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New School!

How one backcountry skiing neophyte found religion in the San Juan Hut system.

story by Erinn Morgan ?��Photography by Darren Croke

THE HUT LOWDOWN

The San Juan Hut System's ski route consists of five backcountry huts connecting Telluride, Ridgway and Ouray in the Mount Sneffels Range of the San Juans. Each hut can be individually accessed but the terrain is varied from the North Pole hut with an 11-mile, 2,500-foot approach to the beginner-friendly Blue Lakes hut with a 5-mile, 1,200-foot climb in. The system can also be skied hut-to-hut for a multi-day trip. Additional terrain - ranging from intermediate to extreme - is accessible above each hut and requires avalanche knowledge.
It is one cheap vacation - $26 per night per person includes a key to the wooden hut (which is stocked with propane stove and lamps, cooking utensils, bunks, sleeping pads, wood-burning stove and firewood). Visitors can melt snow for water and there is an adjacent composting toilet that works quite nicely. Word to the wise: in addition to toilet paper, bring your own matches. Yet another item you don't want to be caught without.
Each hut sleeps eight people. Check out www.sanjuanhuts.com or call (970) 626-3033 for more information.

I have a confession to make. In this land of tele'a plenty, double-black addicts and backcountry hardcores, I am a relative powder novice. Sure, I've logged my days schussing alpine-style on the slopes. Yeah, I've taken a snowshoe outing or two. And, there was that one sub-zero winter camping trip on Vermont's Long Trail.

Still, while everyone else is chattering on about beacons and probes and slope grades, I begin to glaze over. This winter "backcountry" of which they speak seems to me shrouded in an obscurity that is understood only by a special club called The Freeheelers.

Who are they and where do they go? I've seen them pop out of powdery steeps right onto the highway to Silverton. I've heard tales of insane ascents and non-lift-accessed snow-eatin' grins. What is the draw in that mysterious magical white land beyond my reach?

Armed with a tenacious curiosity - and an article assignment - I am resolute in finding out what it's all about. How hard could it be?

IN THE BEGINNING

Step One to Backcountry Salvation: Book a hut trip. With the Durango-to-Moab mountain bike hut trip under my belt, I knew that the San Juan Huts could deliver. Owner Joe Ryan steered me toward a stay-over at his Ridgway Hut, accessible from its namesake town complete with a 2,000-foot ascent and requiring excellent route-finding skills. Out of sheer, unadulterated trepidation, I opted for the uncomplicated nature of the Blue Lakes Hut - a gentle 5 miles in from Ridgway with little to no route finding required.

Step Two: Get outfitted. Is it just me, or does it seem like you need a lot of stuff? Alpine-lovers' AT skis, bindings, boots, poles and skins. Check. Lightweight backpack. Check. Beacon, probe and shovel. Check. (I'll figure out what to do with those later.) Homemade salsa and margarita mix. Check.

Truly, the barrage of equipment options was overwhelming. Just the binding choices alone were a major learning experience. I was properly schooled on all fronts by the folks at Backcountry Experience in Durango; they led me by the hand and helped me make peace with my own inexperience. I was pretty happy to find that some backcountry gear is now women-specific.

I was also relieved to discover (after striking out at shops around town) that the neighboring Southwest Adventure Guides offers a snappy beacon/probe/shovel rental package for $30 a day, thus sparing novices far and wide from further financial bloodletting. That can be reserved for later when I am truly hooked.

Step Three: Gather the troops. Every greenhorn needs a little help from their friends. Being part of that esoteric, Masons-like group of Freeheelers, most of mine were privy to the secrets I wanted in on. Little did I know how much I'd truly need them.

ON THE ROAD TO DISCOVERY

The Big Question: Do I have everything? Not knowing what to expect, The Big White seemed like a supreme being that would certainly swallow me up in the snap of an avalanche. Thus, having all the right stuff seemed ever-so-important. [OK, I was guilty of packing that snakebite kit on the summer hut trip.]

Packing for an overnight winter backcountry trip is no easy feat. Take too much and you'll be lagging behind (not to mention whipped when you get there). Take too little and you'll be desperate for toilet paper. Which, by the way, is a San Juan Huts Top 10 recommended item to take - apparently, ne'er-do-wells have a tendency to scarf this hut staple (conveniently located in the adjacent composting toilets), leaving subsequent visitors with nothing but a bucket of snow to get the job done.

So, for better or worse, missing items or not, off we go. It is Friday night, the eve of our Blue Lakes departure, and Darren (my backcountry-experienced fianc� and our esteemed photographer) and I head straight to Ouray's Wiesbaden Hot Springs Spa & Lodge for a bed and a soak.

After a float in the outdoor pool and a stint in the steamy vapor cave, bliss is my middle name. With limbs of Jello, we sleep like the proverbial rock. The next morning we drive to Ridgway to fuel up at our all-time favorite breakfast spot, Sandy's. We find it closed, kind of.

The owner of this fine organic- and locally grown-focused cafe, overwhelmed with the daily grind of finances mixed with food prep, has shuttered her business and is looking for a buyer or partner to handle the accounting end of things. In the meantime, her passion won't allow her respite from the kitchen.

She is here this morning, cooking a special Saturday breakfast for locals. And us. She graciously allows us to join in at the community table for biscuits and gravy, real corned beef hash (quite unlike the summer hut-stocked Hormel variety), eggs and all the accoutrements.

Everyone is welcoming. There is the couple transplanted from Phoenix, the developer and his wife, and Janet, a warm, friendly soul who works for the San Juan Huts and happens to be sitting right next to us. She helped us book our trip and get set up over the phone.

"We were just up at one of the huts and had to ice climb, traverse and rappel to get around," she says, doing a great deal to launch a fleet of butterflies in my now-full stomach. I confirm this is not the hut we are headed to. "Oh no, the Blue Lakes Hut is a piece of cake," she says. "You'll love it."

THE REAL DEAL

With the breakfast of champions behind us, we head to the meeting point a few miles away to rendezvous with our crew of four others. Parking at the foretold "snow berm" up the road, we pile out, all of us. People, backpacks, skis, beacons, boots, clothes, cookies, sandwiches, maps, bottles of wine - it is everywhere for about 30 minutes until, somehow, it all finds a home on our bodies and in our packs.

The assistance of my fianc� and friends begins here. I have a million questions. How do I put this blasted beacon on? And, more importantly, how does it work? (While avalanche danger is extremely minimal today and on this route in general, I still comprehend the grand importance of this one, single, tiny item.)

Where does the shovel and probe go? How do I switch my bindings to touring mode? How do I get these crazy skins on? How many layers do I need for climbing? Is this backpack supposed to be so heavy? Whew. It is all pretty overwhelming.

Somehow, some way, I am off and climbing. And feeling pretty good about it. While I am holding up the rear, I am close behind the group up this fire road cut all the way to the lunch point, which makes itself clear as the first open view area where we see a passing herd of elk in the distance. Off goes the pack and I quickly learn the first trick - lay it backside (the side that will shortly go against your back) up out of the snow.

Back on trail, I am feeling like a quick study - I am getting the hang of this thing - until I veer off into some deep powder to check it out. Down I go, my first digger with the new rig. The funny thing is I can't get up. "It's the backpack throwing you off," reminds Seth, who rights me with a colossal upwards effort.

This "trail" passes into the San Juan National Forest and through an open valley where the route's only avalanche danger exists. There is hardly enough snow on the hills here to be of concern. We pass through into a wooded area that crosses over Dallas Creek where the trail turns to singletrack flanked by pristine, powdery beds of snow. I resist the urge to float off-trail for now but soak up the views of the Sneffels Range, which is dead ahead of us.

After about three hours of steady, manageable climbing (with room for lunch and pictures) we arrive at the hut. The sun is setting and snowflakes are starting to fly, so we pile in, claim a bunk, and fire up the wood-burning stove. The margaritas, fajitas, guacamole and signature apr�s-dinner Snowshoe cocktails ensue. There is much debate over the last log on the fire - this particular hut truly is the "sauna" that Joe Ryan promised.

The next-day's consensus about the wood is that less is more. We open the door to 6 inches of fresh snow and debate our plan of action over eggs and bacon.

IN THE CUT

There is a steep, old logging cut next to the hut, which we will skin up and ski back down, trying to make a loop of it with some off-trail skiing. We make it up a mile or so to where the trail ends - more spectacular views of Sneffels coming into sight - and continue upwards making our own track. Snow conditions are unusual; there is about 3 feet of powder with no base. Our poles - and Darren's snowshoes (he is trekking in towing a snowboard behind him) - posthole right down to the frozen ground.

It becomes quite apparent that to continue is futile, especially for the snowshoer. We rip back down a delicious powder field. I have to be excavated twice from deep powder crashes, even though my load is lighter this time.

But no matter, I am exalting in my own backcountry epiphany. I now get it - I actually climbed up here on my own skis and am tearing back down; all without the lifts, the crowds, the parking. It is quiet and pristine (except for the laughter and crashes). And there stands Sneffels, blanketed in snow.

The group is resolved to continue on the quest for a loop with some tree skiing. I descend with them, hoping I can manage it somehow.

Then I see Mark, the experienced backcountry telemarker, stuggling to dig out his straddle around an aspen tree, and I know I am licked. I head back to the trail with Darren and we trek back down to the hut, where we meet the group. Patty has a bloody nose from taking a pole (which met its match with another Aspen) to the face. Jody and Seth have glided over deadfall, taking hits to the skis. I am glad I took the chicken route.

So we descend, still working hard for forward motion, back to the trailhead. Skins on, skins off - who's to know what's around the corner? At least I'm getting adept at pasting them on.

On the final descent we pick up speed and race each other back to the cars. While we definitely earned more than our share of the turns we got on this trip, I have no doubt that I'll be back to the winter backcountry (after the requisite avalanche course). The next time - maybe bigger, maybe longer - I definitely have a date scheduled with The Big White.

Erinn Morgan is a Durango-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in many magazines, including National Geographic Adventure, Bike, Skiing, Muscle & Fitness and 5280.