January 26, 2012 Summit Central

The Mountain Pass Report of “Mixed Precipitation” plus the term “Crust” on the Ski Report was not very encouraging. DaveP sent me 2 emails about the crust. I dropped Jill off for her Ski Masters party bus up to Stevens and decided to go to Silver Fir.  Coming from the west side, it was snowing hard from exit 38 all the way to the Summit and the car thermometer read 30 degrees and there was a breeze.  I was the first vehicle in the Silver Fir lot, hmmmm.  At the base, there was about 3” fresh on top of a firm base.  While waiting for the first chair to load, a Ski Patroller mentioned the breakable/unfriendly crust. My spine reminded me of my 2 spinal surgeries and I asked about the groomers. They did groom Silver Nugget and Hogwild which were enjoyable with the fresh snow.  It continued to snow heavily and I found that seeing the line between the goomed surface and the ungroomed breakabke crust challenging at times. Plus some of the ridges left by the groomers were firm. Venturing off the groomers was really variable with the crust.  So for me, it was a cruiser morning on the groomers as the snow continued to accumulate.  The snowboarders seemed to handle the crust better than the skiers.  I stopped by Alpental as I was leaving and 2 different skiers mentioned the crust with a firm surface near the base.  The upper lift was scheduled to open shortly so hopefully the higher elevations were spared the crust.

There was definitely (rain?) crust up top at Alpental, just buried under a foot of new snow. Conditions from about the top of Sessel down weren't enjoyable at all, even on a groomer, even with the 2-3" of new snow which had fallen this morning. However, conditions up top were great, despite fairly low visibility from entering the whiteroom with every turn.

Chair 2 didn't start loading until 10 which meant I had a full 3 laps of crusty mank to warm up with this morning before waiting in the line - which was about two dozen people long. The five laps I got up top were well worth the wait as was the line through Shot Six I took around 11. Finished my day with a lap down Nash which wasn't bad but Adrenaline and Lower Nash were certainly interesting with that crust and wind effects.

Lots of sluffing up high... easy to knock all the snow off in front of you leaving you with a boilerplate bed surface to skitter down. Snow wasn't even holding to the Fan. Lots of bombs going off all over the place this morning and chunky debris in the usual places.

Skied Alpental from 9-12:30 and was pleasantly surprised with the conditions...esp up chair two. there was enough skier traffic down low to break up the crust and snow was light underneath so was fun when all mixed up. Took 5 or 6 rides up chair two, trekked out above the bowl (newbie so excuse lack of specific names) and had lot of fresh turns in 1-2' ft.

It was still snowing hard when I left and with the colder temps, possible sun, tomorrow morn should be sweet!

John

That's crazy it got a visit from Krusty the Clown.  It was snowing and skiing great last night at Alpy, and you wouldn't have guessed there was a bout of freezing rain from the telemetry.  Makes me feel less bad I had to work and school today.  :