December 29, 2008 Stevens Backside Opening Day

Little in the middle but Stevens got much back...

For sure enough cover. There were definitely places I visited where there were boulders or stumps or logs still shaping the terrain, but for most part they were adequately covered by great pillows of loose snow, even though sometimes you could spy into little cracks to see what was beneath. Only in a few places (like near Tye chairline) where the hummocks were less playground and more minefield. Snow wasn't Utah grade but with a largely undisturbed snowpack you got to sink in plenty. Best runs IMO were dropping Jupiter chairline into Corona, and the whole area between Pegasus and Andomeda (could go anywhere).

There were still some ticketing snafus, particularly for people trying to get either season pass or Adv Card onsite.

Around lunchtime the wind really picked up and the last 200 vf of the southern cross chairride were snowblasted misery, particularly with chair running halfspeed. Retreated to Jupiter after that, and bailed for good at 1:30. The backside might still have been the place to be to stay out of the wind. Drive home got interesting for as far as Scenic because blowing snow took visibility to zero more than a few times.

Family and I skied there also. Ticket lines were atroscious! We were there early and lost a hour of early skiing. Good skiing though with things filling in. finally about 230 the winds wore us out. Top of tye mill one of our Adults party was completely blown over.

I went up there yesterday around noon and the wind was nasty but the snow was great. I didn't get to the backside because they started closing the lifts early. I mostly stayed under the quad to stay out of the wind and found some chest deep powder. On big chief to the skiers right, in the woods, there was some great powder lines and drops. At one point I passed a guy with a wind indicator and and he said it was 42 mph around 3:30. Even though there was a white out from time to time, the snow was amazing and the drive home was a blind one!

Windy day for sure on Monday, got to agree the backside had awesome powder off the popular trails when you weren't running into wind scorn areas later in the day.  High winds got worst as the day progressed... Seventh closed early, back side closed early, then Tye Mill closed (all these lifts before 2:00 or shortly after).  Then Big Chief closed which was a bummer as there was good powder collecting there and then by 4:30pm Skyline lift closed... 40 mph winds with higher gusts it felt like, could hear the empty chairs on Big Chief clanking against the support tower poles.  With only Hogsback running, no point staying after that.

Might expect more of this for the week with all the forecasted wind storms  ???

Skied there yesterday but by 2:00 had enough of the wind blowing us around. Nice powder early in the a.m. so I'll be heading up after work today for a few runs - perhaps Cowboy!

What is it about the ticket lines at Stevens.

Can you still get tickets at a gas station or two on the way to the area? I hear you used to be able to do so...