Angel of Shavano Spring Ski

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Ross working the booter on the ‘steep’ pitch of the Angel of Shavano.

Angel of Shavano Spring Ski Trip Report

Backcountry ski days have been real hard to come by for me this spring. I got plenty of resort days in this winter, but for whatever reason, getting up and down mountains just hasn’t happened for me this spring.

I’ll mostly blame the Grand Canyon R2R2R training, which ate up a lot of weekends. I’ll also blame the general trials and exertions of a mid-30’s dude with two kids. Days out ain’t as easy to come by as they used to be.

Whatever the case, Ross had been in my ear for months about a trip in early May, thankfully. Coming up from Texas, he was keen to sneak in a peak that was fun, not too crazy, and fit within a semi-reasonable driving range from North Texas (any driving range is reasonable when escaping from Texas IMO, but that’s a conversation for another day). Anyway, we settled on the Angel of Shavano which seemed to fit the bill nicely.

After a late night arrival at the trailhead punctuated by me somehow setting off my car alarm at 2:30 AM and waking up a different disgruntled Texan in the Porsche parked next to me (sorry, partner), we were up and moving at 4:30.

After an opening ~1,300′ on trail runners, we finally broke tree line and got a view of the basin + the full Angel couloir. Looks plenty good from here.

We had some worries about a weak overnight freeze and a thick cloud layer, punctuating a few very warm days prior. But if I’ve learned anything with this hobby, it’s this: never trust NOAA. By the time we reached the lower basin it was obvious that the crystal clear night prior left the snow nice and frozen. Low lying clouds were keeping the sun (mostly) off the east-facing pitch as well. Perfect.

We kept the skins stowed away as we were able to move pretty fast over the frozen ground. We marveled at the traffic jam forming in the Angel ahead.

Looking ahead to the three skiers from Colorado and the three hikers from Minnesota that we met on our ascent. Care to guess who’s who?

Awww yea!

Right around ~11,900′ the base of the Angel Proper started and steepened to low/mid 30 degrees. But between the relatively mild angle, the folks ahead of us, and the slowly warming snow, it all set up for a pretty good, if not still slightly frozen, booter.

This went on for the next 1,500′ feet as we climbed higher and higher up the torso and then the north arm of the Angel. By the time we reached 13,400′, Ross was feeling pretty pooped. Almost everything is bigger in Texas, but not the altitude. The elevation can be pretty rough coming straight from sea level.

Thankfully it was an easy pass for him. He had already done the summit previously and the top skiing looked like junk anyway. So, while he settled in for a date with some gouda cheese and a warm down jacket, I blitzed up the final pitch of the east ridge to tag the summit and then head back down.

Mt Shavano’s East Ridge and Southeast face snow coverage on May 8, 2021. A skier is on descent. If you could just HEAR the scraping sounds he was pushin’ on the way down.

Made it. With summits fewer and further between these days, gotta enjoy each one of these all the more.

Views off towards the west. Carbonate > Aeta group within view.

After a quick congratulations to our Minnesota friends at the summit (how bout doing a frozen snow climb in trail runners without an axe for your first 14er??), I dropped off the summit at about 10:00. On another day, this would have probably been too late, but thankfully the lingering clouds made the timing just about perfect. Shark fins and hidden rocks abounded, but all in all I was pleasantly surprised with the coverage up high. Given how this season has gone + the generally thin nature of this face in the best of times, there wasn’t too much to complain about. I was able to scape my way back down to Ross in a flash.

From there we were able to cruise all the way back down the Angel. This is a wide, mild ski for sure, but that also made it really fun. Just fun turns on good snow on a beautiful May day in Colorado. Hard to ask for much better than that.

Now the fun starts. By the time we made it back to the core of the cooolie, the snow was corning up nicely.

Looking back up guts of the angel. She’s got a Texas-sized belly, no doubts there.

Lower basin turns are severely underrated, IMO. I always really enjoy the cruiser sections of these days just before the trees.

We were able to ski back down to about 10,700, which was a really welcomed surprise. The snow in the trees held on nicely as we poached the tracks of the other skiers from the morning. From there, it was just a matter of Christmas tree-ing the gear and hoofing it out the last mile or so to the cars.

The very definition of not giving a f*ck.

By the time we got back to the car. the day was beautiful. We cracked the beers and crushed the food for the better part of an hour and a half. I often rush out of days like these, but keeping with the theme of soaking it all in, we just chilled out and enjoyed it. Great conversation with great food and great beers is another thing that can’t be beat. It was nice to savor it.

Our bliss was eventually interrupted by an incoming storm. This was our line about 30 minutes after departing the trailhead.

All in all, a fantastic little ski day out in the hills. Good weather, a great line, and I really enjoyed the time spent with Ross and all our conversations. Can’t wait to get out there again with him. The whole outing was just a good chance to sit back and enjoy the moments out there that we do have. Sometimes it’s all about the little things, ya know?

Tallahassee knows what’s up.

Thanks for reading if you did. Happy skiing!

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