Home > Trip Reports > 1/27/2012, hwy 2, Surprise Shocker tour

1/27/2012, hwy 2, Surprise Shocker tour

1/27/12
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Posted by alecapone on 1/29/12 1:02am
Um....custom heelside reverse camber, or broken?


slice slice...is it skis or a snowboard? or a skiboard? Something soulful about somewhat crafting your own ride.



test day, suprise creek inaguration...calf deep pow on soft crust and avi debris.. not that I felt any crust or cookies on the way down... circa 3,500-4,500



Next days pre dawn start gets early morning sunshines on sparkplug...



Hey Sunshine!!



our destination, Sparkplug's NE 1/2 couloir down to Suprise lake that we dubbed "the shocker"... anybody else ever bother to go out therre and ride this thing? I've been desiring for a few years now..








shocked.....









from suprise lake we toured around to glacier lake, then up to pipers pass, and then finally back to the true summit of sparklug... even the two boarders of the group where able to ride non stop, past spark plug and lil plug lakes, all the way back to Suprise creek for a full decent of almost 2,700' in all POW!

Awesome day..so hard to compare, but for my own reasons this is my favorite day of the season so far. A million thanks to Ben and and my lucky charm Leyland for helping ot make it happen.

Sorry for the photo overload. Figured I'd make up for the lack of photos in my recent reports.








Nice TR Scott! What's the story with that board?

thanks Marcus..

The first board pictured is Kyle's prior that I have been riding broken all year so far. The 'puck' is the only thing that has been holding it together. recent pow days at the Flying Squirrel, aka just above MTR holler, took it's toll.

I bought two solid boards last Sunday from a shop in monroe for a 100$ a piece. By evening I cut them both in half.

I made one into more of an alpine touring board. I'm old and only go in one direction so I don't have much use for a big upturned tail. Also figured it would be more practical to have a flatish tail with holes at both ends for an emergency sled and anchoring.

Um was the efforts of the R&D guys from hyperlte wakeboards, but they are no longer manufacturing boards.

That's a good looking rig -- I like the use of the Dyna toes for touring.  You just carry the puck-plates in your pack?  Are you still using those old TLT 700s that you modified?

Yes, still using the 700's you gave me, thank you very much.  And correct, some old burton race plates mounted on voile sliders for the down. More then a pound in the pack, so they need to go on a serious diet.

Next up is to get a TTS on there.  ;)

I get questioned on it so much, I'll try to post a small tutorial of my two rigs, and the pros and cons.


Big thanks to Scott for breaking trail up the approach the day before. Scott's photos sum up the day pretty good, but here are a few more from a different perspective.

Surprise Shocker tour

Conditions were pretty damn perfect for a tour so I'm pretty jazzed we did a dark to dark day. So much so that I fell asleep that night with all my ski clothes on. Pretty fine couloir! About twice as wide as the slot and banked on both sides. Don't mind giving info since it's not an easy day.

hey ale how is the tour up suprise creek? i saw on a map once it was marked as a winter xc ski route?

author=christoph benells link=topic=23449.msg99452#msg99452 date=1327881322">
hey ale how is the tour up suprise creek? i saw on a map once it was marked as a winter xc ski route?


i'm not sure it would be a very popular nordic trip... unless you like taking your skis off to cross streams on logs and having lots of meandering snowshoers stomp all over your trail.

nonetheless it was a great way to spend one of the better weather days of the season.  lots of travel time, but 2 super fun descents in great conditions, plus lots of good views.  and with a few notable exceptions the skinning was all pretty mellow.  good call on the destination, scott!





full trip report is here.

Friday was a good day to be out ..eh? Glad you got you crazy skiboard down that one scott..I know you have been looking at that line in the past. Looks like a blast!

Reply to this TR

9435
1-27-2012-hwy-2-surprise-shocker-tour
alecapone
2012-01-29 09:02:49