It's not every day that Bobby Danger beats me to a TR post, but then again it's not every day that Bobby leaves for the day before I do.
Day 15: Storm day
Things I love about storm days:
- Casual skiers stay home (so do powderhounds who don't think that the storm will start until later in the day)
- 4x4/chain restrictions in LCC have the same effect to a lesser degree
- The falling snow muffles most sounds, except for whoops, hollers, giggles and shrieks
- Skis don't make scratching noises, either
- Each run is better than the last
- Free refills all day
- The overwhelming presence of nature's power
- The ice jam that builds up in my beard
- Going inside actually feels like something special
- You have to clean off the car at the end of the day
- You still get to look forward to the day after the storm
- Your face still has that warm glowing feeling while you're sitting at home writing up your TR
It wasn't supposed to hit until afternoon, but it started around 8:30 a.m. Any time we get pre-frontal snow it bodes well for outpacing the forecast.
True to form for a legitimate Wasatch storm day, each run today was better than the last until I called it quits at 3:30 and started cleaning off the car. By that point the mid-Collins snow plot reported 6" of medium density snow. The sensor at the mid-Collins plot is for some reason not reporting liquid precipitation equivalent and the snow pack total reading has gone haywire again, but at the Alta Guard Station the density calculates to 10.52%.
That 6" may have been the official tally, but I swear to God that there were places on Supreme where it had filled in thigh deep because there was a decent wind blowing in some spots today. Even a tall guy like Skidog was grinning from ear to ear about face shots. It didn't hurt, either, that today's snow fell atop about a foot that has quietly accumulated little by little throughout this week. Two more inches have fallen since closing and snowfall has resumed in earnest here in the Salt Lake Valley behind the front. On radar it looks for all the world like lake effect. Winter has finally arrived, for after weeks of skiing in temperatures in the 30s it was a nippy 9 degrees atop Collins mid-afternoon. Alta seemingly had every snow gun they own running all day today, and then some.
And to elaborate on Bobby's comment about the EBT, the weather there today was a frigid, sandblasting, vertigo-inducing, ice cream headache-creating, forward momentum-stopping pure hell on earth until they closed it due to the building avalanche risk off East Baldy. Even before they closed it we unanimously decided to use the Transfer Tow to get from Albion Basin to Collins instead of the EBT.
With Supreme coming on line for the season about a week earlier than usual yesterday (and one day ahead of the announced opening day, which pissed off Skidog to no end), everything other than the Castle is now open at Alta. One possible exception, depending on how you define an exception, is Chartreuse Nose/Extrovert. The usual ridgeline gate is closed because the wind has stripped a good deal of the cover from the ridgeline itself beyond the gate, but people yesterday were using the Glory Hole gate off of Devil's Elbow and hugging the ropeline as an alternative route into there. You just can't take the usual gate. Patrol was obviously well aware of the alternative access because they even marked a portion of Extrovert with some bamboo, so it's apparently kosher with them. It looks like it's still closed but it's really not in nice weather, although the avalanche danger kept the gate into Glory Hole closed today.
As for the Castle remaining closed, those who ski at Alta regularly know that the Castle is open about as often as not even in mid-season. I was surprised to see that they gave us everything off of Supreme today, including all of Catherine's Area, Supreme Bowl and the Spiny Chutes, and everything skied well, even Tower 12 Chute and the Spinys themselves.
A shout-out to Jason "I'm getting nervous" Capecod: seriously?? Get over it. The pattern change I told you about has officially arrived.
collins chair was constently stopping for one reason or another from what i observed
as one can tell it wasn't a day for any distance pictures.
