Day 25: Beating the closure.
Two feet of new snow, what's not to like? The problem is that thanks to a change in procedures, since Oct. 1 I've been absolutely buried (and I mean buried) by the day job. Each day that passes, not only do I not gain any ground on my backlog, I actually lose ground. Not once this season have I been able to sneak out for a few runs when it snows midweek, as I've grown accustomed to doing over the past several ski seasons. But after a dry spell that has persisted since the holidays, when the mid-mountain Snotel hit 18" last night from a storm that just several days ago wasn't supposed to produce diddly-squat, I started to second guess my decision making process. There had to be a way.
Enter UDOT, which announced last night that they would be closing Little Cottonwood Canyon Road for avalanche control at about 6 a.m. this morning, with an estimated reopening at 8 a.m. I set my alarm for 5 a.m. If I drove up before the closure, I could get in at least three solid hours of work from the cafe at Goldminer's Daughter before the lifts opened, two of which would be before normal business hours. I could therefore justify skiing for up to a couple of hours without having a guilt complex.
As Col. Hannibal Smith so often said, "I love it when a plan comes together."
The Snotel this morning read 24" for a storm total. I hit B-Gate at 5:40 a.m. and headed up canyon within a surprisingly steady stream of cars that thankfully turned out to be primarily employees or Snowbird skiers. I strolled into GMD at 6:00 sharp, pausing along the way to capture some unique moments from Alta's daily pre-opening rituals.
I sat down in the cafe, fired up my laptop and logged into the company VPN. I was joined by two members of our weekend ski posse (who shall remain nameless as they were doing the same thing) and Colin, my favorite Alta parking lot attendant. Perhaps 25 others who also beat the road closure gathered in the cafe -- some working, some napping, and some just shooting the breeze. Shortly thereafter we fell under full Interlodge.
I was pleased to actually complete an enormous amount of work, possibly more than I would have had I stayed at home, wandered downstairs for a cup of coffee and logged into the system at 8 a.m. per usual. I didn't even notice it get light out, even though I was seated in a solarium.
8 a.m. was also the time that Interlodge was lifted, when a half dozen rabid powderhounds dashed across the base area to compete for the prize of first in line. They'd have to wait in the blustery cold for well over an hour to board a lift. That wasn't going to be me.
We didn't get in line ourselves until 9:15, the mountain's usual opening time, but the clocked ticked away without anything happening. Even 9:30 came and went without anyone but a patroller actually loading a lift. The crowd erupted in cheers as the "CLOSED" sign was finally removed around 9:40 or so.
Collins, cranky girl as she is, had other ideas. The lift started, sputtered and stopped. Repeatedly. It seldom moved more than ten feet without stopping again. The real workhorse, Wildcat, was running on diesel. As folks continued to arrive the Wildcat line and the Collins line eventually merged into a sea of humanity, so there was no way that I was going to voluntarily abandon our position.
We inched forward as Collins continued to complain. Apparently a breaker was tripped somewhere and lift crews simply weren't getting enough power. We neared the front of the line by the time that lift staff closed the chair again, this time with a full load of passengers already aboard. Most folks scampered over to Wildcat, causing that liftline to swell even further. We got on the rope tow, thankful that at least we weren't already dangling in the air. Small blessings.
Of course, we weren't the only ones to load the Transfer Tow, which itself started complaining about its more-than-full load of passengers. It, too, stopped repeatedly, but we eventually found ourselves at Sunnyside which thankfully had no line because the Tow acted as a metering agent. We skied right onto Sugarloaf, because Sunnyside was acting as its metering agent, and took a lap, but the EBT remained closed due to avalanche concerns so we were unable to get to the top of Collins Gulch that way. Instead we headed for Supreme, where we scored a couple of laps of deep skiing before folks caught on. The new snow was of a medium density, so you were skiing on it nearly as much as you were skiing in it, but it didn't matter because it was smooth, soft and untracked. Even where you crossed tracks the snow had sufficient meat to it that you didn't even feel them. It was divine.
I was ready to split, but we then learned that Collins had reopened so we took one last lap there. While loading the lift, Timmy told us that Backside was now open. :shock: Of course, our hopes were dashed when we got to Germania Pass and realized that only the High Notch access was open, and patrollers hadn't yet opened the Instructors Traverse gate. We all had to get back to work and therefore lacked the time for a High Notch hike, so we returned to our original plan to head out the High Traverse through Piss Pass to ski Greeley Bowl down to the Willows. Visibility out there was nil the whole way, but with absolutely untracked snow you really didn't need to see anything anyway. ;-)
Two feet of new snow, what's not to like? The problem is that thanks to a change in procedures, since Oct. 1 I've been absolutely buried (and I mean buried) by the day job. Each day that passes, not only do I not gain any ground on my backlog, I actually lose ground. Not once this season have I been able to sneak out for a few runs when it snows midweek, as I've grown accustomed to doing over the past several ski seasons. But after a dry spell that has persisted since the holidays, when the mid-mountain Snotel hit 18" last night from a storm that just several days ago wasn't supposed to produce diddly-squat, I started to second guess my decision making process. There had to be a way.
Enter UDOT, which announced last night that they would be closing Little Cottonwood Canyon Road for avalanche control at about 6 a.m. this morning, with an estimated reopening at 8 a.m. I set my alarm for 5 a.m. If I drove up before the closure, I could get in at least three solid hours of work from the cafe at Goldminer's Daughter before the lifts opened, two of which would be before normal business hours. I could therefore justify skiing for up to a couple of hours without having a guilt complex.
As Col. Hannibal Smith so often said, "I love it when a plan comes together."The Snotel this morning read 24" for a storm total. I hit B-Gate at 5:40 a.m. and headed up canyon within a surprisingly steady stream of cars that thankfully turned out to be primarily employees or Snowbird skiers. I strolled into GMD at 6:00 sharp, pausing along the way to capture some unique moments from Alta's daily pre-opening rituals.
I sat down in the cafe, fired up my laptop and logged into the company VPN. I was joined by two members of our weekend ski posse (who shall remain nameless as they were doing the same thing) and Colin, my favorite Alta parking lot attendant. Perhaps 25 others who also beat the road closure gathered in the cafe -- some working, some napping, and some just shooting the breeze. Shortly thereafter we fell under full Interlodge.
I was pleased to actually complete an enormous amount of work, possibly more than I would have had I stayed at home, wandered downstairs for a cup of coffee and logged into the system at 8 a.m. per usual. I didn't even notice it get light out, even though I was seated in a solarium.
8 a.m. was also the time that Interlodge was lifted, when a half dozen rabid powderhounds dashed across the base area to compete for the prize of first in line. They'd have to wait in the blustery cold for well over an hour to board a lift. That wasn't going to be me.
We didn't get in line ourselves until 9:15, the mountain's usual opening time, but the clocked ticked away without anything happening. Even 9:30 came and went without anyone but a patroller actually loading a lift. The crowd erupted in cheers as the "CLOSED" sign was finally removed around 9:40 or so.
Collins, cranky girl as she is, had other ideas. The lift started, sputtered and stopped. Repeatedly. It seldom moved more than ten feet without stopping again. The real workhorse, Wildcat, was running on diesel. As folks continued to arrive the Wildcat line and the Collins line eventually merged into a sea of humanity, so there was no way that I was going to voluntarily abandon our position.
We inched forward as Collins continued to complain. Apparently a breaker was tripped somewhere and lift crews simply weren't getting enough power. We neared the front of the line by the time that lift staff closed the chair again, this time with a full load of passengers already aboard. Most folks scampered over to Wildcat, causing that liftline to swell even further. We got on the rope tow, thankful that at least we weren't already dangling in the air. Small blessings.
Of course, we weren't the only ones to load the Transfer Tow, which itself started complaining about its more-than-full load of passengers. It, too, stopped repeatedly, but we eventually found ourselves at Sunnyside which thankfully had no line because the Tow acted as a metering agent. We skied right onto Sugarloaf, because Sunnyside was acting as its metering agent, and took a lap, but the EBT remained closed due to avalanche concerns so we were unable to get to the top of Collins Gulch that way. Instead we headed for Supreme, where we scored a couple of laps of deep skiing before folks caught on. The new snow was of a medium density, so you were skiing on it nearly as much as you were skiing in it, but it didn't matter because it was smooth, soft and untracked. Even where you crossed tracks the snow had sufficient meat to it that you didn't even feel them. It was divine.
I was ready to split, but we then learned that Collins had reopened so we took one last lap there. While loading the lift, Timmy told us that Backside was now open. :shock: Of course, our hopes were dashed when we got to Germania Pass and realized that only the High Notch access was open, and patrollers hadn't yet opened the Instructors Traverse gate. We all had to get back to work and therefore lacked the time for a High Notch hike, so we returned to our original plan to head out the High Traverse through Piss Pass to ski Greeley Bowl down to the Willows. Visibility out there was nil the whole way, but with absolutely untracked snow you really didn't need to see anything anyway. ;-)
