Day 45: An uncanny sense of timing.
When you ski at your "home hill" for 75-plus days per season you get a pretty good sense of where to go, and when to go there. If you're honest with yourself, however, you also realize that there's an incredible amount of luck involved in getting things just right. Today was one of those days when everything went perfectly. Today was unquestionably my best day of the season thus far, and when taking into account the snow (the storm total equaled 27"), terrain, weather, friends and our remarkably good luck, it was probably top-ten lifetime, too.
You've already heard my sob story about the drive getting out of Alta last night. I finally made it to the Cliff Lodge at Snowbird by 8:10 p.m., and after unloading our gear we headed downstairs for a bite to eat at El Chanate. They normally serve dinner until 10 p.m. on weekends but the manager locked the door right behind us. The rooms were overbooked for the night so he had to get his staff down the canyon before the road would close again at 10:30.
I had a restful night on the living room couch, and awoke at 6:30 a.m. We were still under full Interlodge, and as Sima made a breakfast of scrambled eggs and bacon it was lifted to straight line travel only. We watched out the window as UDOT prepared the Little Cottonwood road for a scheduled 8:30 opening, which happened right on time. We grabbed our gear, grabbed the car and hit the Bypass Road just as the first wave of traffic coming up the Canyon appeared over the crest of the hill at Entry 4. That kind of good fortune would continue to follow us all day long.
Time was short. We booted up at the car, something I almost never do because it's so downright uncivilized, and were walking up to Wildcat right as the lifts opened at 9:15.
Sima pressed to drop in off the road onto Warmup, but I was determined to get a longer line. We skied untracked down Punch Bowl and hung a left through the gate. All tracks led west toward Bridge Shot, or further right toward Bear Claw. There were no tracks dropping down through the stands of trees in between.
Our legs weren't yet ready for it, but this run was off the charts. Untracked from top to bottom, and it was deep and bottomless. We couldn't believe our good fortune. It was going to be a great day!
There was zero line on Collins as we arrived back at the base, so we rode it and headed out the High T to Greeley Hill. It was untouched!
We met up with Skrad back at Collins, and he did a Thirds while we repeated the previous run, convening for the lower half. That animal must've literally jogged up the Thirds sidestep! The second pass through Greeley Hill was as good as the first.
We had been watching ASP preparing both Ballroom/Baldy Shoulder and Backside for opening, and while on the Transfer Tow we got some inside info that Backside was just about ready. By the time we arrived back at Germania Pass the hike to High Notch was open. But we had earlier observed that nearly all of Backside had slid down to about the elevation of the Instructor Traverse, so rather than push on to High Notch we dropped into High Yellow Trail just as the Instructor Traverse opened.
A quick glance across Albion Basin from Backside showed that Catherine's Area and Supreme Bowl weren't yet open, but the Supreme lift was. We could hear bombs being deployed in the Spiny Chutes and I figured that it wouldn't be long. We'd therefore ride Sunnyside and Cecret to get to Supreme and stage ourselves in position.
Right as we rode up past tower 13 we saw the first skiers heading out to Catherine's. Just then, however, we saw patrol drop the rope on Supreme Bowl. Catherine's could wait.
In the moments before we reached the gate virtually everyone ahead of us had headed for the Spinys. Not a single track headed downhill beneath the lift. Our choice was obvious.
I don't think that I've ever been that fortunate for those lines. We skied the Challenger ropeline down to below the ledges, then traversed out to beneath the Diving Board and down to Calf Rope...absolutely, completely untracked from top to bottom!
Now, it was time to get back to that Catherine's plan. We hiked up, clicked in and pushed off along the traverse. So Long was already absolutely hammered, so I was shocked to discover that by pressing on only slightly further not a single person had yet ventured out to Sunset. I set the track and we bounded down through the trees in an unblemished field of white.
No one had yet gone out beyond the boundary onto Patsy Marley yet, either. I didn't feel like schlepping to set the high traverse, so I broke trail to set the lower one, wrapping all the way around to Powerline Hill. As we stood there making plans to take photos several other skiers came up behind us on the traverse that I had set. To their extreme credit, they stood there and waited as we skied the run one by one for photos before dropping in themselves.
That was so good we needed a variation on it to wrap up my day. By the time we returned to Patsy Marley someone had set the high traverse, so we followed it.
Without a track yet in it at 1 p.m., Albion Gully was awfully tempting but I wanted a longer, steeper line, so we pushed on all the way to ACL Chute, where the traverse ended. It was effortless to avoid the tracks of those who went before us and have yet another heli-quality line, followed by a last absolutely untracked hurrah dropping into Grizzly Gulch.
I had to laugh when a Powderbird flew overhead, realizing that the guests in that chopper had each paid about $1,300 to ski the same quality snow that we had been skiing all day.
When you ski at your "home hill" for 75-plus days per season you get a pretty good sense of where to go, and when to go there. If you're honest with yourself, however, you also realize that there's an incredible amount of luck involved in getting things just right. Today was one of those days when everything went perfectly. Today was unquestionably my best day of the season thus far, and when taking into account the snow (the storm total equaled 27"), terrain, weather, friends and our remarkably good luck, it was probably top-ten lifetime, too.
You've already heard my sob story about the drive getting out of Alta last night. I finally made it to the Cliff Lodge at Snowbird by 8:10 p.m., and after unloading our gear we headed downstairs for a bite to eat at El Chanate. They normally serve dinner until 10 p.m. on weekends but the manager locked the door right behind us. The rooms were overbooked for the night so he had to get his staff down the canyon before the road would close again at 10:30.
I had a restful night on the living room couch, and awoke at 6:30 a.m. We were still under full Interlodge, and as Sima made a breakfast of scrambled eggs and bacon it was lifted to straight line travel only. We watched out the window as UDOT prepared the Little Cottonwood road for a scheduled 8:30 opening, which happened right on time. We grabbed our gear, grabbed the car and hit the Bypass Road just as the first wave of traffic coming up the Canyon appeared over the crest of the hill at Entry 4. That kind of good fortune would continue to follow us all day long.
Time was short. We booted up at the car, something I almost never do because it's so downright uncivilized, and were walking up to Wildcat right as the lifts opened at 9:15.
Sima pressed to drop in off the road onto Warmup, but I was determined to get a longer line. We skied untracked down Punch Bowl and hung a left through the gate. All tracks led west toward Bridge Shot, or further right toward Bear Claw. There were no tracks dropping down through the stands of trees in between.
Our legs weren't yet ready for it, but this run was off the charts. Untracked from top to bottom, and it was deep and bottomless. We couldn't believe our good fortune. It was going to be a great day!
There was zero line on Collins as we arrived back at the base, so we rode it and headed out the High T to Greeley Hill. It was untouched!
We met up with Skrad back at Collins, and he did a Thirds while we repeated the previous run, convening for the lower half. That animal must've literally jogged up the Thirds sidestep! The second pass through Greeley Hill was as good as the first.
We had been watching ASP preparing both Ballroom/Baldy Shoulder and Backside for opening, and while on the Transfer Tow we got some inside info that Backside was just about ready. By the time we arrived back at Germania Pass the hike to High Notch was open. But we had earlier observed that nearly all of Backside had slid down to about the elevation of the Instructor Traverse, so rather than push on to High Notch we dropped into High Yellow Trail just as the Instructor Traverse opened.
A quick glance across Albion Basin from Backside showed that Catherine's Area and Supreme Bowl weren't yet open, but the Supreme lift was. We could hear bombs being deployed in the Spiny Chutes and I figured that it wouldn't be long. We'd therefore ride Sunnyside and Cecret to get to Supreme and stage ourselves in position.
Right as we rode up past tower 13 we saw the first skiers heading out to Catherine's. Just then, however, we saw patrol drop the rope on Supreme Bowl. Catherine's could wait.
In the moments before we reached the gate virtually everyone ahead of us had headed for the Spinys. Not a single track headed downhill beneath the lift. Our choice was obvious.
I don't think that I've ever been that fortunate for those lines. We skied the Challenger ropeline down to below the ledges, then traversed out to beneath the Diving Board and down to Calf Rope...absolutely, completely untracked from top to bottom!
Now, it was time to get back to that Catherine's plan. We hiked up, clicked in and pushed off along the traverse. So Long was already absolutely hammered, so I was shocked to discover that by pressing on only slightly further not a single person had yet ventured out to Sunset. I set the track and we bounded down through the trees in an unblemished field of white.
No one had yet gone out beyond the boundary onto Patsy Marley yet, either. I didn't feel like schlepping to set the high traverse, so I broke trail to set the lower one, wrapping all the way around to Powerline Hill. As we stood there making plans to take photos several other skiers came up behind us on the traverse that I had set. To their extreme credit, they stood there and waited as we skied the run one by one for photos before dropping in themselves.
That was so good we needed a variation on it to wrap up my day. By the time we returned to Patsy Marley someone had set the high traverse, so we followed it.
Without a track yet in it at 1 p.m., Albion Gully was awfully tempting but I wanted a longer, steeper line, so we pushed on all the way to ACL Chute, where the traverse ended. It was effortless to avoid the tracks of those who went before us and have yet another heli-quality line, followed by a last absolutely untracked hurrah dropping into Grizzly Gulch.
I had to laugh when a Powderbird flew overhead, realizing that the guests in that chopper had each paid about $1,300 to ski the same quality snow that we had been skiing all day.
