Bolton Valley, VT 12MAR2024

An image of Ty skiing in waist-deep powder after a March snowstorm at Bolton Valley Ski Resort in Vermont
An image of Ty jumping out of exploding powder as he skis a line in the Maria's area at the end of a March storm cycle at Bolton Valley Ski Resort in Vermont
Ty takes off as he blasts through another line filled with the powder from our recent March storm cycle.

As our most recent storm cycle progressed into its second half yesterday, it brought prodigious upslope snowfall, but heavy winds also pounded the upper mountain areas at Bolton Valley. That meant that the Vista Quad Chair never ran, so all that fresh snow would still be sitting there for today.

For Ty, today was one of his days off from work, so the two of us headed up to the mountain for a ski session. At this point in the ski season, we’re well past President’s Day and school vacation week; it’s mid-March, and today was just a random midweek Tuesday, so we didn’t expect a lot of visitors to the mountain. Apparently nobody told the skiers about that though – we arrived up in the Village within a half hour of lift opening, and we were already having to park all the way down by the Sports Center in an impromptu middle lane of cars. Where did all these people come from? What we eventually discovered was that every parent in the state had decided to pull their kids out of school for the day to get in some skiing. On our Vista lift rides, we literally paired up with multiple dads and their kids who had done this, so apparently it was the thing to do!

An image of a car covered with wind-driven drifted snow after a March storm cycle at Bolton Valley Ski Resort in Vermont
Winds had hit the mountain overnight on the back side of the storm cycle, so it was important to visit sheltered areas today for the most pristine powder and highest-quality turns.

The weather today was clear with brilliant March sunshine, so it was quite a contrast to yesterday’s snowy maelstrom, but winds were still brisk near the summits. Despite the bit of remaining wind, overall, today had that feel of the “day after” the storm. The new snow from the storm had been pounded and scoured in exposed areas like the tops of trails near the Vista Summit, but thankfully most terrain was protected enough to hold onto quite an excellent bounty of soft accumulations from the storm. There was a bit of wind crust in areas depending on exposure, but nothing that ruined the skiing aside from reducing the explosiveness of the powder relative to yesterday’s consistency in the more exposed areas. My snow depth checks revealed the same roughly two feet of accumulation that I’d found near the middle of day yesterday, so there was probably some additional accumulation and continued settling that left things about where they were.

An image of Ty skiing powder in the trees after a March storm cycle at Bolton Valley Ski Resort in Vermont
Ty works his way down through another powder line left by our most recent March storm cycle.

We prioritized hitting some of the steepest terrain to really make use of the resurfacing that the storm brought us, so we visited areas like Devil’s Playground and the Vista Glades, which I hadn’t yet visited at all this season. There were still a lot of nice areas of untracked snow, and areas that had seen skier traffic still provided top notch conditions. The storm was so potent that even the steepest terrain has the coverage to keep you from encountering the old base snow, so you can just drop into anything and anticipate your edges biting into packed powder without the worry of touching the crusty stuff underneath. Along with the steeps, we also visited some of our favorite areas for powder turns, and as long as the snow was protected from the winds, it was still delivering that cold smoke that we enjoyed yesterday.

Bolton Valley, VT 05MAR2023

A black and white image of Ty Telemark skiing in powder after Winter Storm Quest in the Snowflake area of Bolton Valley Resort in Vermont
An image of Ty Telemark skiing in powder in the Bonus Woods area of the Snowflake Chair at Bolton Valley Resort in Vermont
We had initially planned to stay mostly on piste for today’s outing, but the powder ended up being so good that Ty got in an excellent Telemark practice session spanning the entire alpine area of the resort both on and off the trails.

After a couple of great outings in the new snow on Friday and then again yesterday, I wasn’t really sure if I was going to ski today.  I figured the snow would be settling or warming, at least in the lower mountain elevations, and combined with skier traffic, that would bring the conditions down a notch.  Ty was still at the house for the weekend though, and when he was eager to get out for some turns, that easily tipped the balance and we decided to head up to Bolton Valley.

It was late morning by the time we hit the mountain, and they were already running out of parking spots at Timberline, so people were clearly eager to get out today.  Once we hit the hill, it was easy to see why.  Winter Storm Quest had departed, the weather was pleasant, and the quality of the snow seemed like it hadn’t changed at all.  There had been some additional snow on the back side of the storm cycle, but even the earlier snow seemed like it was in great shape.  Amazingly, it almost felt like it had dried out a bit more and the powder seemed notably less dense.

An image showing skis on a ski rack outside the Timberline Base Lodge at Bolton Valley Resort in Vermont
Skis filling up one of the racks at the Timberline Bae Lodge today

We had planned on a mellow day on the Telemark skis enjoying the groomed and packed runs, but that plan fell by the wayside a bit when we found that there was still plenty of untracked powder around, and it was of such good quality.  We had a great time touring around the mountain and managed a big loop that hit every chairlift at the resort and concluded with a big long run down from the Vista Summit to the Timberline Base.  Temperatures were very wintry and chilly up above 3,000’, and remarkably pleasant down around 1,500’, but still cold enough to continue preserving the snow.

An image of Ty smiling after taking a tumble in the powder while Telemark skiing in the trees at Bolton Valley Resort in VermontWe were most impressed by the durability of the recent snow.  The surfaces just continued to hold up with incredibly soft composition and no signs of ice, even in high traffic areas.  I know that we’re really skiing on snow from more storms than just Winter Storm Quest, but even the packed runs were just so enjoyable because on every turn you made, you could rely on encountering only soft, yielding snow.  We’ve reached a point where the quality of the snow is so good that it’s actually dropped the difficulty of every trail down a solid notch.  Skiing advanced runs feels like skiing intermediate runs, and you can definitely enjoy the steeps without having to dodge patches of hard snow.  This aspect of the skiing was displayed prominently on the steepest pitch going down into Maria’s, where tight, high-angle, moguled terrain just seemed to flow because you never had to avoid ice or other obstacles.  It was a great day for Ty to push himself with his Telemark skiing on challenging terrain, so I’m definitely happy he tipped the scales and got us out for those turns.