SUMMER SKIING: At the Bird
With temps hovering around 90 degrees down in SLC, Matt Sterbenz, Cody Barnhill, and I elected to head up Little Cottonwood for spring, err, early summer skiing on Saturday.

CASCADE MISSION: Pics from Hood, Adams and Helens
On our mission of Cascade volcanoes, Helens and Adams, Hood was the most picturesque. On the way up we ran into 'old man steep face' who gave us a heads up on the good spot to ski. "It's steep as shit over there" he says. It turned out to be about 500 feet of 60 degrees (the dark picture). We ran into a storm on St. Helens and had limited visibility (understatement). We had 60 mph winds up top and had to side slide about 800 feet before we could see well enough to make a turn. There was a time I thought I was sliding forward when I got a little vis and realized I was sliding backwards. It was kind of a freezing rain and when we got to where it warmed up, we were totally soaked.

HORSTMAN'S SICKLE COULOIR: As rad as it sounds
The Sickle Couloir is located on Horstman Peak in the Sawtooth National Wilderness Area. It's visible from Stanley and, for many, is a snow/ice climb in the summer months. The top of the cooler is at 10,000'. It's about 1000' run inside the cooler itself with a roll-over crux at the top of 55 degrees and about 12-15' wide. The second roll-over crux is about a third of the way down and also approaches mid 50s and again about 15' wide. -Marc Hanselman

IF ULLR WAS A GIRL: Revolutionary contest brings skiers, snowboarders together
Last April, the Whistler/Blackcomb marketing department had an idea—to create the ultimate contest among skiers and snowboarders, park riders and big-mountain competitors and call it If Ullr Was A Girl. The Scandinavian god of justice and dueling, who was quite savvy on snow, was their muse. One girl, either a skier or a snowboarder, would be crowned the Ullr Girl...Click here for the complete story!

GRAND DESCENT: Davenport and friends nail Middle, Grand Teton
Ted Mahon, Neal Beidleman and I met up with our friends Kip and Andrew from Squaw, who had skied the Ford/ Stettner route on the Grand on Tuesday, and skied into Garnet Canyon at 6:30 a.m. Friday morning for a recon tour. As we passed the meadows the weather closed in on the Grand, but we climbed the headwall to the Middle Teton Glacier anyway, just to get a little higher. At the foot of the glacier there was a foot of new snow, and the skinning was perfect, so the five of us climbed up the Middle Teton Glacier, arriving at Dike Col around noon.