn about these routes because the videos kinda suck, pictures are limited, and the only good videos are of pros hucking much bigger cliffs on that ridgeline. Half the tracks are of people just traversing to the groomer. Also difficult to view from the dreamcatcher lift and even riding down underneath them, still is hard to figure out where exactly to drop in. I'm usually pretty good with navigation but this area challenged me to find a good way down without completely traversing like a little bitch or dying.
 
If you don’t know that terrain super well huck and pray is the name of the game at foghee but the landings are pretty good on all those hits so just give er the meat and try to stomp it
 
So if you're just skiing Das off of the top of Sac, not hiking up to Toilet Bowl/Wildcat/whatever then yeah, you got the general idea. That cliff band is pretty sustained with several weak points that you can duck through with a little billy goating if you're not looking for a mandatory air. And honestly, most of the "mere mortal" sized hits in there are kind of weird and awkward for the first few laps. The Freeride kids get clean hits in there by basically taking off 10 feet above where I would, and landing 10 feet further down. They gap from above the main traverse because they are animals, with rubber bones. Otherwise, you're figuring out the traverse to whatever your favorite line in there is. I have a go-to hit that I know goes for me in any conditions, but it takes a few laps to figure that out. And a lot of the hits are sort of blind from the top until you're fully committed, so it's useful to scope them before you get down onto the takeoff.

That's all assuming it's reasonably tracked/traversed. If you get lucky and get it when it's deep and fresh, basically anything goes, even for average skiers like myself. I personally prefer upper Das (far skier's right, next to the rope line) on days like that, the hits are a little bigger, with cleaner landings IMO.

But yeah, for me, Das usually looks like this: Ski into the second gate (the first one that you don't have to sidestep up to), carry speed off that mini cornice, slide through three or four steep and deep turns, hit the traverse, traverse about 50 yards, and duck into a little chute to a mando that's maybe five or six feet tall.

The instructor/patrol chutes area has a little cleaner/more straightforward hits IME, but since they're south facing the snow is less consistent, and there's sometimes more sharks in the landings.
 
14402953:cydwhit said:
So if you're just skiing Das off of the top of Sac, not hiking up to Toilet Bowl/Wildcat/whatever then yeah, you got the general idea. That cliff band is pretty sustained with several weak points that you can duck through with a little billy goating if you're not looking for a mandatory air. And honestly, most of the "mere mortal" sized hits in there are kind of weird and awkward for the first few laps. The Freeride kids get clean hits in there by basically taking off 10 feet above where I would, and landing 10 feet further down. They gap from above the main traverse because they are animals, with rubber bones. Otherwise, you're figuring out the traverse to whatever your favorite line in there is. I have a go-to hit that I know goes for me in any conditions, but it takes a few laps to figure that out. And a lot of the hits are sort of blind from the top until you're fully committed, so it's useful to scope them before you get down onto the takeoff.

That's all assuming it's reasonably tracked/traversed. If you get lucky and get it when it's deep and fresh, basically anything goes, even for average skiers like myself. I personally prefer upper Das (far skier's right, next to the rope line) on days like that, the hits are a little bigger, with cleaner landings IMO.

But yeah, for me, Das usually looks like this: Ski into the second gate (the first one that you don't have to sidestep up to), carry speed off that mini cornice, slide through three or four steep and deep turns, hit the traverse, traverse about 50 yards, and duck into a little chute to a mando that's maybe five or six feet tall.

The instructor/patrol chutes area has a little cleaner/more straightforward hits IME, but since they're south facing the snow is less consistent, and there's sometimes more sharks in the landings.
Click to expand...

OK that makes sense. Is the hike to section more obvious when going down?
 
14402977:HypeBeast said:
OK that makes sense. Is the hike to section more obvious when going down?
Click to expand...

The hikeable stuff is all skier’s right, up Peaked mountain from the top of Sac, or from the Mary’s saddle on the other end. It’s not always open, so it’s a good call to check in with patrol to get the deets.
 
1033465.jpeg

1033466.jpeg

This is where me and my friends go, we enter the 2nd gate and go to the left a little. We go off the rock on the left of the picture cause it's easier but the one to the right looks like 8 or 9ft. Also, I have only been to the Das Boat area, I know nothing about the upper areas.
 
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