Baldy 2/9-10/10- From Dust and Crust Springs a Sesh in Fresh

[Aukai]

Shot up for a little workout session this morning, figuring it'd be dust on crust at best, and widespread ice capades at worst. Didn't count on much in the way of daytime precip, but checked out the radar before heading up and thought maybe I could catch an inch or two in the afternoon before heading down.

The morning went pretty much as expected- the variable crud typical of a few days after a mixed precip event. Some mellow turns in South Bowl and the Goldridge trees were fun but nothing special. Then around 11AM graupel starting falling. Lots of it. Enough that by noon or 1230, nontrivial accumulation was laid down. What had been icy turns off the groomed were becoming much softer. I decided to duck into the Notch for a bite and a brew, hoping that when I emerged again, more snow would improve things even further.

Ullr went to work at lunchtime, and indeed, the rest of the day would be in 4+ inches of new. The graupel had changed over to big fluffy flakes, and it was coming down pretty damn hard. Every lap's tracks were covered in the time of the lift ride. The whole mountain came alive- South Bowl and the Tube were best, Goldridge not bad, even Emile's trees became carveable and fun. What an unexpected treat. Don't get me wrong, plenty of crust lurked underneath, but this is SoCal, and you take what you can get.

I wondered about Bentley's, and headed up Chair 2 to drop down there. Heard some thunder, didn't sound close but it's always a little alarming when you're on a big metal object at altitude. Got my freshies over a crustier subsurface down to Chair 1, and by the time I got back up, they had closed the mountain for concern of thunderstorms. Fair enough, but I would have loved to milk the last hour out of the day in the new snow. A last, better run down Morgan's across Bentley's ended the day, riding down right up to the car.

Lots of snow on the road already, but plows out working and it should be OK for the morning. Snowing (dumping, really) down to the tunnels when I left. Go get it tomorrow, boys and girls, 2/10 will be a great day. Wish I could be there.

Maybe Waterman on Friday, if what's on their website holds true...

 

[Tony Crocker]

Garry was at Baldy 2/8 and also pleasantly surprised. I agree today should have been outstanding.

Waterman's website is stale, last updated 2/6. The phone line 818 790-2002 was updated yesterday afternoon, hopeful but no confirmation that they are working on the road.

 

[ski-the-face]

if snow stays nice i'll probably go to waterman saturday but if it warms up too much before then i will take the baldy skier packed.

 

[Tony Crocker]

Might be worth one day at each over the 3-day weekend. Some consolation for missing today. :x

 

[ski-the-face]

thats what i was thinking. how many days does it take for the corn to get going at baldy? week long heat wave...

 

[Tony Crocker]

how many days does it take for the corn to get going at baldy? week long heat wave...

I don't see it getting that warm by the weekend. Nonetheless Holcumac and much of chair 4 face directly south and those places can go to corn in 3 days or so. I expect the steeper and sheltered parts of Thunder to be packed powder for awhile. Chair 1 steep runs are the tricky call. Might stay packed powder until you get under the lift. If it gets warm enough for melt/freeze, save those runs for late afternoon.

 

[Mike Bernstein]

how many days does it take for the corn to get going at baldy? week long heat wave...

I don't see it getting that warm by the weekend. Nonetheless Holcumac and much of chair 4 face directly south and those places can go to corn in 3 days or so. I expect the steeper and sheltered parts of Thunder to be packed powder for awhile. Chair 1 steep runs are the tricky call. Might stay packed powder until you get under the lift. If it gets warm enough for melt/freeze, save those runs for late afternoon.

The powder was a little heavier than expected, and they got a good bit of wind, so it was wise to stay in sheltered, north facing areas today. That said, baldyskier told me the snow off Ch 4 was surprisingly soft, which is NOT what I would have expected given our brief hike and run down to the Ch 1 base from that side.

For my first day at Baldy, it was a smashing success. Got there on time - top parking bay. On the lift by 8:30 and everything was closed for skiing except for Ch 2 due to avi control. Just as I got to the top, a voice crackles over the air that Ch 3 is opening. Raced down to snag 2nd chair. Deep and untouched somewhere skier's left of the liftline. 12-15" with more in spots and less in others sounds about right. Back up for more and traversed out skiers left a little for some more deep. Wash, rinse, repeat. Then down to the lot runs. Definitely less snow down there, but if you stayed in protected spots, it was deep. Ended up wandering back up to Ch 3 and was the first one into South Bowl. Lots of fun, but that slog out was unexpected. Very much reminded me of the 20th hole at MRG. Finished up with another run on 3 and then dipped into Bentley's Dream. All good. Won't be all that powdery by the weekend me thinks - it was in the upper 30s at the base when I left and its forecast to get warmer in the next few days.

All in all - a great first day at Baldy. Got home in 63 minutes and snuck in a few hours of work too. Hard to complain about that.

 

[Tony Crocker]

You nailed it yesterday quite well. =D> =D> =D>
If you get Thunder opening in the morning, South Bowl anytime on the same day, plus powder on the parking lot runs, you're in the top ~25% of Baldy powder days IMHO. You should have been over 20K vertical from the timeframe you describe.

Ch 4 was surprisingly soft, which is NOT what I would have expected given our brief hike and run down to the Ch 1 base from that side.

Holcumac is steep and direct south facing. If the sun comes out even a hour it won't be powder anymore. But I'll be looking for corn there this weekend. Go the other way from that spine into Eric's (OB, but ends in west end of the parking lot) the exposure is SW so the first-day powder might last until noon or so.

Waterman updated the phone message this morning, but have no info on a timeframe for the road. :-(

 

[SoCal Rider]

I wasn't on Holumac yesterday, but was between there and the main Ch. 1 run at 3:45 yesterday. It was already mushing. Quality in the morning was excellent for below-Notch terrain, IMO, not that I'm a Klassen-like Baldy vet; yesterday was day 11 for me there. The afternoon sun at Baldy was absolutely brilliant blue. Wow, it is something contrasted against the white-caked trees and runs.

 

[Staley]

I just got back from Baldy today, so I thought I might let you know how conditions have changed. Our first run of the day was in South Bowl and the top was still pretty nice. It wasn't especially crusty and there were some untracked turns. The traverse out, however, was very icy (broken up little shards of ice). Our next run was in the area of Herb's Hollow, and was terrible iced up chunks of snow, scraped sections, and ice shards. The next few runs we skied the trees under the Chair 3 liftline. At worse, it was hard pack, and most of the time, we had nice chopped up heavy powder. It was consistently soft, which couldn't be said about any other run.

I tried 2 runs over on Chair 4, and they were terrible. I spotted some inviting untracked lines from the lift, but getting there involved more ice shards, and the untracked snow was what I'd probably describe as death crust. Unless I went really fast (and there's not enough pitch on Chair 4 for that), my tails would just cut through the crust and make skiing impossible.

Around 11, we returned to Thunder and skied some different lines in the South Bowl area. These generally involved a crusty section on top, then ice shards, then a few powder turns, and then more ice. Unfortunately, the ice sometimes crept into the powder turns, and one time, my ski came off after hitting a giant chunk of ice. Isn't the uniqueness of Baldy just wonderful! During one of these South Bowl runs, I actually found an untouched area of boot deep, fairly light powder. Of course, it slid on my first turn, and if I hadn't been able to grab onto a tree, I made have been taken for a long ride. After the avalanche, I decided to call it a day, finishing up by skiing Nightmare. I wouldn't say it quite lived up to its name, but where we were expecting slush, a mix of scraped snow and ice still remained.

 

[ski-the-face]

well that doesnt sound good...im going sunday i hope since the waterman update

 

[jojo_obrien]

thanks for the info everybody

i was thinking of hitting up baldy tomorrow but it got up to a whopping 56 degrees today at the notch!

after reading the reports i'm now tempted to go for the groomers on mt high east or perhaps even making the trip to big bear for some first of the season groomers.....hmmm....

 

[Tony Crocker]

Garry was at Baldy Wednesday for the last 3 hours. He thought there was a weird warm air pocket that put most of the terrain below the Notch into spring conditions. He was pleased with conditions on Thunder. He skied Eric's first but it was too late, already sun affected. He thought Baldy was more aggressively tracked out for a midweek powder day than he had seen for a long time.

 

[jojo_obrien]

around your last comment tony -- that's what the new reality is at baldy. all this marketing, etc. --

having skiied baldy now for 15+ yrs, this is the most crowded i've ever seen it. (but still want $60 for a lift ticket.....)

you can pretty much expect to get little to no fresh tracks unless you hit it up during the storm or the day after....

 

[SoCal Rider]

I didn't really think it was particularly busy Wednesday. I got to the ticket booth at about 9:30 and there was almost no line, maybe eight, 10 people. The only long lift line for me was right when 4 opened. True, by the time I got to Thunder after five runs elsewhere, all the obvious stuff was tracked out.

For the Baldy fiends - some of whom I know patronize the Mammoth board - here are my pics and short TR: http://forums.mammothmountain.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=5360&start=90; my handle there is Stephen

 

[Mike Bernstein]

I didn't really think it was particularly busy Wednesday. I got to the ticket booth at about 9:30 and there was almost no line, maybe eight, 10 people. The only long lift line for me was right when 4 opened. True, by the time I got to Thunder after five runs elsewhere, all the obvious stuff was tracked out.

For the Baldy fiends - some of whom I know patronize the Mammoth board - here are my pics and short TR: http://forums.mammothmountain.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=5360&start=90; my handle there is Stephen

Thunder was mostly tracked out by late morning - the line for Ch 3 was up to about 15 minutes at 10:00 or so, which is why we bailed for the parking lot runs. That likely explains why you didn't have much to pick over when you arrived. It got tracked out surprisingly quickly. By the time I left at 1:30, everything was pretty much tracked, at least for a noob like me. I'm sure veterans could have found some nice stashes still.

 

[Mike Bernstein]

You nailed it yesterday quite well. =D> =D> =D>
If you get Thunder opening in the morning, South Bowl anytime on the same day, plus powder on the parking lot runs, you're in the top ~25% of Baldy powder days IMHO. You should have been over 20K vertical from the timeframe you describe.

Let me do the math:

5x Ch 3 @ 1000'
4x Ch 1 @ 1330'
2x Ch 2 @ 200'

Doesn't quite add up to 20K. I did take a few breathers in the Notch b/c I'm in awful shape and that was not exactly champaign powder. Probably left 5K vert on the table there, but I had a great mid-week day and got home safe. Hard to ask for more. I realize that those conditions, and the relative ease of access, will only come around a small handful of days each year, but combined with the possibility of weekend runs to Mammoth and occasional flights to SLC and other Western locales, that should be enough to sate my jones.

Ch 4 was surprisingly soft, which is NOT what I would have expected given our brief hike and run down to the Ch 1 base from that side.

Holcumac is steep and direct south facing. If the sun comes out even a hour it won't be powder anymore. But I'll be looking for corn there this weekend. Go the other way from that spine into Eric's (OB, but ends in west end of the parking lot) the exposure is SW so the first-day powder might last until noon or so.

Saw lots of tracks coming out of Eric's. Actually didn't know it existed until I saw that. Never did make it up to the top of Ch 4, but that will be a must try on the right day. Just Eric's alone must add a few hundred acres to their in-bounds skiable acreage of 800. When you consider stuff off the other side, Baldy is no joke if you know where you're going.

 

[SoCal Rider]

I didn't really think it was particularly busy Wednesday. I got to the ticket booth at about 9:30 and there was almost no line, maybe eight, 10 people. The only long lift line for me was right when 4 opened. True, by the time I got to Thunder after five runs elsewhere, all the obvious stuff was tracked out.

For the Baldy fiends - some of whom I know patronize the Mammoth board - here are my pics and short TR: http://forums.mammothmountain.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=5360&start=90; my handle there is Stephen

Thunder was mostly tracked out by late morning - the line for Ch 3 was up to about 15 minutes at 10:00 or so, which is why we bailed for the parking lot runs. That likely explains why you didn't have much to pick over when you arrived. It got tracked out surprisingly quickly. By the time I left at 1:30, everything was pretty much tracked, at least for a noob like me. I'm sure veterans could have found some nice stashes still.

I'm not really a veteran (10 of my 11 visits are in last three seasons); only real extended stashes I got over there were in South Bowl, way left - I think you can call it way left - and the Tube; hardly secrets. I was on Ch. 3 from probably 1:30 to almost 4. I made a mental observation on the lift that Liftlines and Emile's were largely being ignored in favor of - I presumed - the greater South Bowl metropolitan area (ha) and then Robin's and Bonanza.

 

[ShiftyRider]

Thanks for the reports!

I realize that those conditions, and the relative ease of access, will only come around a small handful of days each year, but...that should be enough to sate my jones.

Mike, it's great in warm and hot weather too. One recent spring Baldy was open later in the season than Kirkwood LOL. Many of those (and winter) days it will be cloudy and gloomy in the LA Basin and Baldy will be above the clouds.

Re lift lines, even on the most crowded days everybody* goes home early and never realizes the lines are only temporary.

* snowplayers and experts excepted

 

[Tony Crocker]

The major chokepoint is usually the ticket line and initial line-up on Chair 1. If you're on Thunder early (Mike Bernstein got 2nd chair) you usually get 1+ hour of unimpeded first tracks before the line builds there. When it does, you go back to chair 1, which Mike did also. If you're lucky you also get South Bowl's opening later in the day. Since Mike executed all of the above nearly perfectly I presumed he got 20K or so. Obviously you need a fat/crudbusting ski to avoid exhaustion. Chair 4 doesn't open at all on a lot of the powder days, another reason that I suspected a decent amount of vertical could be had on this one. No question snow was more difficult than normal, except maybe the first couple of hours.

Agree on the spring corn skiing, can be amazing (and I'm a lot more stingy with that term than Patrick). It's very hard to predict when that will happen. Chair 4/Holcumac might be there this weekend. It can take a long time for Thunder and chair 1 to settle out, especially after the snow has been churned by the powderhounds. The last big year in 2005 the final big storm was late February. The off-piste was difficult according to Garry the whole month of March that year, then the corn rocked most of April.

FYI this is not a big year yet. Baldy has had maybe 150 inches and the reported base is only 3-5 feet. In the big years (I can recall at least 8 of them) it's double that. It will need to snow more for us to get that April corn.