Pajarito-Bred
New member
Today's the day to be at Snowmass, with 10" new and blue skies. But we were there yesterday.
The conditions were good but no-where near great. (41" at midway, 60 on top) the extremely firmly packed groomers had some gravelly areas peeking thru, and there's not enough base yet for good skiing in the cirque. Apparently there was a significant slide that plowed away some of the base. Anyhow the wind and clouds conspired to keep the cirque poma shut all day. It started out gray and windy, and the the clouds started flaking off some serious powder about noon, with about 3" of fluff by the end of the day. The bumps we skied were in great shape, though, on Sam's Knob and off High Alpine. There were quite a few "skiers" that decided the football games in the lodge were more appealing than the slopes.
Snowmass is in the midst of a huge capital improvement plan, which includes a trendy new Base Village and new lifts. Right now there's a huge pit at the base, and the snazzy new 6-pack HS lift replaced the creaky old Fanny Hill high-speed quad. The bottleneck at the base will be relieved next year with the new gondola replacing the ancient 60's Riblet double, Funnel, which will top out at the base of the Elk Camp's family-friendly cruisers.
The marketing for Snowmass this year is really stressing the extremes, cliff areas, chutes and stuff in the Cirque and Hanging Valley Wall-- for a mountain that built it's reputation on the groomers, there are plenty of bumps and steeps to be had. Hidden in the center of the Big Burn Groomers is a great bump-run-in-a-canyon, Garrett Gulch, with cliffs on one side, and a couple of steeps dropping in from the Sheer Bliss side.
I guess they got tired of the nickname, Slowmass.
Looks like a snowy week though, hope there's some powder left somewhere for Friday!
The conditions were good but no-where near great. (41" at midway, 60 on top) the extremely firmly packed groomers had some gravelly areas peeking thru, and there's not enough base yet for good skiing in the cirque. Apparently there was a significant slide that plowed away some of the base. Anyhow the wind and clouds conspired to keep the cirque poma shut all day. It started out gray and windy, and the the clouds started flaking off some serious powder about noon, with about 3" of fluff by the end of the day. The bumps we skied were in great shape, though, on Sam's Knob and off High Alpine. There were quite a few "skiers" that decided the football games in the lodge were more appealing than the slopes.
Snowmass is in the midst of a huge capital improvement plan, which includes a trendy new Base Village and new lifts. Right now there's a huge pit at the base, and the snazzy new 6-pack HS lift replaced the creaky old Fanny Hill high-speed quad. The bottleneck at the base will be relieved next year with the new gondola replacing the ancient 60's Riblet double, Funnel, which will top out at the base of the Elk Camp's family-friendly cruisers.
The marketing for Snowmass this year is really stressing the extremes, cliff areas, chutes and stuff in the Cirque and Hanging Valley Wall-- for a mountain that built it's reputation on the groomers, there are plenty of bumps and steeps to be had. Hidden in the center of the Big Burn Groomers is a great bump-run-in-a-canyon, Garrett Gulch, with cliffs on one side, and a couple of steeps dropping in from the Sheer Bliss side.
I guess they got tired of the nickname, Slowmass.
Looks like a snowy week though, hope there's some powder left somewhere for Friday!