Alpental, March 4th

After witnessing the gorgeous conditions on Thursday it was a little sad to be up there on sunday...
Fog was so dense from just below Armstrong to the base that I was starting to get dizzy from the vertigo of trying to ski through zero visibility. Snow was wet-pack springish conditions and suprisingly skiable...you just couldn't see anything.
All of chair 2 was above the clouds and was much better but Lower Nash was so bad it was funny...good practice for bad backcountry conditions i guess....12" deep loose glop mixed with chunks of what looked like avy debris....I had high hopes my new skis would somehow be able to chew up conditions like this....nope.

Hard to beat Thursday, for sure. We were up there yesterday too, and the members of our group debated as to whether the snow was more fun to ski down in the fog on the quad or up on chair 2 in the sun. We avoided Internationale after hearing the top was excellent but the lower half was re-frozen skied mank that was among the worst snow ever skied (in flat light). As long as we stuck to previously groomed or more heavily skied areas, we actually had pretty fun turns (but not like Thursday, to be sure). As usual, it helped to ski near trees down in the fog, though they seem to have groomed enough that braille turns in the open worked pretty well too - i.e. few suprise moguls on the lines we chose.

We kept running into Androolus through the day, who I sort of recognized from seeing him on top of Earl a few seasons back. He tried to gently pry the location of our favored Snoqualmie area stashes out of us, but I invoked the "stashworthiness protocol" (we'd have to take you to tell you, and you've have to agree to abide by the protocol), and he seemed satisfied. But yesterday, many of us seemed more inclined toward frontcountry.

I most enjoyed my afternoon at alpental, even lower international. Perhaps it got better in the afternoon. The chair 2 line was about 10 minutes line until about 2:30pm when the line disappeared. I also enjoyed the fact that the chair 2 lifties were selling hot dogs. Next time I will have to purchase one.

It was great to meet "He who must not be named" and his comrades all wearing dynafits. I suggested a thumb wrestling match for the location of "the slope that must not be divulged", but no dice. It will continue to remain a secret.

I had a feeling it would be lousy.
We opted for a different kind of adventure by plowing our way up the Middle Fork for a soak at Goldmeyer. I figure the positive karma I accrued digging out 3 separate parties will help bring the freezing levels back down to the blower conditions of last week. In the meantime, warm wet weather is Ullrs way of saying "get some work done".