December 25, 2006, Merry Crystal

I don't post many reports here anymore, especially not about a lift-served day, but this was SO GOOD! I wasn't sure if it would be worth going, since 50-60 mph winds all day on the 24th had kept the entire upper mountain closed according to the Crystal Mountain website. But I decided to wake up early and check the telemetry, and sure enough the winds had died down closer to 10 mph, with 11" of new snow from top to bottom. I hurriedly packed and got there by 8:30, and the ticket cashiers promised that Rex would open by 10AM, followed by High Campbell later on. Lots of bombs going off high above as I waited with about a 100 others in line for the lifts to open at 9:00 sharp. Nearly half those folks headed straight to Rex to wait in line, but I decided to head to FQ for 5 runs of foot-deep untracked powder! Way better than waiting in line! Lots of avalanche activity visible above Campbell Basin, perhaps 20+ separate small windslabs (looked about 6" deep from a distance) had let loose along the ridge from Silver Queen to the Throne, don't know if they were natural or patrol-triggered.

Made it over to Rex at 10:10, just a couple minutes after it opened. Still managed to get an untracked first run right down the center of the trail formerly known as Iceberg Gulch (Middle Ferk's Run, what the ?!?!?). Heard an interesting story on the lift my next time up, from some regulars who had chosen to wait in the Rex line. A small group of skiers was yo-yoing Rex in untracked powder from 9-10AM, while it remained closed to the public. They recognized two of them as (owner) John Kircher and his wife, a former ski patroller. By the time the group skied down a 4th time in untracked fluff, the angry mob at the base of Rex managed to fling a few snowballs at them. I'm glad I didn't see it with my own eyes (I was too busy SKIING instead), but that's quite a nasty slap in the face to the paying customers if management really did behave that way.

Anyway, it didn't affect me and I got over 20 more excellent runs, every one of them in deep semi-untracked powder. The 11" new had wind drifted into more like 4-18" above 6000 ft, with shallow wind slabs on certain exposed aspects above a solid crust, while more sheltered knee-deep areas were excellent all day. I took a couple of runs all the way to the base in the morning (lower Bull Run & Exterminator), but below 5000 ft it had clearly rained just a bit overnight making the snow denser and nastier, so I stayed above the rest of the day. Partly sunny in the morning, mostly cloudy in the afternoon, but The Mountain was visible on and off for most of the day, while winds remained nearly calm. Crowds were very light after 10:30, and it was still possible to ski semi-untracked powder run-after-run past 3PM on a certain officially-marked trail with no hiking to get to it. Apparently North Back opened around 2:30, but I never felt the need to head over there as long as every run remained powder in my own secret-but-in-plain-sight stash. The Avocet altimeter counted 42K vertical by day's end, probably the most I've ever skied in deep powder.


Nice view just before my last run of the day.

Nice report. Good to hear you had a wonderful day. I was lusting at my computer looking at the Crystal cam and telemetry while awaiting the invasion of my grandsons, aka future trailbreakers.   Zap

We had quite a weekend at Crystal - I skied Friday, Saturday, rested Sunday and back again Monday - Saturday we got into the northback just as they opened the ropes and skied powder through the trees. Monday morning we skied forest queen and waited til they opened Rex and bombed campbell basin. We skied chair 6 then back to green valley. The funnest was powder bowl to bear pits...by 2:00 PM my legs were cooked. Really great skiing.

Way to be vigilant with that telemetry, Amar.