“Peak P” Ski: The Piney Plunge

Making turns down the Piney Plunge off “Peak P”, March 17th.

At the tail end of winter Brandon, Dylan and I made the long skin up Booth Creek and climbed/skied “Peak P” down its long west-facing chute, known by some as the “Piney Plunge”. It was the sort of long, committing day out there that we dream of all winter, and given the current state of things in the world and local community, it might be one of the only such big days we get to experience all spring. I guess we’ll see…

“Peak P” (12,965 ft) resides on the rugged ridge line between “West Partner” and “Peak H”, and is best accessed via the upper-Piney Valley north of East Booth Pass. It’s distinguishing feature, aside from awesome summit views of Peaks Q and H, The Spider, and others, is a long, curving 1,800 ft couloir that drops from the summit straight down to upper-Piney Lake. It’s a bit of an obscure route that likely only sees a handful of descents every season, but one that is worth every ounce of effort to climb and ski.

Pow turns off the north side of Booth Pass, never a bad way to get the day rolling.

After the fairly familiar approach up Booth Creek and the appetizer run off the pass down into upper-Piney, we scooted around the corner and climbed the long chute to the summit of P. We encountered just about every snow condition imaginable on the way up, but it was clear we were in for some decent turns as long as we were willing to play with the aspect a little bit on descent.

A fun climb in an amazing setting.

Views south towards “West Partner” and beyond.

After awhile on the summit it was time to click in and get on with the skiing. We mostly stayed skier’s left in the more protected, northerly side of the chute. There we found plenty of soft powder turns, with a little corn skiing on the skier’s right side lower down. These west aspects can be a little finicky this time of year.

Dylan in the meat of the line. And what a nice line it is.

Brandon.

We ripped a few GS turns out the bottom and exchanged pole slaps (high fives would’ve broken social distancing protocol). Then it was just a matter of climbing back up the the pass before we skied all the way out Booth down to the trailhead. Always nice to be early enough that skiing to the car is still in the cards.

Looking towards an empty Vail Ski Resort from the pass. Strange times we’re living in at the moment.

Thanks for reading and be safe out there…