Day 78 a good day and some stuff coming down tonight

This morning dawned overcast and with no new snow but with a promise of flurries. Temps were around -10 but got up pretty quick to low minus figures at the base and about -5 on top all day. It remained socked in all day despite an attempt for the sun to shine mid morning so there was no direct sun warming. Early afternoon it clouded over and started to snow with a light high moisture content snow which had great fill in qualities. By the end of the day it was coming down reasonably hard and although it seems to have slackened off in the town I have a feeling it is still coming down pretty hard up on the tops.

After a couple of days on the New Side we went to the Old Side for starters if only because the viz deteriorated pretty quickly above Bear top. Conditions revealed some well wind affected surfaces with a mixture of wind sift and wind slab. This was the pattern for the day - very variable conditions as you were never quite sure what kind of blow in snow you were going to ski on plus the surface it had accrued on could be anything from soft powder to bullet hard ice. In other words you had to stay alert and on your game all day in some very mixed conditions.

We warmed up down Sunny Side shoulder and the China Wall chute both of which were exactly the varied conditions described. Next was loop out to Steep and Deep which was just that but getting a little crunchy in the sun affected snow on the right hand side. for the first time in a few weeks I dropped the mid chutes and they were surprisingly good but as always tight and steep.

After that it was loops off Cedar Ridge, King Fir, Boomerang, Buck Shot etc, Boom ridge was off the agenda because once again the groomers had destroyed the surface into a flat boring carpet which was nothing to do with my definition of what skiing was about. We took another loop out to Steep and Deep and this time I stayed a bit further left to avoid the sun crust and had great soft snow skiing all the way into the left hand exit chutes.

Returns were always via Kangaroo which we skied 5 times and was always hard icey bumps, the best test of a good skier you can get. Just once I had to avoid a large number of visitors not having their best days skiing as they tried to negotiate the bumps and particularly the drop onto the cat track mid way down.

Lunch ....... dinner just called, report to be corrected and completed later............. oh dear one very heavy red wine based meal later, God only knows how this is going to turn out.

In the afternoon I went to the New Side and found that Polar Peak was closed on account of it being socked in - probably a good call. We went out to Cougar Glades and had an ok run in tracked snow all the way down to left hand creek bed at the bottom which was a bit less tracked.

Stag Leap was also ok soft snow although tracked up. Having met up with my buddy Rob who was skiing his split shift we went out the Decline top which was all soft bumps followed by Window Chutes which were still pretty good and soft if a little icey on the final ski out.

By then we had met up with two more buddies - Stinger and (Manchester) Peter who had just tried to find the Brain and not succeeded. Next loop we all went out to the Brain and I think everyone was satisfied as it was lightly tracked and as you dropped the trees there were still plenty of untracked lines to find.

We had some time to kill so with the others gone Stinger and I went into Knot Chutes which were ok but a bit chunky and then Surprise Trees which were in ok shape and getting better as the late afternoon flurries were starting to accumulate.

Final run was of course Skydive. The bumps in the top are steep, the middle section is great and the lower section just a little scratchy but getting better in the new snow. Hoping for some more snow tonight but not too much more as I can hear my Irish guests getting the bottle of Jamesons out so it could be a long night.