Crystal - 12/02 Yeee Haaa!

Short Ski Report - Yee Haaa! Prime early season and nobody around, resonable grooming, GREAT off piste in GV Bowl skiers right for me!!!! Ouch! Fun. Dang it! Definitly rocks in places (gotta be smart or a salalom skier. Bumps great in the Valley, Bumps maybe almost to big off of LS. Didnt go a lot of places....did do a couple of runs on FQex to give #1 some info for tomorrow...will be her first day!. Should be gerat out above the lowland soup!

Other - Checked out various places (CB lodge, Base Lodge, Guest services, Starbucks coffee shop)....all fun, gave grief, got grief, heard tell that someone actually reads email, or posts about opinions...there are a lot of new things, processes and operations...that might be negotiable with enough local input...

ps re-met lots of folks, and even some Tay folks - Quick Foot - nice to see everyone again...Big Fun Day. Got my LTS (longest time skiing) and my SMDV (season max daily vert)....and I could still walk when I got out of my truck at home!

Other Other - Drive up this morning in the lowlands was a praise the lord I made it...happy driving from Mud Mt up....Special folks parking was pretty empty when I left way to early, rest of A was pushing 1/3...B lot full past the shuttle stop, C had a lot of cars...but not full and that was pretty much it today. Drive down was happy fast till I dropped into the PS muck....Ouch! Looking forward to more big sunny up high tomorrow.

And now for the rest of the report. No one was there! The only time I rode a chair with someone was with ddk. I thought Snorting Elk Bowl skied better than GV right, but the rest of Elk Snort wasn't groomed and pretty rocky getting to the bottom. Ferkberg also wasn't groomed, but in the 40 degree weather, softened around 10:30. Would have been fun to ski more than once, but it was a rock garden. Front side softened sometime after 11, and coverage was much better than Ferkberg. Noticed NW was open, so took a run down Paradise Bowl. Just OK and of course the run-out at the bottom wasn't groomed, although better coverage on that last turn than expected. Also headed up C6 which was the biggest surprise of the day. Rocks on top, but easy to ski around and drop in without side-stepping. And PB was the best snow I skied. Not powder, just carvable styro with well-spaced moguls.

ddk and I stopped in the Campbell Basin lodge to see if they had any food offerings. Absolutely nothing. The one employee in there said we could buy food at the outside fish stand. A big sign on the door said no outside food or beverages...everything had to be purchased inside...where there was nothing to purchase. So, I also stopped into Guest Services. They told me Campbell Basin would indeed start serving food mid-week after they were staffed and got busier mid-week. However, they said it was still TBD whether they were going to open the 2nd floor seating area in the new bitchin' base lodge before 10:30 mid-week. Huh? And then when I made a comment about the lack of seating, was told they hadn't done a very good job of planning and it is the number one complaint they're hearing. Maybe they should put the BWT (big white tent) back up with a real floor and close to the new lodge?

Yes, it was a very nice day. Beautiful sunny skies, fun snow, and very few people. We parked right by the C lot shuttle stop, our updated seasons passes worked and we found plenty of room to sit in the new lodge. This was our first day of the season so we weren't too bold about going off the groomers. The ones that we did were a bit of work. The gondola face of Green Valley was a bit crunchy and West Face was more of the same. Some of the edge of the groomer moguls were fun. The upper part of Forest Queen had really good chalky snow. It was nice to run into ddk and my legs hardly hurt.