Well, spring finally came to the Northern Green Mountains today, and it was a welcomed sight.
Today was the final lift-served day of the 2014-2015 ski season at Bolton Valley, and with the weather featuring temperatures around 60 F and sunny skies, we headed up this afternoon to enjoy some warm spring skiing. The weather was really quite a blast of spring after a long, cold winter, and with a sign at the base of the Timberline Quad Chair that read “AND ON THE LAST DAY… SPRING ARRIVED!”, it was obvious that we weren’t the only ones feeling that way. Indeed the first third of the month has been quite cool, but that’s kept the base of the snowpack in good shape, and even added some rounds of powder that we’ve been able to enjoy over the past couple of weeks. The good snow preservation was very obvious as we rode the Timberline Quad and looked down – there were just a few rocks poking through here and there. That says a lot since the Timberline terrain is low elevation and faces west; it’s typically the first place on the mountain to start losing its snowpack.
We started the afternoon off with a trip on Spell Binder, and found a nice ridge to ski down the center of the headwall. The snow was well softened into spring corn of course, and it was even a bit sticky at times. I’m sure the absolute primo time for the snow was a bit earlier in the day, but what we got was still quite good. Twice as Nice was fun, and that’s when everyone started to have snowball fights on the slope – I managed to avoid getting hit most of the time, although Ty was in hot pursuit down much of the trail.
Spring fun on Spell Binder
We decided to head over to the main mountain to see how Spillway was skiing, and it was a bit slow getting through the flats of Villager, but we had fun pushing and pulling each other along. The main base area was hopping, with lots of people out on the back deck of the lodge, and a D.J. playing tunes and taking requests. Spillway had some very nice corn snow, with a ridge along the skier’s right that was great for skiing, or grinding, depending on your preference. The boys did a lot of grinding/drifting on it, and Dylan had an especially long slide that left quite a track.
It was getting close to closing time as we approached the base, so we played it safe to ensure we could get back to Timberline and made our way to the Snowflake Summit to catch the connection. That route was a little slow at times as well, being a green slope, but we had more fun pulling and pushing each other with “crack the whip” types of moves. Areas with pitch were skiing nicely. I actually think that the snow down low at Timberline was better in some respects because it probably had seen a bit more corn snow cycling, but all elevations will be getting there eventually. With Bolton Valley’s lifts closed for the season now, we’re thinking Stowe next weekend, depending on the weather, and then we’ll see where our ski adventures take us for the next couple of months before summer arrives.
Temperatures were around the freezing mark in the valley, but dropped into the 20s F up in the higher elevations. I swung past Timberline and found about 3-4” of new snow there, but I kept going up to the main base area, planning to use the Wilderness ascent route. It was in the mid 20s F, blowing, and indeed downright wintry up in the Village. I made my way over to the base of Wilderness, and broke trail up the ascent route, since nobody had been out in that area before me. There really wasn’t any noticeable difference between the accumulation of new snow up there above 2,000’, and I found essentially the same depth as I did at the base of Timberline and even our house, so there wasn’t too much elevation dependence with this snowfall. This was actually my first time getting to use the official ascent route on Wilderness since it’s been in place. I stuck to the climbers left where the signs are, although my usual preference up there is on the climber’s right for whatever reason. I can’t figure out if it’s because it feels more sheltered or what.
I ascended to near the mid station elevation, switched over, and started my descent. The snow was reasonably dense, so with my 115 mm AMPerages it was easy to float on the available snow. There were a few scoured spots due to the winds, so I did touch down in a few of those however. I skied a bit of the Wilderness Woods, but with the contours in there, the wind had actually scoured a few more spots, so I quickly returned to Lower Turnpike. It was a nice run, certainly nothing epic, but there was some good powder skiing, I got in a quick workout, and naturally it was a great way to start the day.
Back down in the valley, snow totals had fallen off west of Bolton Flats, and in the town of Bolton itself it only looked like there was an inch or two of new snow. Snow totals seemed the least in the zone heading westward from Bolton to around Richmond, and then they increased again as I got into the Champlain Valley. I’m not sure exactly why the snow stuck to the trees so well in the Burlington area relative to other towns to the east, but it was unquestionably the most picturesque area I saw west of the mountains. Eyewall’s pictures do a great job of showing how beautiful this snowfall was in the Burlington area.
After fresh powder overnight an into the morning, the sun came out this afternoon to provide some great skiing up at Bolton Valley
The local ski resorts here in the Northern Greens picked up about a half foot of snow from a storm that started overnight, and by early this morning the snow levels even dropped down to the bottoms of the valleys. Since everyone in the family has been a bit under the weather this week with a cold that seemed to focus on stuffy noses, we were generally taking it easy this morning and resting up. By that afternoon I was feeling decent though, so I decided to head up to the mountain to check out the new powder and catch a couple of runs.
The sun was just starting to come out in spots as I left the house in mid afternoon, and as I headed up the Bolton Valley Access Road I could see the last flakes from the storm blowing lightly through the air. I’d opted to head all the way up the main mountain based on the strong elevation dependence of this recent storm, and I grabbed a spot in the top parking lot from someone who had already left. The winds up high were sufficient to keep the Vista Quad from running, so I walked right over to Wilderness for a run. The sun was really starting to come out and produces some wonderful views of the fresh snow, but it was still cold like mid winter, with temperatures around 20 F. I decided to take a run through White Rabbit as I’d done last Saturday, and found that the storm had totally erased any signs of previous tracks. Indeed the snow was right in line with the report, as there was roughly a half foot of powder out there. Although the powder turns on White Rabbit were fine, I’d already encountered some potentially challenging conditions in some places where the subsurface snow hadn’t fully refrozen, so you could sink down through the new powder and get into some mush. In a way it was a really good excuse to call on the extra floatation of fat skis, although I’d just brought my midfat Teles today. They worked fine, although once I got down toward the end of Snow Hole I found that the lower elevation meant less freezing of the underlying snow and more potential to punch through the soft subsurface. The main traveled areas of Snow Hole were skiing fine though, so I just stuck with the spots that had previously been packed and skied. Lower Turnpike was skiing beautifully, as was the Wilderness Lift Line based on the quiet sounds of people making their turns while I was on the lift.
Sampling the Outlaw Woods today
For my next run I headed up Wilderness again, and this time visited the Outlaw Woods. The subsurface there in untouched areas was less secure than what I’d found on White Rabbit, and perhaps that was due to more exposure to the sun. With the Vista Quad down on wind hold, I cut left at the Wilderness Mid Station and headed over to some of the Vista trails to see how they were skiing with no traffic. The trails were awesome with the packed surface underneath, and a few fresh inches on top. I caught some turns at the bottom of Hard Luck and they were fantastic – it probably would have been worth a skin up to higher on Vista, but I hadn’t brought my skins since I’d planned to take it pretty easy as I recuperated from being under the weather this week. I made my way over to the Snowflake Summit and found Snowflake Bentley totally untracked, so I put a nice signature down that and then headed onto Lower Bentley to do virtually the same thing. From there I just skied down past the townhouses and back to the parking lot. It should be interesting to see how the skiing shapes up for tomorrow with the way it’s cooling down tonight – it might actually improve the powder skiing in the lower elevations if that subsurface tightens up.
Wiley getting out into Mansfield’s trees for some powder today.
After our morning session at Bolton working with Josh and Mike, we headed off to Stowe for BJAMS ski program. With the recent fresh snow in the past couple of days and the bright sun of late March, the alpine areas of Mansfield looked blindingly white as we approached from the south. The overall timing of the trip was actually quite good, and we were even able to grab some lunch at the Great Room Grill before the start of program. The line for the main grill area was long, and at first I thought it might be groups of ski racers from the races going on, but upon hearing all the British accents, I quickly realized that that’s who it was. They’re certainly getting some midwinter-like conditions on their ski vacations this weekend.
After lunch we suited up and headed to the base of the Spruce Peak lifts to gather our group for the day. There were some absences, so there were only six students (Ty, Dylan, Wiley, Elizabeth, Luc, and Jonah). I had Joe to help me as a second coach though, so we had a very good coach to student ratio for exploring whatever we wanted. Based on the snow conditions, and in the interest of expanding the student’s repertoire and keeping things fresh, I decided that we should take a trip to the Outer Planets area. I can’t recall the last time I’d been out there, and I didn’t really have a chance to make a recon trip this season, but I knew everyone could handle it.
I told the students that we’d be heading out past Angel Food on the traverse, and that we’d play it by ear as we scoped out the terrain. The traverse was in great shape, and the powder up there was midwinter light aside from areas exposed to significant sun. In those areas you could see that powder was just starting to take on some melt, so we knew that we might want to factor that into our skiing if we had options. Once past Angel Food, we continued on the traverse for a few more minutes and headed upward with some side stepping. I didn’t recall ever seeing any specific trail signs in the area, but I told the kids to keep their eyes peeled for anything they might see in that regard. I didn’t see any obvious trail signs, but I did see an interesting piece of artwork on a paper birch just above the traverse that presumably had some interesting meaning – it was a pair of eyes with almost mask-like surroundings. Not long after passing that image, I felt like we’d gone far enough and opted to take the next obvious line for the descent. I chose one with a couple of tracks, which in this case was good; we were doing a bit of exploring, but I didn’t want to take the kids on anything too exotic that might push things over the edge. Eventually as one gets farther and farther into the notch, things can get overly steep, and that’s not what we were looking for.
The line we got into, perhaps Yeranus but I can’t say for sure, was well defined, much like a mini Angel Food. As we pushed farther down the line, it got a bit less defined at times, but in general it didn’t matter because the hardwoods all around were eminently skiable and we could just fan out wherever we wanted. The snow quickly transitioned from somewhat settled midwinter powder to a wetter powder as we descended. Fortunately, it skied well, and the main issue arose when you’d stop. You’d melt enough snow to make it sticky, but as soon as you started skiing that went away. The snow continued to transition until we got down into what was becoming a very supportable spring-type snow. That really skied well with a few inches of dense proto-corn that shaved away nicely over a supportable base. A few minutes into the run, I could see that the terrain was going to be rolling over down below us, and it naturally got me wondering if we were going to have to deal with some sort of cliffs. When we finally arrived at the top of that section, I could see that a pair of very steep chutes lay below us. I was fairly committed to the right chute, which was the narrower of the two, and it did have a bit of ice in the throat that I could navigate with a bit of side-slipping. I let the kids know that the chute to the left was larger and offered a better entrance, so those who could, headed that way. Luc was committed to the chute I was in, and got hung up in there and lost a pole below that tumbled down to me. It took a couple minutes of strategic ski placement, and me tossing up his pole, but he managed his way through. Meanwhile, Dylan had circumvented the whole deal simply by skiing the snow just to the left of both chutes – the snow was great there and the trees were quite open. I love how he finds these great ways around obstacles.
Those two chutes quickly converged into a beautiful gully that must have been 30 plus degrees in pitch. I suspect it’s the pièce de résistance of that run, because it’s a few hundred vertical feet from there down to the notch road. The group skied most of it before cutting off to the right where a tree had fallen that required a bit of a limbo move to get past it. I later learned that Ty, or course, ducked under the tree and skied it anyway. On the notch road it was about 10 minutes of traversing before we were back to Stowe’s equipment barns and the Gondola area. There was some grumbling about the trek to get back to the lift, and everyone was dropping layers and getting warm in the sun. It was hard to complain when we were out there cruising along on the snow on such a great spring day, but as fun as it was, I knew I wasn’t going to push the kids to run another lap in there. We’ll have to get back there some time after a nice dump of snow and see how that gully skis.
We made another Gondola run on Gondolier and found the on piste conditions rather mixed – there was some winter snow, some areas of hard refrozen stuff, and some areas of nice soft snow lower down. We took a break at the Midway Lodge, and based on what we’d found for snow, Joe and I decided that it was best to head back to Spruce Peak and see if we could find some good spring snow on its south-facing slopes. The upper elevations of the Sensation Quad were still high enough to be generally a mix of midwinter snow and refrozen snow, and it really wasn’t until we got down to the Meadows elevations before the snow was consistently spring-like.
The day concluded with a BJAMS ski program tail-gating party in the parking lot of the Spruce Peak Performing Arts Center. Although temperatures were only in the low 30s F, there was no wind and that late Much sun was doing its work. It wasn’t the kind of day that you’d be stripping down to your shorts, but in ski gear it was very comfortable, and indeed we saw a lot of groups having similar parties today. It was a fun way to finish off the official ski program season, although I think many of us will be back in the coming weeks for some additional ski days, even if they aren’t official program days. The nice part about those days is that we can play it by ear with respect to the weather, and there’s no need to cancel if the weather is sour. The forecasts suggest we’ve got some additional storms coming as we head into April, so we’ll see how much extra snow we’ll have before the season finishes up.
After today’s photo shoot at Bolton Valley, we farmed some of the powder that is hanging around thanks to the consistently cold temperatures.
Thursday night’s storm did a nice job of coating the mountains with some picturesque snow, and that seemed to be on Josh’s mind when he contacted us about a potential photo shoot today up at Bolton Valley. I hadn’t gotten the details on the timing via the phone message he left with me, but I knew the biggest hurdle with respect to our participation was whether or not it would interfere with BJAMS ski program in the afternoon at Stowe. I wasn’t optimistic about fitting everything in today, but when I checked in with E about the possibilities on Friday evening, she said the scheduled session at Bolton Valley actually looked like it would fit into the day. Josh wanted us in the 8:30 A.M. to 10:00 A.M. timeframe, and that would be easy to fit in prior to our afternoon session. The photo shoot plan would likely be for groomed slopes, so when I got back from skiing yesterday, I packed the ski rack with carving skis for the morning, and fatter boards for the afternoon at Stowe. From actual experiences on my solo trip to Bolton yesterday, and recent Stowe snow reports from Powderfreak, I knew we’d be able to get into plenty of powder on the slopes of Mansfield. The weather continued its cool trend today, with lows at our place somewhere down in the single digits F, so I expected snow surfaces both on and off piste to be preserved in the wintry state I’d seen yesterday.
We got together with Josh in his office, and as we geared up, we met our photographer Mike. I hadn’t met Mike before, but I’d seen him a number of times in some of the great Bolton Valley promotional videos that he’s put out this season. He started us off with an Alta Vista run, and shot stills of us skiing at various angles as he made use of the morning sunlight. Then it was on to some Spillway shots that he had planned, and it was great to see that Spillway was actually in nice shape with respect to a carving surface. Sometimes it can really get stripped of its snow by the winds, but with recent snow and a fresh grooming, our skis were able to bite in quite well. The photos went smoothly and Mike was pleased, so for the bottom half of that run we just had a free ski. That gave us a chance to head off into the powder, so Ty, Dylan, E, and I all jumped off to the untracked snow sitting off to the left along the junction with Sherman’s Pass. I was in the lead and heard a lot of commotion behind me, and when we finally got back onto the groomed snow I found out what it was all about. It turned out that Ty was near the back of the group, and as he looked ahead he found me taking every little powder line that he’d spied. Finally, just as we were about to return to the trail, I opted for something different and a line was going to be his… except Dylan took that one. It was all in good fun of course, but apparently we’ve got some seriously similar thoughts on line choice. I wonder how that could have evolved.
Bolton Valley Resort photographer/videographer Mike takes in the scene on the lower mountain during today’s photo shoot.
Mike had to be done around 10:00 A.M. for other duties, so we decided to make that the last photo run. He’d already set up Josh for capturing the time lapse of the pond filling for the pond skimming taking place later in the day, so things were definitely hopping at the resort as they set up for that event.
E with some tracks in the Snowflake area
E and the boys and I decided to take one final run, since I’d told them about all the untracked powder that was available from the top of the Snowflake area. We accessed it easily from the Mid Mountain Chair and Deer Run, and found Snowflake Bentley pretty much as I’d left it: with my two tracks from yesterday. The powder was still in perfect shape, and we coupled that upper section with a totally untracked run through the trees between Lower Foxy and Lower Bentley – the terrain was very reminiscent of back on the 15th at Stowe when we were skiing all those lines off the Mountain Triple Chair.
From the bottom of Snowflake it was a quick trip across the Village Circle to Josh’s office, where we got out of ski boots and prepared for the trip over to Stowe for the next phase of the day. One great bonus from today was that Josh gave us a huge promotional Bolton Valley poster that features an image of E and the boys skiing. They’d used it for ski shows and other events, but now they’re done with it. It’s made of fabric and seems quite durable, so it should make a great addition to the walls of the recreational area downstairs.
Taking in one of the wintry views from the top of Timberline today at Bolton Valley
The Northern Greens picked up about a half foot of snow on Thursday night, and it made for some fun powder skiing on Friday. I couldn’t get out Friday myself, but temperatures stayed nice and wintry to preserve the powder in the mountains, so I headed up to the mountain for a little skiing this afternoon. I knew that Bolton Valley had done well with the storm, and although there would have been plenty of visitors hitting the new snow between Friday and this morning, trips to the usual spots off the beaten path were likely to yield some of that classic Bolton powder.
Temperatures were around 30 F down in the valley, and upper 20s F when I pulled into the Timberline lot at ~1,500’. I was happy to see that the resort is letting folks park in the upper Timberline parking lot near some of the winter driving center terrain, so I parked up there planning to ski right back to the car. Driving through both the lower- and higher-elevation valleys today, one could see that the freezing level must have risen up to around the 2,000’ mark yesterday, because while below that point there’s no notable snow accumulation on the trees, above that point, the trees were remarkably white and wintry. The fresh snow was also especially bright with the late-March sunshine that was out there.
Cam out monitoring the Timberline Mid Station in the sun
I hopped on the Timberline Quad and I could see that the fresh snow in the 1,500’ – 2,000’ elevation range was just an inch or two, and subsurfaces there were a bit scratchy, but above that, things generally got deeper and softer. I saw that Cam was manning the mid station, and seemed to be having a good time in the sun while he monitored his post. I headed over toward the main mountain, and as I hit Five Corners, I remembered that the Snowflake Lift wasn’t running, so I skated up to the Snowflake Summit to see what the potential was for fresh tracks in the powder. Indeed Snowflake Bentley had just a couple of tracks on it, probably from patrol, so I had almost the entirety of the trail to choose from with 4 to 5 inches of untracked snow on it. That was a treat, and after that I put the Snowflake terrain on the hit list if I found myself in the area again.
Getting ready for another run in the powder on Snowflake Bentley
I headed up the Vista Quad and took a run through the Villager Trees, finding some nice powder in there. Despite the relatively cold temperatures, it’s till important to pay attention to aspect, because terrain facing the south and exposed to sun has certainly seen more melting underneath than more protected aspects. I found myself near Snowflake again, so I farmed another run of powder next to my tracks from the previous pass.
I thought that White Rabbit might be a good bet for today, so I set a course for Wilderness. On the ride up, I could see lots of people having a great time in the Wilderness Woods – with the soft snow and sunshine it was simply looking great in there. Peggy Dow’s was in nice shape, especially with that high elevation, and White Rabbit had a few tracks, but plenty of untracked powder. Snow Hole was actually skiing really well, and just the way the contours of the snow have evolved in there let me know that indeed our snowpack is currently quite deep.
Powder and sun today in the White Rabbit area at Bolton Valley
I decided to head up the Vista Quad again and take a big, varied run all the way back to the car to finish off the session. I skied a nice long full vertical run of Vista à Cobrass à Five Corners à Sixth Corner à Timberline Lane à Tattle Tale Woods à Split Rock Traverse à KP Glades à Spur à Corner Pocket Glades à Timberline Run à Car. That definitely got the Telemark burn going, and left me with a very satisfying feeling with respect to exercise by the time I’d hit the car. Just about as good though was being able to change boots and put my gear away in that warm sunshine. It’s fun this time of year to get midwinter snow surfaces and a taste of spring warmth at the same time.
You never know what you’ll come across when you’re skiing the trees at Stowe.
It’s been another one of those weeks without much new snow, so we didn’t have a ton of inspiration to get out on the slopes this weekend. There was a day or two during the midweek period that got into the 30s F in the valleys, and it might have warmed some of the south-facing or lower-elevation slopes in the mountains, but it didn’t seem like there had been enough warmth to affect the conditions in the higher elevations. Yesterday in a post on the American Weather Forum, Powderfreak mentioned that at Stowe, the upper mountain was in midwinter form. We didn’t ski yesterday with somewhat gray skies and mountain temperatures in the low 30s F, but today we had to head out in the afternoon for ski program. The forecast looked very unappealing – single digits at the summit elevations with winds pushing practical temperatures down into the -20s F. Morrisville canceled their ski program for today based on the forecast, and E considered it, but canceling for cold in late March just didn’t seem right. With a sun angle equivalent to September, it’s really hard to get that feel of deep winter cold this late in the season. Even when the temperature is the same, late March cold is just not what it is in mid-January. It would have been hard to inform everyone of a cancellation of the program this morning anyway, so ski program was on, and off to Stowe we went. I wasn’t too optimistic about the overall conditions off piste, and planned on a lot of on piste skiing, so it felt strange not packing the fat skis on the rack for the first time in what must be at least a couple of months.
I hear that Claire was really looking forward to a stop at “The Beanery” today.
It was indeed brisk as we walked into the wind through the Spruce Peak Village, but as we gathered for meeting up with our ski groups in the sunshine at the base of Spruce Peak, it was clear that the March sunshine was beating out the cold. My plan was to take the group over to the Gondola to stay out of the wind and get a feel for the conditions in the higher elevations, and a quick conversation with Rick confirmed that the woods were the place to go. He said that the wind had pushed a lot of snow into the trees and the powder was fantastic. Hearing that, I decided that we’d explore some of the terrain that we’ve been eyeing above us whenever we return on the traverse from Angel Food. Very few people cut off the outward traverse prior to the main Angel Food line, and the powder just sits there. Several people from our group were actually out today for various reasons, so our crew was only six students with Ken and myself as coaches; that would be a very manageable number for out in the Angel Food trees
“I told everyone to hold up as I assessed the terrain options below, and found that we were right atop a 15-foot, double-decker frozen waterfall.”
Embarking on our first run, we were faced with the reality of what the wind had done to exposed slopes. The first hundred yards of Upper Gondolier was a heinous, bulletproof disaster. None of us generally pay too much attention to the sharpness of our ski edges since they’re typically not that critical for our usual skiing, but it hardly seemed to matter what edges were like on the start of that run. My carving skis typically have at least some edge, but heck if I could get a good hold on the stuff we hit. Fortunately, the snow improved as we got lower on the trail and the loose snow hadn’t been blasted away by the wind. Picking the right spots where the snow had collected actually yielded some decent turns, but you still had to be aware of scoured areas.
There’s nothing like jumping around in the powder.
Fortunately we were into the trees within another couple of minutes, and it was an entirely different world. It was obvious that the idea of a spring thaw clearly has not caught on in the higher elevations; as everyone started to probe the state of the snowpack, they found themselves pushing their ski poles down past the handles as they disappeared into bottomless nothingness. We stopped on the Angel Food traverse about 50-100 yards before Angel Food itself, chose a nice area of untracked snow, and dropped in. As we headed down, a snowboarder on the traverse told us that we should be careful down there. I could only assume that meant cliffs or some sort of terrain trap, but whatever the case, I knew the kids could handle it.
Ty negotiates the bounce off the second half of today’s big obstacle.
The powder skiing was fantastic, and everyone devoured the lines we found. At the completion of our first pitch, it was obvious what the guy up on the traverse had been talking about. I told everyone to hold up as I assessed the terrain options below, and found that we were right atop a 15-foot, double-decker frozen waterfall. I let the group know what lay below us, and said that everyone could take a look and decide what they wanted to do. Dylan said that he’d start looking for a way around that everyone could use as needed, and headed off to skiers right. I dropped into the icefall to get below it and scout the area, carefully negotiating a landing off to skier’s left to preserve the main landing zone for anyone else that wanted to jump. There was no doubt that it was a technical line; the options were either to drop the whole thing at once, or carefully dial in a landing on the small shelf below the first tier and then finish off the final drop into the powder. The entrance was very narrow, and I told the members of the group up top that if they wanted the most options, they should set themselves up for the entry with their ski tips to skier’s left. I assured them that the landing zone was clear, and filled with bottomless powder at a reasonable slope. Some folks assessed the jump from above; others could tell from afar that it was more than they were looking for and followed the route that Dylan had made around the side. Ultimately it was Ty and Wiley that decided to go for the drop. Although I made sure that they knew of the more conservative route of pausing on the middle tier, they both pretty much straight-lined it from the top. Ty went first and made an impressive show of essentially just touching down briefly on the middle tier during his drop, much like running a pillow line. Wiley took a line a bit more off to skier’s left and did a nice job, although he did eject when his skis sunk into the deep powder at the base of the icefall. Ken contemplated the drop as well, but after discussion we decided that it was better for him to go around and play it safe. Hats off to Ty and Wiley for going forth on that one, because I can tell you that when you looked down from the top of that thing you realized that you were higher than the roof of a single story house. Even with plenty of sloped, bottomless powder below, it still takes some skill and confidence to negotiate such an obstacle.
Dylan dropping off the Angel Food traverse into the powder
We didn’t encounter any more huge icefalls on that run, but we did find ourselves in a lot of untracked bottomless powder. We worked our way in and out of various gullies and ravines, and found that it was a veritable skier’s playground. After a while we ran into the main return traverse, and contemplated taking a longer run all the way down to Route 108, but the powder down at the base elevations was starting to get a bit shallower due to dense layers below that had been partially affected by spring temperatures. It seemed like the best bang for our buck would be to simply take the Gondola up and start from the top again. We paused for a brief snack and bathroom break in the Midway Lodge, and found the typically deserted upstairs seating area filled with people. To find it like that in the middle of a routine Sunday afternoon was very surprising, so there must have been something going on. We headed to the downstairs seating area instead, and found that it was fortunately deserted.
Ken shows how today’s explorations yielded great untracked rewards.
After our break it was right back up the Gondola and all the way out to Angel Food proper. Our approach this time was to ski the first pitch of the run, and then cut skier’s right into lines that would be farther north than what we’d just skied. After a bit of cutting through the evergreens, lines began to open up and the group was off into powder city again. We caught some great additional lines, and gradually found ourselves in some of the same drainages that we’d hit on the previous run. We mixed up our lines a bit based on our prior experience, and wound up coming out right at the bridge at the bottom of the traverse. The kids remarked at the four to five feet of snow that sat atop the bridge, which was a testament to the impressive snowpack that sits even at the base elevations of the resort.
Ever wanted a cross section to see the snow depth at the base of Stowe Mountain Resort, well there you go!
We headed back to Spruce Peak and while most of the kids headed off to the s’mores area, Kenny and Luc wanted to take another run, so I said I’d join them. Of course the quality of the snow was nothing like what we’d just been skiing, but I got to watch Kenny on the groomed snow putting down some impressive carves. He’s really improved a ton in the past couple of seasons, and as I’ve always expected with his athleticism, time on snow was all he’d need. I’d say my only regret from today was thinking that we’d be skiing on mostly groomed snow and not bringing our fat skis. My carving skis are fine, but I could feel the lack of width and rocker making turns just that little bit tougher when the powder started to get a bit shallower. I guess that’s what one gets for doubting Mt. Mansfield. The Mansfield manta should probably be, “If in doubt, bring the fat skis.” The powder skiing was great though, and by riding in the Gondola and skiing in the trees, any cold and wind were essentially non issues. When someone would crash in the powder today, the rest of the group would just sit down in the sun and relax, and it was really comfortable. Despite the initially daunting weather forecast, I have to admit that it was a fantastic day. By the end, Dylan had devised his own version of what the forecast should have been; he said the forecast should have indicated that “There was a high chance of awesomeness.” I’d say that forecast verified.
Since the end of the school year was keeping E rather busy last weekend, the boys and I just made a quick day trip out to ski the Mt Washington snowfields on Sunday. The turns were good, and with things lightening up for E by this weekend, we again kept our eyes on the weather for some possible camping and skiing. The forecast ultimately looked even better than it did for last weekend, suggesting warm, dry weather both Saturday and Sunday, so we packed up and headed off to New Hampshire yesterday around midday.
“…Ty started banging out runs pretty quickly on that upper section because he really liked the short hike back up.”
We set a course for the Glen, NH area to see if we could get a site at the Glen Ellis Family Campground similar to what we’d had last spring. We’d never been to the campground before that trip, but we really liked the riverside campsite we had along the beautiful Saco River. Since the Sunday forecast looked even a bit better than Saturday with respect to the potential for clouds and wind, we headed right to the campground yesterday and found that they had a number of the riverside campsites available, even ones with electrical power, which we find great for charging up various mobile devices. It was a warm afternoon in the 80s F, and tubing on the river was a popular activity. They’ve really got a great setup there for running laps in the river; you just ride down as far as you want, and walk your tube back up along the edge of the campground. We spent a chunk of the afternoon working on Dylan’s throws and playing some disc golf in the campground’s massive grassy fields. After we’d spent so much time practicing, it was great to see how often Dylan was able to hit the disc golf basket. We then had dinner at the campsite, and finished off the day with some evening exploration of the shoals and islands in the river. Dylan discovered that the campground had Wi-Fi, and we had an excellent signal even all the way out by the river, which is almost a half mile away from the main office. They must have an impressive wireless setup to be able to span the 65 acres of their campground. I did a test on Speedtest.net and found that the upload and download speeds were both 1.0 Mbps, which is plenty of bandwidth unless you need to stream video or do something similarly intensive.
Enjoying the views along the Saco River
This morning we had breakfast, gradually broke down the campsite, and headed north on Route 16 for the quick trip to the Mt Washington Auto Road. Thanks to the available Wi-Fi at the campsite, I was able to do a check on the Ravines Cam to see the current state of the snowfields. It was clear that the main Ball Crag Snowfield had lost a lot of snow in its middle sections, and the snow had the look of a backwards letter “C”. The main area of the East Snowfields had broken up a lot, such that largest remaining section didn’t seem to have much more vertical than what seemed available on the Ball Crag Snowfield. With that information and our knowledge from last week about the ease of access, we decided that the Ball Crag Snowfield area was still probably the best bet for today’s trip. After reading another trip report at the Time For Tuckerman Forum last week in which someone monitored their gas mileage up the Auto Road, we decided to monitor ours, and found that it was right around 9.0 MPG up to the 5,700′ parking area in the Subaru; since the other report indicated that they managed 10 MPG in a hybrid vehicle, and we were loaded with four passengers and lots of camping and ski gear, I guess that’s not too bad. Presumably there’s not much gained in a hybrid on a long, continuous climb like the Auto Road, but whatever vehicle it was, it’s likely to be a fuel efficient one anyway. As we unloaded our gear, one of the Mt Washington Auto Road Coaches passed by, and the driver reminded us to make sure we stayed on the rocks so that we didn’t harm any of the fragile alpine flowers and other vegetation. I hadn’t seen much vegetation flowering last week, but he noted that some of the flowers were just starting to make their way up to these elevations now. It actually wasn’t as sunny as we thought it might be, and gray clouds almost looked like they might throw down some precipitation, so everyone packed light shells in their packs just in case. Being just a few minutes from the car, we find that one can pack minimally if they want to, but if rain really came down, we’d want to have something on hand.
After missing last week, E was able to get out on the snow today.
It was again a short trip to the snowfield, and we could start to get a sense for how what the ski options were going to be. Since last week, we could see that there hadn’t been too much change in the areal snow coverage in the upper section of the snowfield, but the lower section showed dramatic differences due to the past week’s melting. The lower section was much smaller, and the snow was no longer continuous into that area. That made laps in the upper section most practical, and Ty started banging out runs pretty quickly on that upper section because he really liked the short hike back up. E slid out a bit on her first run and even got into the rocks at the bottom, but she was OK – it was definitely the most dramatic encounter with the rocks we’ve seen though, even more than when Dylan got into them a little bit last week. We often talk about how much we really need our helmets on these outings on the snowfields, since there are rarely other skiers around, but E’s slide was another great example of why we make sure to wear them. As she was sliding, even though she was in good shape being feet first, she was very happy to know that she had that helmet on. Ty kept cranking out the runs, and even Dylan whipped out a couple of quick runs before taking a break. I started to make some runs to see if I could catch up to Ty, but every time I’d take a run, he would do another with me, so there was no catching up that way. He was having fun with that, knowing that as long as he did a run every time I did, there was no way that I’d be able to catch up. It made for some fun runs where he worked on mirroring my turns, and although I couldn’t see him while we were skiing, now that I look at some of the photos, I can see he was doing a really nice job. For our last run, Ty and I connected down to the lower snowfield for a few extra turns on our way to hike out, so in the end we called it an extra quarter run, so Ty wound up with 7 ¼ runs to my 4 ¼ runs, with Dylan at 3 runs and E at 2 runs. We joked with Ty that he didn’t even do as many runs as the rest of us, because before that last run, he was quite proud that he had! The sky remained with one and off gray and sometimes fluffier clouds, with the occasional break of sun, and fortunately there were no signs of any precipitation.
The boys had wanted to head up to the summit of Mt Washington and visit the Sherman Adams Summit Building on our last outing, and we didn’t really have time, but this time we’d planned on it, so we stopped in at the visitor’s center for a while. We used our tickets to the new exhibit area in the museum, which is focused on the extreme nature of Mt Washington in the winter, and indeed it has been heavily updated relative to what was there before. The whole area seems very new and modernized all around, and there’s some impressive use of high-definition screens and other video technologies. It’s certainly worth a visit to the new exhibit if you have not seen it since it’s opening in May. We stopped in Gorham for a bite on the way home, and ate at one of the picnic benches on the Gorham Town Common, where the boys hit the playground for a bit. I’d say that’s just about it for the snowfields this season, so most of the activity will be shifting to Tuckerman Ravine. For some strange reason, the availability of snow only seems to decrease this time of year!
Dylan out on the snow today among some of Mt. Washington’s massive boulders
Last weekend’s weather was a bit too dicey to get us to head over to Mt. Washington for skiing, but the forecast for good weather this weekend was looking pretty solid. E was feeling the need to get other work done with the end of the school year closing in, so the boys and I decided to just go for a day trip to the snowfields. Typically we throw in some camping in the White Mountains as part of our Mt. Washington ski trips, so this would be the first time in a while that we’d be doing the out and back in a day. It’s actually just a couple hour trip to get over to the base of the Mt. Washington Auto Road from our place in Waterbury, so day tripping is certainly practical, but breaking up the driving with some camping has been the routine these past few seasons.
“The snow was great, being a bit harder in a few spots, and a bit softer in others, but the bulk of it was just right for making turns.”
I did a final check on the forecast for roughly the 5,500’ level on Mt. Washington this morning, and it called for leftover frost, clear skies, a high around 50 F, and light winds in the 10-15 MPH range. That’s an excellent forecast for some skiing in Mt. Washington’s alpine areas, and it’s good to jump at these sorts of days, because you never know what the next one will bring when it comes to the Mt. Washington and the Presidential Range. The boys and I headed out around 9:00 A.M. under blue skies and temperatures in the 60s F, and by midday we were up in the parking lot along the Nelson Crag Trail at ~5,700’ getting our gear together. The weather was great, and the numbers on the board showing the summit weather conditions had been right in line with what the forecast suggested. After checking the images from the Ravines Cam over the past few days, as well as this morning, I could see that one of our favorite snowfield areas below Ball Crag was of decent size, so that was our planned destination. We like that Ball Crag snowfield because it doesn’t see nearly as many visitors as the main East Snowfields below the summit, and instead of having to park above it and hike down into the snow, you can contour right across from the parking area along the Nelson Crag Trail. It can be a bit harder to find some of those lower snowfields if you’re not familiar with the area, but we usually have good luck traversing out from near the junction of the Nelson Crag and Huntington Ravine Trails.
Checking the Ravines Cam this morning to orient ourselves to the available snowfields
“The snowfield was a totally clean slate of corn, with no traces of previous skier activity…”
Today the traverse out to the snowfield was incredibly quick – within 5 to 10 minutes (Ty says it was 7 minutes) we’d hit the snow. The snowfield was a totally clean slate of corn, with no traces of previous skier activity, so presumably nobody had skied it in a while. The scene was quiet when we arrived, but it wasn’t long before the boys started having fun with the snow and the activity level ramped up. The boys had a great attitude about the skiing today, certainly relative to some trips we’ve had, and although it was different since Mom wasn’t there, I think they enjoyed the “boy’s day out” sort of feel. We made an initial ski descent of the snowfield, which seemed to provide somewhere in the range of 200 feet of vertical. It was a reasonably long run in which you could certainly get a groove going, and there were a lot of different options for skiing in the various nooks and crannies of the snowfield’s footprint. The snow was great, being a bit harder in a few spots, and a bit softer in others, but the bulk of it was just right for making turns. I told the boys that I’d bring their skis back up for them so that they could enjoy the hike, and strapped their skis on my pack along with mine. It actually wasn’t a bad pack load, and I think it helped to keep their spirits up.
Part of today’s terrain
Back at the top of the snowfield, we had lunch, and the boys again played around in the snow for a while. There was just a bit of breeze at times, and bugs were virtually nonexistent, so it was a great day to be out on the snow. During our first run, a couple with a dog had arrived for some skiing, but they spent their time a little farther over on the snowfield, so we didn’t see them much. It was actually good that they had their own section in which to hang out, because Ty and Dylan were a bit boisterous in their play, and that way the boys weren’t too loud in their immediate vicinity. For our last run we decided to run out the snowfield to the bottom, then contour back over to the Huntington Ravine Trail and take that right back up to the car. That hike took a bit longer since we were starting out lower in elevation, but I’d say within roughly 15 minutes we were back at the parking area. The boys still played around a lot today, so that took up plenty of the afternoon, but this has to be our most efficient outing in terms of the hiking. The snow will likely be around for a bit longer based on what we saw, so there should be snowfield turns available for those that are interested as we move forward in June.
Out for some Memorial Day Weekend turns on Mt. Mansfield
This Memorial Day Weekend certainly hasn’t been like last year, with its two feet of new snow, but even from Waterbury one can see that Mt. Mansfield still has some of this season’s snow left on it, and with today’s great weather, it was hard to pass up the chance for some skiing. We’d actually been keeping our eyes on the weather over at Mt. Washington for a potential trip to ski the summit snowfields this weekend, but the forecast for nice weather didn’t end up being quite solid enough for us to make the commitment. Of course, being around at home meant that the opportunity was there for some local turns. I thought last week’s ski trip with E and the boys might be our last turns on Mansfield for the season, but that wasn’t the case… at least for me. Even last week, the skiing payoff relative to the hike was getting pretty marginal for the rest of the family, so although I did a perfunctory check to see if any of them wanted to go, I would have been surprised if any of them said yes. This time of year, it’s typically a good idea to go into a ski tour with the intention of enjoying the hike itself, because it’s often a big part of the outing relative to the skiing. If either of the boys had wanted to go on today’s tour, they would have had their work cut out for them, because I knew that it would require at least 1,000’ vertical of hiking before hitting decent snow. They barely have the patience for earning turns when the skiing is top to bottom, so all that hiking before getting to the snow wouldn’t be well received.
“You can get a nice 300’ or so of vertical out of it, and if you wanted something to lap with the best turns, that would be the place.”
After some midday yard work with the boys, I finally headed off to Stowe in the mid afternoon. The valley temperatures were generally in the mid 70s F, and the skies were mostly clear aside from a few clouds here and there, and a surprising number of leftover contrails. From Waterbury Center I could already see patches of snow left on Mt. Mansfield near the Cliff House, so I knew that the Nosedive area would have snow. I parked in the Midway Lot at 1,600’ where I saw a few other cars, but very little activity aside from the occasional group of hikers. Temperatures were still warm, so my setup for the ascent was a short sleeve polypro T-shirt, shorts, and socks/Tele boots, and I packed my ski pants, a long sleeve polypro shirt, and my gloves in my pack for later use. I’ve been very impressed with just how flexible my Garmont Garas have been these past few warm, spring-style outings. Throw them in walk mode and add temperatures like today, and it’s like walking in a pair of stiff hiking boots. They’ve got Vibram soles, so the grip is nice on most surfaces. They certainly don’t match up to the a pair of good hiking boots when trying to hop from boulder to boulder working one’s way across alpine areas of Mt. Washington, but for traipsing around on the generally grassy or slightly rocky slopes below tree line, you can hardly tell that they’re there. For trips like today’s, being able to hike up, skin, ski, and hike down comfortably in one pair of boots makes everything so much easier, both in terms of weight and ascent/descent transition times. Of course I probably make up for some of the weight savings carrying camera gear, but the light weight of Telemark skis and bindings also cuts down on the pounds.
Enjoying the mountain views of storm clouds off to the eastSigns of spring during the hike
As far as the snow goes, there were a couple of piles here and there even down near the base, but nothing of real consequence. I didn’t start to see more consistent patches on Nosedive until I got up around the 2,100’ mark at the junction with National. What I did get to see in the lower elevations was the appearance of wildflowers, including what looked like some trout lilies on their way toward opening up. Even though we had some rain yesterday, Nosedive was really pretty dry aside from areas in close proximity to snow patches or the occasional water bar with meltwater, so that made the hiking especially easy. The mid afternoon sun was still quite strong during my ascent, so I hiked in the shade when possible. As for the insects, all I saw was the occasional mosquito, so that made for a pleasurable ascent on that front. The presence of patchy snow off to climber’s left was all that I saw until I got up near 2,600’, and just below the intersection of Cliff Trail I saw the first area of coverage across the whole width of the trail. That was only an isolated section, and it was back to grass for a while above there, but once I got up to ~2,900’ I got into the nearly continuous snow, and there was even some snow remaining in the trees on both sides of the trail. The snow depth at the Mt. Mansfield Stake just up above that location at ~3,700’ was down to only two inches as of today’s report, although it was certainly deeper in those areas of trees I saw. I continued my ascent all the way up to roughly 3,600’ because the snow just kept going. There were a couple more breaks, but they were small enough that it kept me interested in reaching the top pile near the junction with the Toll Road (which is definitely open – I saw a car on its way down while I was up there).
The bottom section of today’s snow on Nosedive
At the top I could definitely feel the ascent, so I downed a GU and cracked open and Odwalla smoothie that I’d been saving for the top. Between the amounts of sugar in those, recovery and rejuvenation were quick. I moseyed around up there for a bit and got a few pictures, and then geared up for the descent. If you’ve ever wondered about why you’ve got full side zippers on your ski pants, well here’s one of those perfect situations that call for them. You don’t spend time taking off you ski boots to get your pants on, you open up those zippers, strap on your pants, and off you go. The first big section of snow right at the top of Nosedive was just a big mound, with pretty dirty snow, but the snow on the second corner was a bit better, and then better again on the third. The best area of snow though is that one leading down to 2,900’. It’s the longest area without a gap, and it’s got some of the smoothest snow. You can get a nice 300’ or so of vertical out of it, and if you wanted something to lap with the best turns, that would be the place. The consistency of the corn snow was great, although that almost seems to be a given on the remaining snow at this time of the year unless it’s just too cold to soften it at all. It was a bit dirty in spots as one might expect, and there were some sun cups and other aberrations, but especially on that lower snowfield area, the turns were quite smooth.
“For trips like today’s, being able to hike up, skin, ski, and hike down comfortably in one pair of boots makes everything so much easier, both in terms of weight and ascent/descent transition times.”
After the bottom of that section, I strapped the skis on once more for that area below the junction with Cliff Trail, and then hiked out the rest of the run. The down hike was very quick, with the generally dry, grassy trail making for great traction, and it was only about 15 minutes or so from that last area I skied to get back to the car. I actually heard a band playing during the final few hundred feet of my descent, and after swinging through the Spruce Peak Base Area on my way home, it seemed like there was a wedding event going on. They certainly got a great day for it. The long-lasting light is great on these days as we approach the solstice – it was already after 7:00 P.M. by the time I was at the car, but there was plenty of light left. I hit the grocery store on the way home, and then we cooked outside and had dinner and some time at the fire pit. It’s really nice to have some of that local snow hanging around to get in some skiing over the holiday – and as much fun as it was to have the two feet of fresh snow last year, the weather in the valleys wasn’t great for outdoor activities, so this type of Memorial Day Weekend is also pretty sweet.
