Crystal - 12/10 Bonus Fun

Yee Haa - Had a hard time deciding this morning...Glad I went! Arrived typically early to a very nice front row spot in the free part of the A lot after a pleasant at speed drive - Pay lot was nice and small today (and typically empty when I left). Got a slot in the Bucket line to snag first ride with a bunch of the normal hard core everyday crowd - nice social on the ride up and then drop into a nice sunny GV bowl (skier right of the top two bucket towers)...Ouch fun boot top cold light smoke over happy smooth enough fun! Then it was GVex repeat and repeat and repeat skiing very nice quality snow, mostly doing #1's fav path - easiest entry to the bottom ramp on GV with out having to hike up the ramp (or trying to keep up speed in the flats). Some rocks in places, some twigs and grass and tree tops to ski around, definitely the thinest snow pack up top I've seen in a long time, but still enough to be fun and get a "real" first day of vert skiing...after a lot of laps did the hike up to the Bucket for the down load - PB looked great and the back side road to LS looked like I could have suffered it. Finished the morning down on CHex - no rocks, no gravel and not many folks around to dodge. #1 would have liked the conditions. So all in all it was way better than expected and should just keep getting better every day this week.

Other - Heard that FQex should be up and running by Thursday, LS should also be open by then - with a little luck maybe sooner.

Other Other - No soup at the base, just big chili. Ultra light crowd, pay lot pretty empty, rest of A lot was almost full, drive down was at speed...did see a few Elk in the morning.

Saw a lot of the skinning hard core crowd skiing the easy lifts today - most were heading out south which is probably really nice right now. The Rock Coombas were very happy today!