January 23, 2011 Alpental

We got that thaw that tele.skier was hoping for. Arrived about 8 am to a dusting+ of new snow that had been thoroughly wetted and sat on top of the reported crust. Once wet and warmer this stuff turned into a grabby layer. In the trees by Meister/Eisfallen the crust was still present. Thankfully it continued to warm up and some rain came down (not a real rain, more like heavy drizzle/mist). Anyway, that decomposed the crust and it was slush and scraped off for the duration. Chair 2 open all day. Rode it several times and the snow up top was just as grabby but there did seem to be more. Lots of untracked snow left of Gunmount and above the fan. Only saw one skier hit Breakover. Fog tried hard to clear a couple times and by afternoon the base area was heavily fogged while about 500 ft higher it was clearer. Lots of holes including the one shown below just under the main lift. Rocks coming out on the lower traverse too. I suppose this is payback for the nice weather at Yodelin on Saturday.