Had I not been there myself, I wouldn't have believed it. <BR> <BR>Sunday night, I was in a truly foul mood as the rain absolutely poured outside my bedroom window at the Sugarbush Inn. Buckets. On top of an already-existing bulletproof crust. The mercury was supposed to plunge overnight, creating visions of rock-hard slopes in the morning. My only potential saving grace was the 2-4" of new predicted at the end of the storm. <BR> <BR>My mood turned darker still when I peeled back the curtain in the morning to reveal nothing but the faintest trace of new snow. Bummer - the day was going to suck, bigtime. <BR> <BR>I laughed at the snow report of 4-8" new, especially upon pulling into a bare parking lot. In the base lodge, however, I heard rumor of powder up high. C'mon - no way. <BR> <BR>Way. <BR> <BR>First trip down Castlerock Run was in, believe it or not, knee deep. The 8" bad blown in there. Unbelieveable skiing. I never would've thought that it could actually be a powder day. <BR> <BR>Next up? Castlerock Liftline. The slightly different exposure had displayed the slope to the prevailing wind, leading to tricky, tricky windslab. Rumble, however, was protected by its narrow width, and too was divine. <BR> <BR>Low down, it was rumble-strip corduroy and chunky frozen granular. Up top, it was powder pig heaven. <BR> <BR>When my intermediate sister and niece arrived, therefore, we spent nearly the entire day on the North Lynx triple, the bottom terminal of which was right at the snow line. Powder to chowder, it was a fun, fun day. Bluebird skies to boot. <BR> <BR>The Heaven's Gate chair never opened due to frozen sheaves, providing visions of still-untouched powder for today. However, 60-mph southerly winds left all of the upper mountain lifts on wind hold today. Not anxious to ski the lower-mountain boilerplate, I opted to take the day off to travel over to Burke at a liesurely pace. <BR> <BR>2 photos from today -- <BR> <BR>Lincoln Peak: <BR><IMG SRC="http://www.firsttracksonline.com/discus2/messages/8/1449.jpg" ALT="Lincoln Peak"> <BR> <BR>Mt. Ellen: <BR><IMG SRC="http://www.firsttracksonline.com/discus2/messages/8/1450.jpg" ALT="Mt. Ellen">