EMSC
Well-known member
Day 20: Better than I had expected, at least up top
With JamesDeluxe in town for a brief stint we made plans to meet up at Loveland for first chair. I thought I had us set up for a BOGO deal, but I forgot to read the fine print - not valid on Saturdays - even in April. #-o
James made it up earlier than I had, and been approached many times with people selling their 4 pack tickets in the parking lot so we went back down and within just a minute or two, there came our salvation.
Since James had skied Loveland Friday as well I let him lead the way hoping he knew where the better snow was. A quick lap up chair two then chair four revealed that there was definitely a crust underneath the 4" of new snow, but that there were also areas with wind sift and drift that were quite skiable and other areas with with only a little crunch underfoot. Then we headed for the Ridge and found very good turns with the upper portion with rare if any crunch and lower portions where if you choose your line well also rare crunch. It was much better than I had expected. Soft wind sift or up to 6" of new in spots with little hard crunch was fine with me as my expectations were not all that high.
We did several laps off the Ridge before deciding to try something different to mix it up - chair 8 with it's low angle terrain. Too much coral reef underneath despite some untouched snow in spots. At some point we took a short lunch break before heading back out to find that Chair two had a mechanical and was not running. That forced a lap up Chair one over to chair four in order to get back to Chair nine up to the ridge. for the final lap we traversed a bit further than before and hit the best snow of the day. A not overly obvious line that didn't look all that powdery, but that certainly did the trick, nicely soft and powdery with no crunch at all. Unfortunately James had a flight to catch and took off for the base a bit before 1pm.
I stayed till a bit after 3pm lapping the ridge and trying out several additional lines and finding some more good snow with nary a crunch underfoot. Jelly Roll was so smooth I did four laps thereof my additional 9 laps after James left. While temps were cold first thing they warmed up to pleasant by afternoon, but never did melt much more than the very base area and a few spots along the flat sections/runouts. Great meeting you and skiing with you for the first time James!
I had the camera today so you get lots of JamesDeluxe pics!
With JamesDeluxe in town for a brief stint we made plans to meet up at Loveland for first chair. I thought I had us set up for a BOGO deal, but I forgot to read the fine print - not valid on Saturdays - even in April. #-o
James made it up earlier than I had, and been approached many times with people selling their 4 pack tickets in the parking lot so we went back down and within just a minute or two, there came our salvation.
Since James had skied Loveland Friday as well I let him lead the way hoping he knew where the better snow was. A quick lap up chair two then chair four revealed that there was definitely a crust underneath the 4" of new snow, but that there were also areas with wind sift and drift that were quite skiable and other areas with with only a little crunch underfoot. Then we headed for the Ridge and found very good turns with the upper portion with rare if any crunch and lower portions where if you choose your line well also rare crunch. It was much better than I had expected. Soft wind sift or up to 6" of new in spots with little hard crunch was fine with me as my expectations were not all that high.
We did several laps off the Ridge before deciding to try something different to mix it up - chair 8 with it's low angle terrain. Too much coral reef underneath despite some untouched snow in spots. At some point we took a short lunch break before heading back out to find that Chair two had a mechanical and was not running. That forced a lap up Chair one over to chair four in order to get back to Chair nine up to the ridge. for the final lap we traversed a bit further than before and hit the best snow of the day. A not overly obvious line that didn't look all that powdery, but that certainly did the trick, nicely soft and powdery with no crunch at all. Unfortunately James had a flight to catch and took off for the base a bit before 1pm.
I stayed till a bit after 3pm lapping the ridge and trying out several additional lines and finding some more good snow with nary a crunch underfoot. Jelly Roll was so smooth I did four laps thereof my additional 9 laps after James left. While temps were cold first thing they warmed up to pleasant by afternoon, but never did melt much more than the very base area and a few spots along the flat sections/runouts. Great meeting you and skiing with you for the first time James!
I had the camera today so you get lots of JamesDeluxe pics!
