December 9, 2004, Alpental

You were probably following our tracks.  Overall, quite a nice morning.  The sky was clear, the peaks were out and white.  Not a breath of wind.  We three met up with MW88888888 and broke a difficult trail above the quad to Shot Six's exit.  Turns in the open were delightful -- if you could stay perfectly balanced over your skis.  I emphasize perfectly because any thing else yielded less stellar results (at least on our modest mid-fat to less fat skis).  Some might have described the snow as manky, I'll simply say unconsolidated.  Near trees and buried minor drainages, the typically knee deep turned into a waist deep wallow fest.