Crystal - 01/24 BIG 2

Ski Report - Bigger Sun, Bigger deeper new cold smoke and sadly a bigger crowd.   Hell quality first two runs - SunnySide and PB/BP,  and PB was by far my best deep snow skiing of the season!  Snow quality is great, but big sun impact will hit the south facing slopes, North facing will be awesome for a long time.   Coverage is BIG and deep everywhere - should be a great spring season.

Other - Fair sized very early crowd for CHex, late opening for REX allowed the rest of the early crowd to show up and make REX a painful crowd early.  Got lucky because of the REX line up and headed over to be nice to #1 on FQex - dang CH6 is running and loading and  that led to a great PB run.   During the typical 10am hour lines grew so we did a QuickSlowSilver ride and a CHex ride to  see if life had mellowed and spread out - not! So we had a to early bail out...shoulda stuck it out based on the early afternoon cam's.   Fun morning, more skiing would have been even more fun - but it was another random POWDER day.

Other - Drive up and down kinda slow due to snow on the road and ultra careful  drivers.  Pay lot FULL!, B and C full  as was D,E and H.  Hope today was the "new" weekday hoards day.  Used to just be buses and HHW day....oh for the good all days.

We were looking forward to a bluebird day with a couple inches new and light crowds.  Woke up and checked the report.  9" of 10 degree powder.  Dang, we gotta get on the road.  Through Enumclaw at 7:10 and then a really slow grind to the mountain.  Our normal 1 hour and 10 minute drive was an hour and a half.  Our friends were way ahead of us by the time we pulled into the lot and being a powder day, no friends...they were off and up the lifts.  Of course, if things were reversed, exactly the same thing.  Got two really good powder runs on the front side and then it was all over.  As things warmed, the snow got heavy.  And the lines mid morning got huge helped out by long random REX stops.  But, as has happened almost every crowded day this season, everybody on REX and GV disappeared at noon.  The afternoon was very nice even with the heavy snow, but GV definitely held the nicest.  And thanks to a suggestion by Derek, one of the last runs down was Rinky Dink, which was awesome, but too short.   

Drive down was also painful, just not as bad as the drive up.

Best Quality snow of the year under the best weather of the year. Quantity was limited by big lines, delayed opening, stopping (broken?) Rex, and the best sunny weather of the year turning the afternoon snow to thick, mucky potatoes. Got 3 good Frontsides before the deep new was tracked out. Headed northish for the runs of the day down the good side of Employee Housing and an old school line down Left Angle, both where the shade of trees made the difference. By noon, anything with sun was painful junk. Some good snow left in Green Valley, but on-and-off long lines made us take our big runs to the bank and bail.

Might not be the best underlayment when it freezes, but looks like lots of snow to cover it. Lots of morning slides on Rock Face and north. Southback was supposed to open late, never heard any booms or a green light. With all the slides in Bear Pits, could be dicey out there.

The line on REX turned me off so I went straight to GV and got in half a dozen laps in a lot of delicious 
pow before the hord arrived.  I tried to exit via Kelly's Gap but it was closed and had to walk back to GV..  Then a couple on the front side where  the thicker snow  made it more work, but still fun as the line son REX was not as bad.  
I took a nice long lunch break in my car.  After that there were only small lines everywhere, so of to 6 and Northway.  Powder Bowl was mighty fine crud. Hamburger short was aun effected.  Hamberger itself would have been a better bet.  Northway was getting a crust on top of the sunshine. pow as the sun moved arlound.   What a glorious day to be out in the mountains.