Day 16 a good powder day but maybe better to come

We woke this morning to find it snowing. Obviously it hadn't been snowing long as there was no real accrual but the fall rate looked pretty promising. As we arrived at the hill in the usual -3ish temps it was really puking down snow and the fall rate had to be at least 5 cms per hour. The snow stayed until late morning after which we had occasional light flurries.The official figures were for 8 cms of fresh and maybe we had another 10 during the day.

With everything socked in we went to the Old Side and found that the new snow on the existing base gave some very nice deep and fluffy powder - it seemed to me that the upper hill had about double the snowfall of the base but that is just a guess. In any event everything was very good early season powder.

Boomerang was well filled in with untracked lines on skiers left. After that we tried Linda's as it had been good face shots a week ago and we weren't disappointed, still good face shots. We then stuck our noses in Cedar Ridge, and that was it for the morning as we found our way down several times in deep untracked snow with only a bit of bush wacking needed to get out at the bottom. As this area had only officially opened a couple of days ago the snow was particularly deep and soft all over.

We did have a look in Kangaroo but even with the new snow the top was still too twiggy but the lower section was good powder skiing between the trees, roots, rocks, stumps etc. As the New side was calling we dropped to base through Bear Chutes (don't shoot the Bear) and found great lines in between the clumps of alders with an exit via the Goat Trail.

We had time for two Polar Peak loops on the New Side before a late lunch. Both times up the peak it was very socked in at the top so that the first few turns did involve a fair bit of guess work. As we came out of the cloud the run in Pappa Bear opened up into knee deep untracked powder for some of the best skiing so far of the season. The two runs to base were through Cougar Glades (a bit tracked up but nice soft snow) and Decline (just getting better all the time with deep soft snow on lively terrain and a fantastic lower section thanks to the work done on the alders in the summer) - time for a late lunch.

In the afternoon it was straight back up Polar Peak. The viz had improved a bit which was a pity as it encouraged a few more takers but there was still plenty of deep untracked on the sides of the chutes. We went to base via Stag Leap which was improved by the new snow with great soft rolling terrain for the most part but still a bit scratchy in the final pitch.

Polar Peak was too good to miss so we made a final run and it was just as good as the others. In order to get some final skiing in White Pass we had to return to White Pass base by Trespass Trail which a buddy of mine describes as the only run on the hill which is up hill in both directions. Our White Pass loop took us into the 3rd Knot Chute via a pretty steep drop in but we were repaid but some of the deepest untracked snow on the hill - on to Surprise Trees which were tracked but still with some fresh lines available,

Last run was - you guessed it - Skydive. The new snow just meant that you could push things that little bit harder and as a result have a really fun finish to the day.

Best news of all is that the really heavy snow is still yet to come (so they say) and if the forecasters are right (chokes on beer) we could be in for a very exceptional few days.