The weather and ski conditions yesterday were excellent, but today kicked that up yet another notch. Today’s temperatures were well up into the 20s F with brilliant winter sunshine and no wind. And after our spell of cold, snowy weather, you could really feel the difference today. Whether you were riding on the slopes, sitting the lifts, or just hanging out at the base area, it was all very comfortable. Also, with brilliant sun, we had great light for action photography; Near base ISO I was able to shoot 1/4000 sec at f/2.8 even in the trees.
I was up at Bolton Valley this afternoon skiing with Ty, and one notable, and surprising improvement was in the powder. As I mentioned in yesterday’s report, the powder skiing was decent, but not outstanding because the snow density was so homogeneous throughout its depth. I guess Mother Nature just needed a bit of time with that new snow because as of today it had settled beautifully into a more right-side-up powder stack that skied much better. Ty and I dug into the snowpack and checked to see what had changed: the first roughly half foot of powder had dried out, and the snow below it had settled into a smooth density gradient, presumably due to compression from the snow above. At ~2,400’ elevation on Wilderness we found roughly 18 inches of powder before you hit what I’d say was a layer resembling a subsurface.
With the weather and snow conditions, it was once again fairly busy at the resort with parking needed down at Timberline. Since we went up in the early afternoon though, we were able to get a parking spot up in the Village because of people who were leaving, but it still wasn’t easy – others were arriving to get in afternoon turns as well. Based on the current forecast, the next storm is expected to move into the area tomorrow, with a couple more systems over the course of the week, so hopefully we’ll have a few rounds of snow to keep the great conditions in place.
