Day 67: The Utah 500.
Eight inches of snow overnight put Alta over its 500-inch average for 2010-11, only two-thirds of the way through March. Happy 500th, Utah!
I spent the first part of the day skiing Alta with Bobby Danger, skidog and Telejon. Dale rode up with me but we lost him on the second lift ride. The opening Collins line was a bit healthy so we started with Wildcat, and while I seldom ski a full-length Warm Up its untracked goodness was too much to ignore. The snow fell light (I heard 4%) and at that density 8" isn't enough to cushion the ride from the base beneath. However, the wind was already back on the increase and had sifted the snow sufficiently that it broke the dendrites from the crystals and thickened it up a bit such that you were only hitting bottom on the steepest sections. However, it was admittedly slightly tricky as there were thicker wind deposition in some areas than others and you had to be ready for sudden deceleration zones.
With the wind loading of the new snow, and a bigger impulse moving in on Monday much of Alta remained closed, including Backside, Ballroom/Baldy Shoulder, The Castle (of course) and the EBT. Catherine's Area was the only gated area on the morning opening list. The Snowbird access gates off the Wildcat ridgeline, however, were ready to go, so we headed up Wildcat and went out through the Keyhole which was truly the run of the day as far as I was concerned, deep and untracked. That, of course, dropped us into Snowbird with no easy way to return, so we phoned rdwore and found him skiing on Gadzoom with mrgskier, mrgskier's wife Abby, and Bobby and rdwore's friend Paul.
The 8 of us spent the rest of the day suffering through the increasing winds and looking for the goods, which we found in spades on Hourglass, Lone Pine, Nirvana and other little offerings in between. We avoided the Tram due to the lines, but I'm surprised that they kept Little Cloud running until I left at 2:15 pm and I'm not sure that it was running for long thereafter as chairs were swinging in the crosswind and the already slow chair was running at half speed. The top was a true ground blizzard, and even standing on the cat track buckling boots you had to use your poles to keep the wind from propelling you down the slope. Not pleasant by any means, but it was far more tolerable once you got a few hundred verts off the ridgelines.
Speaking of ridgelines, hiking up the Peruvian ridge to the High Baldy Traverse would have been masochistic in those crosswinds even if it was open. It was earlier in the day, but by my quitting time SSP had already given up on that idea. Mineral Basin remained closed all day (as did Road to Provo, BTW), so the only way back to Alta was to return to Snowbird Center and await an up-canyon UTA bus to bring me back to my car.
All in all, it was a fine day snow-wise and far more enjoyable than Saturday had been. And now that we've surpassed the 500-inch mark, everything from this point forward is gravy. \
/ Likewise I'm at the two-thirds mark to my century season. It'll be a struggle, but sitting here running the numbers I think that I can probably pull it off. It's likely my last good opportunity to do so until I retire in about 20 years so I'm going to give it the best effort that I can.
Eight inches of snow overnight put Alta over its 500-inch average for 2010-11, only two-thirds of the way through March. Happy 500th, Utah!
I spent the first part of the day skiing Alta with Bobby Danger, skidog and Telejon. Dale rode up with me but we lost him on the second lift ride. The opening Collins line was a bit healthy so we started with Wildcat, and while I seldom ski a full-length Warm Up its untracked goodness was too much to ignore. The snow fell light (I heard 4%) and at that density 8" isn't enough to cushion the ride from the base beneath. However, the wind was already back on the increase and had sifted the snow sufficiently that it broke the dendrites from the crystals and thickened it up a bit such that you were only hitting bottom on the steepest sections. However, it was admittedly slightly tricky as there were thicker wind deposition in some areas than others and you had to be ready for sudden deceleration zones.
With the wind loading of the new snow, and a bigger impulse moving in on Monday much of Alta remained closed, including Backside, Ballroom/Baldy Shoulder, The Castle (of course) and the EBT. Catherine's Area was the only gated area on the morning opening list. The Snowbird access gates off the Wildcat ridgeline, however, were ready to go, so we headed up Wildcat and went out through the Keyhole which was truly the run of the day as far as I was concerned, deep and untracked. That, of course, dropped us into Snowbird with no easy way to return, so we phoned rdwore and found him skiing on Gadzoom with mrgskier, mrgskier's wife Abby, and Bobby and rdwore's friend Paul.
The 8 of us spent the rest of the day suffering through the increasing winds and looking for the goods, which we found in spades on Hourglass, Lone Pine, Nirvana and other little offerings in between. We avoided the Tram due to the lines, but I'm surprised that they kept Little Cloud running until I left at 2:15 pm and I'm not sure that it was running for long thereafter as chairs were swinging in the crosswind and the already slow chair was running at half speed. The top was a true ground blizzard, and even standing on the cat track buckling boots you had to use your poles to keep the wind from propelling you down the slope. Not pleasant by any means, but it was far more tolerable once you got a few hundred verts off the ridgelines.
Speaking of ridgelines, hiking up the Peruvian ridge to the High Baldy Traverse would have been masochistic in those crosswinds even if it was open. It was earlier in the day, but by my quitting time SSP had already given up on that idea. Mineral Basin remained closed all day (as did Road to Provo, BTW), so the only way back to Alta was to return to Snowbird Center and await an up-canyon UTA bus to bring me back to my car.
All in all, it was a fine day snow-wise and far more enjoyable than Saturday had been. And now that we've surpassed the 500-inch mark, everything from this point forward is gravy. \
/ Likewise I'm at the two-thirds mark to my century season. It'll be a struggle, but sitting here running the numbers I think that I can probably pull it off. It's likely my last good opportunity to do so until I retire in about 20 years so I'm going to give it the best effort that I can.