During the night I noticed rain turning to snow and woke to find a covering of wet snow which was down to valley level and a report from the hill of 23 cms of fresh snow at mid mountain giving a base of 391 cms - 4 metre party could be coming soon. Temps on the way to the hill were +2 with about -3 at the top. During the day temps rose, but not much with overcast conditions protecting the new snow and flurries of grappel (quite heavy at times) adding to the base with ridge line blow in also doing it's bit.
Just like yesterday we went to the New Side and stayed there all day so nothing much I can say about the Old side conditions. Despite the notice at the base of Timber telling us that Knot Chutes and Anaconda Glades were open, they weren't which was hardly surprising given the snow we had overnight. The I bowl and Surprise Trees were open and with hardly anyone on the hill they remained only lightly tracked all morning. It was awesome in Surprise, just like cat skiing, point your skis anywhere you wanted to go in untracked terrain and let it rip.
The snow was a little different from yesterday. I think it had been packed a bit harder by the wind so you got on top more quickly and as a result the skis ran quicker earlier. This seemed to catch out a few people and we saw some great stacks from the chair which reminded us to recentre ourselves before opening up.
Late morning we took a trip to the base via Triple Trees which confirmed that the new snow had covered the crap band that has been there for the past few days low down and we now had good soft powder all the way to base. Then Anaconda opened.
Anaconda was, just as yesterday, totally awesome. The 23 cms of fresh on top of yesterdays powder gave over the head face shots in all chutes. Knot Chutes then opened and just like yesterday we looped various Knot chutes - various Anaconda chutes - various Bootleg chutes in all permutations. Bootleg was now great soft powder all the way down. We did this until a late lunch.
After lunch there didn't seem any point in doing anything but exactly the same, so we did. The funny thing about Anaconda is that 90% of the traffic drops one of the first two chutes. This means that if you go a little further along the ridge line you are skiing untracked lines even late at the end of the day. Around Bootleg there were so many different ways into the trees either side that I found myself skiing in these tight trees with no obvious line for the first time ever but always in the knowledge that the snow was so "hero" that you could just go anywhere and do anything and get away with it.
One more big opening due for tomorrow ith 83 cms of fresh since that area (no of course I am not going to say where until we have trashed it) was last skied. Early night with only some beer.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
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