December 22, 2009 Crystal

Great day. Solid 8 inches in most places. A few death cookies, but they are avoidable.

Only skied chair 6 and southback.

Lots of goods left on the second half of Silver Basin...some good pockets on the Thrown and the King.

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They opened Northway around 10:30 there was a sign warning od rocks on I-5 but no problems. About 8" of fluff on a hard crust. Wind deposit began building on South Aspects late in afternoon. Nice views. Was stuck on REX for about 15 minutes.

Yep,  went up not expecting much more than beautiful mountain views, smiley people on x-mas vacation, and some fresh pow on chopped up refrozen inbounds.  I was  hopeful that I would find some smoothness in the south.  Conditions met, and in most cases, exceeded expectations.
Good skiable chop could be found in bounds.  The snow stayed cold in the shade until I decided to start heading south due to my desire to ski SE off the King, and the sun's warming effects.  Good call.
Good boot top Cascade powder, other tracks could be avoided for the majority of turns.  Woo-hooing escaped my upper airway from mid face down to Silver basin... Hey, life's short.
Next lap I dropped further south off the ridge (note to cornice huckers: let 'er fly).  Then, seeing as how I lack even a crumb of common sense, I skinned back up to the ridge.   I jumped on a switchback and kicked a cornice.  Stability was good with only the top two inches sluffing easily, and the rest staying put.  At 15:40 I dropped into my own private untracked NW facing gully just north of Three Way (I don't know the name).  Very good.
If you're wondering if the real backcountry at Crystal would be worth it... Definitely!  Tomorrow should yield excellent vis, cold temps, and about a foot of soft, smooth, stable pow on NW-E facing slopes.  If you've got your shopping taken care of, go get it!