Day 29: An extraordinarily long day.
Those who ski with me know that my motto is, "Start early, quit early." I still arrived at the usual 9 a.m. meeting time but didn't finally click out of my skis until 4:20 p.m. And I'm beat!
While we spent time in North Rustler, Garbage Chute, etc. the vast majority of our day was spent off the Supreme Lift. Tele Jon and I had PQ, Mark from Rochester, and Tele Jon's brother and nephew in tow. PattiMac was here, too, skiing with Marc_C and PQ's friend Cynthia. What surprised today was what four inches of heavy new snow could do. I referenced the unusually high humidity in yesterday's report from The Canyons and how the snowpack seemed to be absorbing that humidity. I can only guess that the humidity somehow broke down any crust on west-facing aspects for even with only four inches of new snow today the sub-surface wasn't scratchy. As a result, it skied damned fine for only four inches.
At noon we were the first folks to enter Garbage Chute from skier's left, and only a few had skied it from the entrance proper, so that skied very, very well. Greeley Hill was only lightly tracked with plenty of untracked lines remaining between tracks already established. Ditto for Last Chance in Catherine's Area. We somehow found boot-top untracked in Back Forty at 2:45 p.m. (not quite sure where that came from). The "Cliff Area" signs gave Jon's nephew pause as we dropped into the claustrophobic Dogleg Chute between the White Squaw cliff bands (the Dogleg Chute in Supreme, not the one on Baldy). Even west-facing No. 9 Trees were a delight, as were the trees in The Bears.
We finished up the day with a trip out the Summer Road to Powerpole Hill, which was the only funky snow we managed to find today. Untracked at 4:15 p.m., but with an odd spongy, dense subsurface from yesterday's humidity before we froze out on the GMD deck with beers in our hands until well after 5 p.m. under a solid overcast with low clouds marching up the canyon from the Salt Lake Valley. With any luck we'll pick up a few more inches tonight.
And skrad, thank you so much for your gift this morning!!! \
/ Off to study it now.
Those who ski with me know that my motto is, "Start early, quit early." I still arrived at the usual 9 a.m. meeting time but didn't finally click out of my skis until 4:20 p.m. And I'm beat!
While we spent time in North Rustler, Garbage Chute, etc. the vast majority of our day was spent off the Supreme Lift. Tele Jon and I had PQ, Mark from Rochester, and Tele Jon's brother and nephew in tow. PattiMac was here, too, skiing with Marc_C and PQ's friend Cynthia. What surprised today was what four inches of heavy new snow could do. I referenced the unusually high humidity in yesterday's report from The Canyons and how the snowpack seemed to be absorbing that humidity. I can only guess that the humidity somehow broke down any crust on west-facing aspects for even with only four inches of new snow today the sub-surface wasn't scratchy. As a result, it skied damned fine for only four inches.
At noon we were the first folks to enter Garbage Chute from skier's left, and only a few had skied it from the entrance proper, so that skied very, very well. Greeley Hill was only lightly tracked with plenty of untracked lines remaining between tracks already established. Ditto for Last Chance in Catherine's Area. We somehow found boot-top untracked in Back Forty at 2:45 p.m. (not quite sure where that came from). The "Cliff Area" signs gave Jon's nephew pause as we dropped into the claustrophobic Dogleg Chute between the White Squaw cliff bands (the Dogleg Chute in Supreme, not the one on Baldy). Even west-facing No. 9 Trees were a delight, as were the trees in The Bears.
We finished up the day with a trip out the Summer Road to Powerpole Hill, which was the only funky snow we managed to find today. Untracked at 4:15 p.m., but with an odd spongy, dense subsurface from yesterday's humidity before we froze out on the GMD deck with beers in our hands until well after 5 p.m. under a solid overcast with low clouds marching up the canyon from the Salt Lake Valley. With any luck we'll pick up a few more inches tonight.
And skrad, thank you so much for your gift this morning!!! \
/ Off to study it now.
