Big Sky - 3/03

Arrived at Big Sky late afternoon yesterday with a forecast for snow over night, snow today, and cold temps. Woke up this morning to sun and a trace of new. And cold. -10 degrees at 10am at the top of the Swift Current chair. The last two weeks, they've received a couple inches of snow every few days so it's kept things refreshed. A few rocks here and there, but coverage is fantastic compared to my home mountain (Crystal). After a really cold groomer, jumped into some diamond bumps. Wow, true packed powder, not the blue ice kind of packed powder back home. Had a great day doing big W's across the mountain from the Lone Moose chair (where we are staying), all the way across to the Moonlight Basin side, then back. Skipped the tram to the top as the wind was blowing and it was -18 up there. With forecasts for sun and warmer the next few days, we decided to wait until tomorrow to head to the very top. A really good day in spite of the cold. Oh, and it was free with our Crystal passes making it even better.

From the place that trademarked Big, it's in their name. Big, and they know how to do cold, jeeeze, I had on more clothes than ever before in my life. Coverage is good on 75% of the terrain which is plenty. Only the steep couloirs look unskiable and a watchful eye was all that was needed on the rest. Screaming Groomers were out of the question with the cold temps even though the snow was good. But we're not here for groomers and the best fun was nice packed pow bumps on the north facers. South facing aspects had some ice from previous sunny days, but they'll come in nicely with warm temps later in the week. Very light crowd, only every 5-7th chair filled at the busiest part of the day and sometimes we were the only people on a chair. And we're almost the only ones skiing off the groomers. Looking forward to getting up top when the temps rise above negative double digits and the wind lets up.