2.28.09 Crystal - Saturday Rec Skiing

Saturday - Skied the lower slopes with the grandson.

Maximum crowd - pretty much all parking must have been full by about 10:30.  I got a parking space across the street from lot D, in front of what looked like a Crystal Fire Station?  Can y'all imagine Lot C totally full?

And the ticket booth lines were strung out down into lot A....  and of course pretty big lift lines.  What saved us is that Grandson with his fifth time on skis, wanted to take on Gold Hills.... no lift line and pretty good skiing.  He got pretty good on that slope.

Weather started out sunny and cool and turned into high overcast and cold winds.  Wore the headsock under the helmet. 

So, all the lower slopes got groomed.  Any ungroomed was pretty condensed  pow.  So, things were fresh and slightly used.  The cold temps are preserving things nicely. 

Easy exit from parking....  passed a situation with a car off the road at about mile 37.  Car had dropped down about ten feet from the road.  Flares were out and others were in attendence so I didn't stop.  Nothing about road conditions would have contributed to that.  So... drive carefully!  WSP was pouncing on morning hwy 410 traffic.

Good day to mix it up with the weekenders.... Thankfully I got to ski on Thursday pow!

We were there too thinking about Vertfest. Didn't want to pay $75 to race up moguls and then stand in line so got some great turns in Cement basin instead. Absolutely no regrets whatsoever when looking down at the crowds and moguls of Crystal!

Better day than the forecast gave though.

Avoiding the crowd was all about knowing where not to be.

2/28/09 – Crystal was quite nice on this partly cloudy Saturday. An early start got us chair 10, and the first crowd was not nearly as big as we thought it might be when we loaded at 0830. The mid-week’s snow wasn’t as soft as hoped, so swapped out the fat sticks for thins and wow, what a crowd buying tickets – backed up out into the parking lot. Bopped on by and headed back up to join the posse for the rest of the morning. Groomers were fun but most of the off-piste had already been pretty well zapped by the mid-weekers. Northway was challenging and interesting. Would be better without the knee-high bumpfields though. Ended up finding the best snow of the day in an old favorite with several boot deep turns and even a knee-tapper or two while slaloming the trees. Camera flaked out, so no pics So it goes. Cars parked all the way down in Lot F when we split at 2. Only 4 corndogs due to lack of fresh and the afternoon wind. TomK & Kerry, Nick, and Chad.