April 13, 2006, Crystal Mtn.

Thursday, a strange day for weather.  Morning was cold with frozen courderoy groom and cold at the base.  Chair six was closed for the first hour or so because of the icey conditions.  We skied the lower slopes for a while waiting for things to warm up.  A constant 20 mph wind.  We soon made our way up the Rex where Green Valley Bowl was super slick but ok.  Passed on Iceberg because a look at the top indicated death cookies, so down a very smooth West Face.  Lower steeps like Bull Run were soft enough with bumps.  Luckyshot was the nice run of the day.  Few folks skiing early, often we felt all alone on the runs.  Somehow crowds showed up late morning.

About Noon things softened up and we expanded our runs into Snorting Elk and down Kelly's Gap.  Sluiceway entrance had roped off rock exposures and the Berry Farm area had big chunks of avalanche debris, probably from blasting.  Iceberg was good.

By about 2:00 pm, things soften up radically, and the stormy weather moved in replacing partly sunny and blue sky.  Things got pretty stormy with some interesting wind gust.  At the level of the bottom of the Rex and below it was irritatingly slushy and sticky.  Visability got bad from fog, wet snowfall on the goggles and general whiteout - ski by touch.  By closing time weather was downright nasty, winds, rain or wet snow, etc.

Generally, things went from crisp and cold to moderate at noon, then to slushy and stormy from about 2:00pm.