after a stop at shaw's for some ground beef, i met up with TC in the pinkham notch parking lot, elevation 2011 ft, at around 9:30am (about 45 min late, sorry, bro). we paid a brief visit to the AMC Visitor Center where we registered for lean-tos,fastened skis A-frame style on our packs and set out for the now-dirt-covered Tuckerman Ravine trail. despite 60lb loads and too little sleep, we arrived at the hermit lake shelters in just over an hours time. so far so good.
happy with our progress, we made quick work of unloading our sleeping bags, extra layers, food (primarily bacon and granola), stove, etc at the first available lean-to. after snacking on green apples and some super heady walnut trail mix, we each swapped out hiking boots for ski boots and continued up the ravine trail.the trail was combination mixed rock/snow and temps hovered in the 50s as the bowl, hillman's highway and dodges drop came into view. we were getting reports from other skiers that the snow was nice and soft and stoke was high.
40-50 other skiers were visible from the floor of the ravine, and the vast majority of activity (uphill and downhill) was in left gully and chute, the steepest of the still-skiable terrain. near a small outcropping of rocks on lookers left of the bowl, TC and i made preparations for the climb ahead, each shortening a ski pole and removing ice axes from our packs. 
as we started up the bootpack for chute, it didn't take long for TC to pull way ahead of me (he's as much of a madman on the ascent as the descent) and i observed a few kids with "BATES" jackets above me, carrying skis over their shoulders. I felt reassured to know i had my skis on my pack and an ice axe in my hand, but made a point to keep an eye on their progress above me.
TC had already passed the first of the BATES group while I was 100ft below. continuing up, i witnessed a good amount of loose, wet snow sliding downward and thru the bootpack with every skier who passed.
approximately 1/3 of the way up the climb, i came to a huge rock with a crevasse below it, where a family of 4 was clicking into their skis. i made my way around the corner, above the rocks, recognizing the high consequence of a mistake from this point forward. making slow but deliberate movements, i made sure to keep 3 points in contact with the snow at all times. thoughts of crampons began to dance in my head as i wished for better purchase in the snow than i was getting from my alpine boots. TC was charging ahead, now hundreds of feet above me, and i did my best to keep up on the increasingly steep snow ladder. i looked behind me and down the bootpack, only to realize i was alone and wondered if the increasing wind and clouds were playing a role in my solitude.
skiers of wide-ranging abilities continued to ski past me and down chute, each one dumping more and more wet snow onto the bootpack and into my face. without warning, a climber above me lost his footing, and began to tumble head over heals, throttling down the bootpack.i jumped to my left, driving my raven pro axe into the snow no less than 3-4 feet to the left of the bootpack, narrowly avoiding being taken out. i was frozen in my tracks for what felt like an hour but was probably more like 2 minutes, when i started hearing from others that the fallen skier had survived the tumble, but had then fallen in a crevasse. not at all comforted by this new information, i worked my way back to the bootpack, albeit slowly and severely shaken from what i had just witnessed.
continuing upward, i came to another BATES skier who told me she was a friend of the skier who had just starfished past me. also rattled from watching the fall, she had found a small ledge where she was able to click into her skis as i passed her on my left. at this point i was roughly 150ft from the top of the chute bootback and it was my assumption that TC was already at the top of the bootpack waiting for me.
the snow was getting firmer up high, forcing me to kick my boot in several times before taking each step. below what seemed to be the last of the rocks, i came to a the steepest section of the climb, nearly 55 degrees. the bootpack began to fade away and then became non-existent, due to sliding snow from skiers above. each jab i made with thh the ice axe had to be solid or i couldn't even contemplate a move. suddenly a group of skiers appeared directly to my right. one in particular looked me dead in the eye and asked if i was okay. next thing i knew, i wasn't...in that split second, i realized the bad news was that i was sliding downhill fast, but on the up side, i was sliding on my stomach and was already attempting self-arrest. although ultimately it was unsuccessful, i was able to slow myself down and briefly felt close to gaining control of the situation. that is, until the toe of my boot caught snow and i began to ragdoll down the mountain, narrowly avoiding the rocks at the choke, and sliding down to the ravine floor.
my pack remained on my back but my skis were gone and my hands were empty. blood pouring out my mouth and shivering, 2 kind skiers appeared by my side and asked me if i knew my name. i told them "yes". they took my bandanna out of my pack and filled it with ice for my lip. before long, 2 volunteer ski trollers came to my aid and began asking lots of questions about my condition and began to steri-strip my lips and put a ton of tape on my face around my mouth. still no sign of TC, i told patrol that i wasn't sure how long he would wait for me at the top but eventually he'd be down. when he finally came down chute (killing it, of course
) he looked shocked to see me covered in blood and bandages.
as we were wrapping things up, additional ski patrollers showed up and asked more and more of the same questions, so i just kept telling them "i lost my gnar". (insert sincere thanks to the mt washington volunteer ski patrol here). by this point, the rest of my gear had been recovered by other skiers and i was helped to my feet. i clicked into my skis and made it back down to where the snow turns to rock. sympathy, applause, photo opps and "10 out of 10s" awaited.
after meeting our would-be shelter-mates and finding lots in common, we re-packed our gear, jerry-rigging my new-but-now-destroyed-pack with my volkl buddahs and headed back down. i was weary of another fall and uneasy to be travelling on snow at all (not to mention under the weight of 60+lbs of gear), but made it down without further incident in just over 3.5 hours after the fall.
we jumped in TC's truck and high-tailed it to memorial hospital in north conway to get my face stiched-up. there in the ER we met up with another casualty of tux that day who had taken a spill on the hike out, "the easy part" as she described it. her husband had to carry her a mile down the tuckerman ravine trail to the car. really nice lady, i was bummed to hear that her xrays revealed a broken tibia.
as for me, i received 6 stitches to my upper lip, 4 to my lower lip, and 3 inside my mouth. i had my left hand x-ray'd today and it's not broken, just contused. and i'm a little black and blue, but generally feeling pretty good (thanks tramadol) considering the circumstances. not exactly how i had hoped to end this epic ski season, but it could have been worse, and i'm just grateful to be alive.
