Dec 29 Alpental

My son and I did a few mid-day laps at Alpental today -- right during the break of clearish weather.   

All but one inbounds run is open -- Debbies is definitely developing bumps.   The entrance to upper International still requires a good amount of rock dodging -- I preferred the upper entrance clearer today as the lower entrance pretty bumpy, rutted and scraped.

Nice soft bumps on International -- even at 2pm there was still deep snow to be found traversing far to the right on lower international and far to the right on Edelweiss bowl.

There was one backcountry gate open -- but we stayed inbounds.

Snow started again in earnest right as we were leaving.

How was the crowd level and how long the wait for chair 2? I surprised by the crowd there friday (as I was pulling out there was the "lot full" sign in the lower lots), wading up to chair 2 was about 10 mins as a single.

My buddy and I got up to Alpental about 6:00pm and it got better as it got later with about an inch and half an hour. Nobody there and sweet snow conditions with pow shots everywhere. Used my headlamp to get it in the trees where it was really good. They closed down the lifts at 9:30 because of lightning. We didn't see it and I think the lifties just wanted to go home. Killer night slaying everything.