18/19 Stevens

1/4/19
TL;DR: An almost-rain, not terribly busy day day at the pass.

Rain never turned to snow overnight, making it an up at the crack of noon type day. Sky was rain soaked groomers with a side of mashers. The layers of traverses in headwall looked geological. 7th was bumps at the top, debris strewn heavy pow off skiers right. Typical stuff. Lower rock garden had lots of the right kind of rocks with good landings.

The upper Gemini traverse to the saddle is still being put in wrong, so no one did it before I did... at 1 or 2. Couple good turns down the wind ridge there. Southpark was full of good turns by the penultimate gully.

Then jupiter broke, and SC never ran while we were there so we went to tye. More good mashers and thick snow. More of the good kind of rocks.

Pretty much good vis all day, some patchy fog at times. No real crowds. Technically snowing, but just enough to test the DWR. I need to redo it.

2.5/3.

Thanks for report. I pick ax'ed ice off a walkway, and worked on a snow blower in a cold garage...Sounds like you had a bit better of a time.

Changed subject to be seasonal.

1/7/2018: The sky lift line had transitioned into the 7th line by 9:15. Barely a slowdown to get scanned after that. 7"+ light snow, no vis issues beyond the moderate refreshing, but the backside got hammered as usual. Frontside kept nice snow through noon, when we left optimistic that legs might be useful tomorrow morning. Some areas moderately wind affected, but nothing too bad that I saw (save one small boulder drop to ice). 80% icestache coverage.

I'll knock off .1 each for there being other people and it not being neck deep. 2.8/3

Swing Shift - deeper snow today than the previous
three afternoons, but a little stiffer near the bottom of Southern Cross.
Sure is fun - not sure if Silas was there or not today.....
missed him yesterday 😞. Oh, and the burger at the Bulls Tooth
is excellent as is the chili.

1/8/19: compared to monday, it wasn't inspiring offpiste for reasons I don't really remember. Groomers were good. Quick laps to get a mild stretch and make the (short) drive worth it.

1/10/19: No crowds, sun came out, great vis, great snow in the shade. N aspects stayed light and cold while everything else warmed up to loud pow by noon. Around mid-shin to knee deep where it was good. April in Jan, minus ~40" of snowpack. 3/3 here, but cement modifiers vary.

1/18 very enjoyable pre-holiday day. few inches fresh made the frontside quite fun. good vis, light crowds. as normal, snow got thick down at the bottom of the backside. Soft enough to be stupid in lower rock garden, my kind of day. 2.8/3

1/22 i really like the days right as the storm comes in. more so when the storm is warm and wet. everything was soft and as flat as can be expected, but vis was terrible. Great turns on groomers, great tree runs, great day to poke about places you don't usually look at. soft surface, but hard underneath made for hard landings. 2.5/3, mostly vis. about .1/3 without a good shell.

1/23 No crowd. Great vis. 10" snow, 2.25" H2O. Yup, totally blower. Not quite loud pow, but thick and a bit of a crust in a few places. Another great day to have quality wet weather gear, but a bit dryer on the person than yesterday, so long as you never fell. Which.... isn't me on a soft day. 7th and backside closed due to avy, not a surprise. After a couple hours on skis we pulled out the boards, in 4k vertical my watched clocked in about 14k, which sounds about right if tomahawks count. I can almost make a turn in soft snow now.... almost. 3/3.

1/25 Stopped by for a few afternoon laps, everything off piste is refrozen garbage. Fast slick groomers made for quick easy laps. Vis was great above windy knoll, pretty much non-existent below it. Glacier came out for a lap or two. No lift crowds but the typical crowded places seemed a lot more crowded than they actually were since you had 10-20' vis. The jump line on the park is nicely sorted, as far as I can tell. 5-6 jumps? Mostly big-to-me step ups, but plenty of speed and enough landing to prevent browning the pants. Lower terminal is the usual ice sheet, but smooth at the bottom so pointing it from the choke point is completely fine. Snow down low was nice and carvable. Crowds: 1, vis: .5, snow: .5. Which is 2/3.

1/28/19 Warm and sunny, but not as warm as Sunday according to NWAC. Refroze Sunday night into fast, friendly groomers Monday. "Ski Groomers Only" signange, no 7th or SC/DD.

Surprising crowd for a monday, but still parked right up front and didn't really see a lift line. Short wait for Hogs, but that was more the solitary badge gun. Nothing but blue skies. Backside was warming around noon-ish, and staying soft on the last pitch. The low angle bumps off at the bottom weren't entirely unpleasant, but nearly so.

2.5/3, groomer scale.

1/31 Amazingly it was another sunshine and groomer day. They started running SC/DD/7th but didn't have many takers. I saw one person get on 7th, no one on SC/DD. The upper half on the backside was kinda soft, but still solid for the bottom 500'ish off piste. Didn't notice anyone get off piste twice. Seemed like maybe a dozen people on the backside, and a few more on the front. The groomers were good to the bottom, only a couple small scraped areas. The snow was fast, nothing sticking at all.

Glacier refused to take its hat off, but otherwise looked great.

Tye had a low of 42 last night, 23 at the base.

2.9/3 groomer day. Perfect vis, no one around, almost perfect groomers top to bottom, wall to wall.

2/11: Slow day, had to clear my driveway, ~400' then the local road for another 900. A 1 series deere does not a plow make, but it's pretty much always good enough. Took an hour, then 1:15 from gold bar to the pass, but they just got turning. Great snow everywhere, mostly mid shin but plenty places knee+ deep and light. Not great bonding, but hitting bottom took some effort and it all seemed to stay in place. Very short to no lines, good vis.

2/12: even slower day, had to clear even more local road and it was twice as heavy. Started at 7, finished after 9. Tiny tractor needs chains. Even slower drive to the pass, 2h. Heavier snow, a single very long line on the backside. They opened then closed DD (the run) then reopened it.... not sure what that was about. Mostly no real waits. Vis was worse but fine, just easy to have worn too much.

I live here because the snow is supposed to stay where it belongs, in the mountains.

Other than that, a pair of spectacular 3/3 days.

2/15 No lowland snow to clear, no crowds, no lines, good vis. A little fresh, around boot top most places. The storm hadn't solidified so a few places still knee+, but between wind and traffic a few places got firm. Big flurries later in the day, and more warming than recently so I expect it'll firm up at least on the lower half.

2.8/3.

Fun day. Cold enough that the backside off piste stayed malleable. Bumps on DD were big and not so predictable. Grooming wa pretty good but a lot of folks came out on a Wednesday. Must be mid-winter school break.

2/20 A few inches of cold (~5%) snow with mediocre bonding to the base. I stuck to the front side since I've been stuck in a 45m+ line dealing with stopped backside lifts too many times this season, didn't feel like trying my luck. No lines, fresh turns all day. Low angle and steeps were fun, anything that gets bumped up wasn't terribly friendly. Spent a few laps learning more of the little slots between 7th and sky. Kinda amazing how few people that go to that area actually ski it, every lap had a single track going into a full pitch side slip. From the lift I saw a few full on butt slides down, pretty amusing to watch.

Found an awesome high traverse into the top of tye bowl from above the typical "danger cliff" signs the other day. Went looking for it again today but went too high and.... yeah. Brown pants. Hopefully no one was dumb enough to follow my tracks. The chute at the end of it was great. I _think_ I know how to get into that chute from the top now.... I'll bring a fresh pair of pants and try again next time. Maybe with 30' of cord....

Vis was variable, mostly good but sometimes 20-30'.

2.8/3.

2/22 Poor planing, should have done chores first. Hogs was broken in the morning sending the hordes to sky, which started lovely and got scraped, bumped and crowded about 3-4h earlier than normal. First couple runs enjoyed the great grooming. Abandoned that pretty fast, did a couple laps on Kehr's then to the back, with absolutely no one there. Off piste was eh but getting better as the day went on, and looks like it got a lot better at the end of the day.

Looking forward to brooks being a high speed. Vis was variable but pretty good.

Drive home had a crash on the bridge by index, snow on rain turned the road super slick. Helped a couple people dig their (AWD) cars out of the ditches before bailing from the shooting gallery for the backroads. Blizzaks rock, but even they were struggling to brake from all of 35.


Shameless plug, if you've got a kid send them here:  proformanceracingschool.com/half-day-teen-program/ or do the full day (adds a few laps on the track). They'll think you're sending them to a race program (you are) but you're actually sending them to learn how to stop. Doesn't matter what you drive. This kept me out of a ditch today, and many many others.

2/27 Styro snow, clearish skies, no lines, tiny crowd, slightly cool, good vis. 2.5/3

The hamster wheel of choice was jupiter today. Quick groomer laps with no ice sheet at the bottom of the backside! Off groomers was good, but not really that good. What wasn't tracked out was still soft, but that's not much without silly traverses; which I only did a couple times. Didn't find a good bump line anywhere, but didn't look very hard.

Telemetry doesn't show it but it was very windy, seems like way more than the ~20-28mph gusts NWAC has. Windswept snow, branches everywhere. Heard the backside was foggy in the morning, but it cleared up by 11(?)ish when we went back. Watched a couple people walking up the rooster over the course of 4-5 laps.

Good grooming, wall to wall but still no Orion. Can't recall when that gets pounded into submission but it should be soon...

Noticed the "vail sucks" graffiti on the tye cave is gone.

Fixed the canting on the better half's boots, yay for non-numb feet.

Fast drive home, except for the white Merc that passed a half dozen people on a blind corner right before Zeke's (you know, next to the giant passing zone...). Just to get off at Zeke's.

March: got lazy, didn't post. Summary: groomers, icy bumps, groomers, almost icy bumps, more groomers, groomers, sun, sun, sun, soft bumps! Sticky snow, rinse repeat. Maybe 2" in there somewhere.... Nothing interesting. I did ski the top chutes into tye bowl for the first time, that's fun.

4/7: First weekend skied in a long time, ~5". Nothing stuck anywhere approaching steep. Slow to open most the terrain but the low angle stuff was smooth. Weekday pow first line, no lines after that.

4/11: My birthday pow came a few days early, 10-12". You're welcome. A dozen people at sky in the morning. Better bonding than Sunday, but steeper stuff started sloughing towards the afternoon.

Started right around 9am. Kehr's took a bit, something about a boulder in the main path from the lift. Took a few laps on the frontside before heading to the back, which was warm and thick pretty early. Took shim's to the front. They should thin those trees. Chief bowl was still good for a couple laps, but the chute behind Dudley's (Pro chute?) had slid. Never seems like much of a point to do that. Grabbed some crappy fries, renewed the select passes and finished at sky/7th to increasing mist like precip.

3/3. Zero crowd. Great snow for April. Viz was off/on but never an issue.

4/14 Odd day today. New snow but nothing slid. Kicked a block down a chute. nothing. Didn't know what to do.

A few inches down low, upwards of a foot at the top of 7th. I didn't actually leave 7th/sky today. Big winds last night put some crustiness in places, heavy un-reactive snow elsewhere. Not so bad it'd grab too much, but some ice goblins where hiding and hunting for edges.

Saw people launching the 7th lift run. Epic. Finished my todo list with a weekend to spare! Epic-ness debatable.

4 out of 3 (+1 birthday pow modifier). Crowds somewhere, but no where I was other than a 50 ft chunk on cloud 9. I wouldn't shoot a major film, but viz was fine.

Great day!

4/19 Slush, boarding goodness. Bit of rain, no one there. It was the perfect day to be bad on a board and have a fun day. Showed up noon, 2nd car in lot 3. Rolled, slid, bounced, tomahawked and scorpioned down hogs, but several inches of rainy spring slush saved me from myself.


4/21 Parked further back than I have this year, but more grills than people skiing. Slow line at 10am but nothing much after that. Sunny laps "looking" for the golden egg. I'm too literal with the hints, maybe I'll be luckier next year. Bit sticky on some ungroomed snow, but not bad at all. Lots of festivities at the bottom. Great end to another great year.