powderfreak
New member
Here's my report, copied from Skivt-L but posted here to add some images.
Image quality not that great as I am using an old laptop without any photo
software and is not very good at retaining quality while compressing images.
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Day 3
Trails still skiable:
Cliff Trail (entire thing)
Upper to middle Perry Merrill
Upper to middle Gondolier
Chin Clip (upper half)
Switchback (down to middle Gondolier)
Likely portions of upper Nosedive but didn't look as good as Gondola trails
From my vantage point in the village I've been gaping at the still snow
plastered upper elevations of Mansfield for the past couple of days. After
skiing Saturday and Sunday, I got the itch this morning to make some more
turns.
Judging by what I could see from afar, the snow level appeared to be
somewhere between 2,500ft and 3,000ft. Also, there appears to much better
coverage on the Gondi side as opposed to the Quad side. I found this to be
quite true today.
I figured turns could be had from about the Cliff/Nosedive intersetion and
above so I would start there and see what I found. I picked Hazelton for the
hike up as it crosses Cliff Trail just above the ND intersection...and the plan
was to skin from Lower Cliff up to the Cliff House at the top of Gondi. This
plan worked out well because when I popped out onto Cliff Trail I found 3-4" of
snow covering the trail. I walked out to Nosedive to take a look, and wasn't
impressed with what I found. ND didn't look too inspiring so I skinned up Cliff.
At the Cliff Trail/Rim Rock intersection there was at least 6-8", maybe more,
and that continued to grow as I worked up towards upper Perry Merrill. Given
that the stake had 7" last night, I couldn't believe how much snow was left on
Cliff Trail. Its wall to wall coverage of 6-12" of rock solid snow. The cold
nights had certainly turned that stuff to concrete... skinning was easy and the
snow was supporting my 90lb black lab. Guess that would explain the slow
melt rate up there. Up at the Cliff House I'd say there's still at least a foot in
areas that weren't wind-swept and its rock solid.
Everything up towards the upper Gondola region was skiable and looked very
nice... for a descent I chose Chin Clip to Last Chance/Exit to Gondolier. Plenty
of coverage all the way back out to Gondolier at tower 18...then it turns
interesting very quickly. Its amazing how fast the snowpack goes from 6-12"
to patchy coverage... but regardless, I was able to skip from patch to patch,
then skied some fast grass down to the last Switchback crossing (the one
that brings you to the Chin Clip Runout).
Sun was out by the time I got to the bottom and it was warming up quickly,
but overall there's still 750ft of verts of quality October skiing to be had...
(you can push that to 1,200 verts if you don't care for your skis).
I'll try to get pics up in a little bit, but if you are willing to put in some effort,
I'd recommend a lap or two in the upper Gondi region.
-Scott
Pictures:
Looking up Cliff Trail from Nosedive intersection... these first three pictures were taken from standing in the same spot. As you can see, even at the same elevation Cliff Trail had notably better coverage from side to side than Nosedive at the same spot. Wind and skier traffic likely resulted in Nosedive losing wall-to-wall coverage as Cliff Trail had been relatively undisturbed and was still holding full coverage:
Looking up and down Nosedive from Cliff Trail intersection:
As I skinned up Cliff, it became obvious that I had made the right choice to head towards the top of the Gondi. Snow coverage was excellent on 90% of the run.
At the top of the Gondi there was a solid 12-14" of snowpack in undisturbed areas. On the Cliff House deck there was more like 2 feet due to wind-loading. Still nice to see though.
Skied Upper Gondolier to Chin Clip to Switchback/Last Chance exit out to Gondolier
Out on Gondlier not far above the snow line... I was able to ski another few hundred feet below this picture, but it was certainly junkboard-type skiing below here.
Finally, a shot from town after I went to get some groceries this afternoon...you can see that it is a lot more "solid" white over towards the Gondola than on the Quad side.
Image quality not that great as I am using an old laptop without any photo
software and is not very good at retaining quality while compressing images.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Day 3
Trails still skiable:
Cliff Trail (entire thing)
Upper to middle Perry Merrill
Upper to middle Gondolier
Chin Clip (upper half)
Switchback (down to middle Gondolier)
Likely portions of upper Nosedive but didn't look as good as Gondola trails
From my vantage point in the village I've been gaping at the still snow
plastered upper elevations of Mansfield for the past couple of days. After
skiing Saturday and Sunday, I got the itch this morning to make some more
turns.
Judging by what I could see from afar, the snow level appeared to be
somewhere between 2,500ft and 3,000ft. Also, there appears to much better
coverage on the Gondi side as opposed to the Quad side. I found this to be
quite true today.
I figured turns could be had from about the Cliff/Nosedive intersetion and
above so I would start there and see what I found. I picked Hazelton for the
hike up as it crosses Cliff Trail just above the ND intersection...and the plan
was to skin from Lower Cliff up to the Cliff House at the top of Gondi. This
plan worked out well because when I popped out onto Cliff Trail I found 3-4" of
snow covering the trail. I walked out to Nosedive to take a look, and wasn't
impressed with what I found. ND didn't look too inspiring so I skinned up Cliff.
At the Cliff Trail/Rim Rock intersection there was at least 6-8", maybe more,
and that continued to grow as I worked up towards upper Perry Merrill. Given
that the stake had 7" last night, I couldn't believe how much snow was left on
Cliff Trail. Its wall to wall coverage of 6-12" of rock solid snow. The cold
nights had certainly turned that stuff to concrete... skinning was easy and the
snow was supporting my 90lb black lab. Guess that would explain the slow
melt rate up there. Up at the Cliff House I'd say there's still at least a foot in
areas that weren't wind-swept and its rock solid.
Everything up towards the upper Gondola region was skiable and looked very
nice... for a descent I chose Chin Clip to Last Chance/Exit to Gondolier. Plenty
of coverage all the way back out to Gondolier at tower 18...then it turns
interesting very quickly. Its amazing how fast the snowpack goes from 6-12"
to patchy coverage... but regardless, I was able to skip from patch to patch,
then skied some fast grass down to the last Switchback crossing (the one
that brings you to the Chin Clip Runout).
Sun was out by the time I got to the bottom and it was warming up quickly,
but overall there's still 750ft of verts of quality October skiing to be had...
(you can push that to 1,200 verts if you don't care for your skis).
I'll try to get pics up in a little bit, but if you are willing to put in some effort,
I'd recommend a lap or two in the upper Gondi region.
-Scott
Pictures:
Looking up Cliff Trail from Nosedive intersection... these first three pictures were taken from standing in the same spot. As you can see, even at the same elevation Cliff Trail had notably better coverage from side to side than Nosedive at the same spot. Wind and skier traffic likely resulted in Nosedive losing wall-to-wall coverage as Cliff Trail had been relatively undisturbed and was still holding full coverage:
Looking up and down Nosedive from Cliff Trail intersection:
As I skinned up Cliff, it became obvious that I had made the right choice to head towards the top of the Gondi. Snow coverage was excellent on 90% of the run.
At the top of the Gondi there was a solid 12-14" of snowpack in undisturbed areas. On the Cliff House deck there was more like 2 feet due to wind-loading. Still nice to see though.
Skied Upper Gondolier to Chin Clip to Switchback/Last Chance exit out to Gondolier
Out on Gondlier not far above the snow line... I was able to ski another few hundred feet below this picture, but it was certainly junkboard-type skiing below here.
Finally, a shot from town after I went to get some groceries this afternoon...you can see that it is a lot more "solid" white over towards the Gondola than on the Quad side.
