Outstanding skiing this afternoon
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
Well, the storm did end up cooperating as the 1pm 24 hour report was 10” at mid and snowing. Added to the 2” yesterday morning means a foot, and they likely picked up an additional inch or so after 1pm as it snowed till about 3 or so. At that point the sun made an appearance creating stunning vistas!
I passed on pressing glass this morning as there was only 5” overnight, and since we had a period of time with westerly winds, I was thinking the snow would be wind-affected and difficult to ski. However, heavy snow showers started this morning when the wind switched to the northwest and I believe these filled in all of the uneveness.
The first clue was the flat pitch in the trees off the top of Storm Peak Express and Highline which skied soft, powdery and bouncy. Skiing remained that way as the pitch steepened down though Closet and over to Shadows to Lower Shadows. I measured between 14” and 16” of snow in the favored areas, with about the bottom half of that depth showing wind affects.
That was so good I repeated with slightly different lines through Shadows and Lower Shadows. Then over to the Twilight area which also skied great. Then over to the trees around Rolex which also held more of the same.
Last run on the upper hill was a ripping run down most of Sundown lifline. This did not have the depth of new snow, however the surface was burnished by the wind creating a consistent, soft and bouncy surface. Over to the newly opend terrain under the the old Priest Creek chair below Duster to find pockets of deep bottomless turns.
I then took a couple of runs in the trees off of Why Not above BC Skiway on the lower mountain, but there is a lot of downed timber and shrubbery in there and more snow is needed. But I found great deep consistent powder while dodging the obstacles nonetheless.
Add comment
Fill out the form below to add your own comments
