Dec. 15th Crystal...I'm Pissed

The morning telemetry at Crystal on 12/15 showed wind gusts to 85 mph overnight. Even if the winds are decreasing, you're unlikely to have great skiing after a night like that.

I skied Crystal on Saturday. It was plenty fun, but not ideal. There was an ice crust a few inches down and a lot of wind effect. My only real complaint was that they didn't mention on their website that the chairs would be running at half speed. The line on REX was huge. On the other hand, Stevens posted clearly on their website that they were running on auxiliary power.

I'll have to agree with Lowell. Dec 15th Crystal website said the upper mountain would be closed. Heavy, high winds were still gusting. If you checked the hourly reports, that would have been confirmed.

I believe Crystal's fault is the lack of communication between employees. I worked as a lift op a couple years ago. When people ask questions about the lifts, the lift ops have the most direct info. Most of the time the chairs are closed because of high winds.

The gusting winds can knock the chairs off the cable on the high speed quads.

High winds are killers. Just look at what happened on Mt Hood.

The Reason that they closed Rex had nothing to do with the wind according to the info I got the cold weather and wind eroded some plastic gromitts on the chair on a few poles so they were afraid if they ran it they could get long term damage I waited in line as well for more then a hour and got denied but I would rather have it messed up for one day rather then take a chance of it being messed up for longer........ and to all who said the conditions were crap where were you going cause I got deep pow lines all day

I waited for an hour and half for REX to open.  Myself, Bill, Mark and friend stood in front of the line and were the first ones to start dancing.

Lifties also confirmed what Teter had mentioned.  Oh well.  Still better than money hold.  Still found nice untouched pow lines of varying depths in the trees.  Was so so so quiet in the trees on Friday.

Communication is the mother of all "f" ups.

Lift riding at Crystal is just like that movie you been dying to see.  You go in with high expectations only to be dissappointed.  Just lower your standards a bit and the sting won't be so bad.

New Crustal slogan:  Washington's Largest Ski Area...Just Lower Your Standards A Bit.

Last seasons trip to Park City ended on the last day with a broken gear on the lift to the upper mountain.  I didn't find out until after I had bought my lift ticket from a machine.  I always wondered why folks lined up at the ticket window instead of using the machines... now I know.  I quit feeling sorry for myself after talking to all the older folks that had to rope-lower from the chairs into deep snow (they got vouchers).

Stuff happens at every resort.  Crystal is not a destination resort with greeters and guides.  It is just a basic get your a$$ up the hill kind of place.   They even don't have much of a tricks-park.   However, I believe that the new upcoming Northway lift is a nod to the pow skiers.

I kind of enjoy Crystal's hokey style and now look forward to the lack of grooming.   If I want real nice then I will get to Deer Valley or some other resort.

If the Rex is closed then can't you slip over into Bear Pits/K2 Face?  I used to get frustrated with it all, but now just look forward to locking into my bindings looking for some goods wherever. 

 

So... I asked.


From: Lawrence Trotter [mailto:lawrencetrotter@comcast.net]
Sent: Monday, December 18, 2006 2:45 PM
To: 'cmpatrol@skicrystal.com'
Subject: RE: Friday Question


Thanks, keep up the great work. - larry

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From: Crystal Patrol [mailto:cmpatrol@skicrystal.com]
Sent: Monday, December 18, 2006 2:33 PM
To: larry@lawrencetrotter.com
Subject: RE: Friday Question


Larry,

Patrol rode up in grooming machines that morning for control work Friday. The winds had been in the 80’s the day before and we were anxious to get upper mountain av control done and then skiers on it to stabilize it asap. Unfortunately, REX was down due to heavy icing on the lift- specifically the sheaves (the little wheels that the haul rope runs on). Maintenance crews worked through the night to change out sheaves. With a storm of that magnitude and high freezing levels the icing problems alone can take days to overcome. This is what happened to Chair 6 as well and involved 2 days of personnel skinning to the top of C-6 and de-icing the sheaves one by one (not to mention the com line wrapped around a chair). Just like the power companies and emergency services in town during the storm we were doing everything we could to get skiers up the lifts and skiing. The good news is over 40” of new snow that we added to mountain. Hope you come and enjoy it soon. Please feel free to forward this to your friends.

Paul
CM Patrol Director

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From: Lawrence Trotter [mailto:lawrencetrotter@comcast.net]
Sent: Sunday, December 17, 2006 9:21 AM
To: cmpatrol@skicrystal.com
Subject: Friday Question



On a chat room, some of us are discussing the confusion that seems to have ocurred as to why the Rex/Upper mountain was not opened on Friday, Dec 15?  People say they got different stories from different people.  Especially, that ski patrol said that blasting was completed.   Does anyone there have the answer? 



Thanks - larry trotter

That it takes time to resolve storm related damage is understandable. What bothers me is that information about what will be open at the resort apparently comes from the marketing dept. For example, I called Friday night (12/15) to the snow line and the recorded message said that High Campbell (among other lifts) would be open. It didn't say, they're working around the clock to open it, or they hope to open, they advertised on the phone line that it would be open. It was not. I was a bit disapointed since High Campbell is probably my favorite part of Crystal, but oh well.  Experiences like this (along with long lift lines and frequent lift stoppages) are why I often prefer just to stay away from the lifts.