Crystal - 04/02

Expected marginal conditions with only 4 reported new over what I saw yesterday, so started the day slow in heavy snow fall with somewhat foggy vis….thought it might be a short day, but as I started poking around the edges of REX I realized that conditions with the Coombas today could be very nice – and it ended up being very nice. Snow quality improved and kept filling in all day, no crowds ( Pay lot half full, C lot full, nobody really parked in the B lot – season is over for most folks), allowed for filled in repeat runs in the Doors and M-world. The soft glop from yesterday had not frozen solid yet and the new on top made off Piste pretty nice. (Heard Upper E to Bull was improving as the day progressed) Big news was all the slides on Friday and early this morning…Kellys Gap got hammered yesterday – a unseen slide around noon stirred up the Patrol and they had a controlled bombing of Rock Face around 3pm which was apparently a pretty big show for the crowd watching it….took out a bunch of big trees from what I heard and covered most of the cat track all the way down low. Also heard a big slide went down Niagraas (which will improve that fall line run next season) and Bearpits was totally roped off and closed today cause of a big slide – could see some trees bent over around the middle of the pit. Should be good tomorrow. Real party time in the lodge with the brewfest and steel drum band playing. ddk

I heard the Bearpits slide when I was riding up REX a little after 8. It sounded huge and you could hear all kinds of trees snapping as it rumbled down. Unfortunately I couldn't actually see it.

Turned out to be a great day, no lines and lots of empty chairs made the snow hold up pretty well even though it felt like less than half the mountain was open. There were pockets of really good snow around, but definitely lots of death cookies lurking under the new.

Thanks for not taking me out on the rightberg ridge today Dan. Sorry to sneak up on you like that.
The upper mountain still has a pretty frozen firm base on it that improved through the day with the new snow, but it's not by any means out of the woods yet. At about 5800 ft down to the base area the snow was softer because the snow base had not set up like the upper mountain. Skiing very fast, with subtle edging helped to hydroplane over the snow snakes.  Skiing the fresh untracked was great in the morning. Although when it got tracked up and the rain layer got tilled up to the top layer... there was some pretty heinous skiing until the snow falling, filled it in a bit to make it more like tolerable, but you still had to have game. My plan was to just point the skis until I saw an untouched patch then turn. The groomed skied surprisingly well later in the day, probably because less people were on the hill so it was not all micro bumped out. Visibility was real variable, usually on the limited side.

As I mentioned before- off piste skiing is being strongly discouraged until the big avy cycle settles out. Crystal is so adamant about protecting the patrol they are bringing in a helicopter to do the control work in North and South backcountry.

Thanks for not taking me out on the rightberg ridge today Dan. Sorry to sneak up on you like that.

Not a problem Joe...since I missed you thankfully...had a great run from that point on down M-World.