Birthday Chute, Pitkin Creek, Eagles Nest Wilderness, Vail, Colorado
This day may end up being one of my favorite days of the year. I got to ski Birthday Chute in the Pitkin drainage in Vail on my actual birthday in powder conditions. What a treat! With the persistent slab avalanche problem that we see in Colorado for most of the season no longer being a problem on west facing aspects, I decided Birthday Chute was the line I had to ski on my birthday. The cherry on top was that the forecast had called for a few inches of snow the night before and we ended up getting 4-5”, making for a really great ski.
We got started early that morning from the Pitkin Trailhead in Vail. The first mile involved some very slippery ski boot hiking on snow and mud that had melted the day before and frozen into ice overnight. It was perhaps the most dangerous part of the day. Once we hit consistent snow, we put our skis on, which was a very welcome change. We headed up the summer trail and after a little over 1.5 miles from the trailhead, we crossed the creek and began making our way towards Birthday Chute.
We found ourselves ascending in the trees to looker’s right of the line. We were able to keep our skis and skins on the whole time and soon found ourselves near the top of the line. We stopped a little short of the top as the snow consistency changed dramatically as we approached treeline and decided that the last bit was too wind affected for our liking and wouldn’t offer good skiing anyway. So we decided to transition at that point.
On the way down, we found much better than expected snow. We were wondering if there would already be a sun crust on the line, but it didn’t seem to be the case. No crust plus fresh snow led to a really fun ski. I’m probably going to have a hard time beating those conditions on this line on my birthday in the future. But that’s a good problem to have. Once we got to the bottom and regrouped, we headed back out along the summer trail the same way we approached the line. I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday!
Total Stats: 6.3 miles, 3100 ft of elevation gain (to where we turned around)
