The streamers of moisture heading into our area at around 10:45 P.M. last night
We picked up 5.3 inches of total snow with this event down in the valley thanks to the second burst of snowfall that came through last night, and up at Bolton Valley as well as Stowe, they picked up a total of 8 inches of snow. I’ve added a picture of the radar image from around 10:45 P.M. last night that shows the snow still streaming into the area. I’ve added the north to south list of storm accumulations for the Vermont ski areas below, and additional details can be found in my morning update in the Northern New England thread at Americanwx.com.
Today featured spring skiing on the slopes of Spruce Peak, thanks to sunshine and corn snow on south-facing slopes. Details and additional pictures are in my Stowe, VT 20MAR2011 report.
We were up at Stowe this afternoon, and while turns at Bolton yesterday were decent, turns today were even better becasue of all the additonal snow. It snowed all day from base to summit and a good 6 to 7 inches of powder was available off the gondola. More details and photos are in my Stowe report from today.
Dylan ripping up the powder in Stowe's Nastar Hill/Meadows area
One of the pictures from our Tuesday visit to Stowe was added to the photo gallery on their website: it’s Dylan ripping up the powder in the Nastar Hill/Meadows area. Way to go Dylan! You can click on the image here to see it full size, there’s another version available in Stowe’s Gallery, or you can find it by browsing the gallery.
Dylan glides through some powder from the recent storm in the Angel Food area at Vermont's Stowe Mountain Resort
Dylan and I headed off to Stowe today to make some more turns in the snow from our recent storm. By this morning we’d picked up 25 inches of snow at the house, and some of the Vermont resorts had received more than 3 feet. It was a sunny, blue sky day, and the first thing that grabbed our attention when we got to the mountain was the view of the powdery lower slopes of Spruce Peak. While they were adorned with plenty of tracks, we could see that lots of fresh lines were left, so we had to check that out for our first run. We eventually worked our way over to the Mt. Mansfield side of the resort as well, and we really worked ourselves hard in all the powder. The snow was synoptic in density, and there was a little wind crust in exposed spots, but it was still oh so good. Dylan did a nice job managing the tricky conditions, even though he doesn’t yet have any fat skis. To read about all the details and see the images from the day, check out the full trip report from March 8th at Stowe.
Dylan getting buried in powder in the trees around Freddie's Chute
We were up at Stowe today for our usual Sunday session, and since it’s the tail end of vacation week, many people were absent. Our group had just Ty, Jack, and Dylan, but we also had Mike Cannon as one of the group’s coaches, and with his immense knowledge of Spruce and Mansfield he brought us to plenty of great shots. Not too surprisingly, we found conditions to be much like Bolton’s, with untouched areas typically yielding between 12 to 18 inches of powder thanks to our recent storm. We skied glade after glade with Mike, and the steepest and highest traffic areas are certainly down to the firm base leftover from those couple of warm days a bit over a week ago. However, outside of those spots it was easy to find areas with either untracked or soft chowder. To read the full text and see all the pictures, check out the full Stowe report from today.
Ty playing around in the powder in the trees off Freddie's Chute
Today we were back at Stowe Mountain Resort for our weekly BJAMS ski program day. There was some light to moderate snow during the day for a short time, but nothing in terms of accumulation that established any powder on the trails. Conditions were still excellent, with packed powder on piste and powder off piste, and while the most popular off piste places had seen enough traffic that they featured packed or tracked snow, untracked powder was easy to find. We played around in the trees on Spruce Peak and had a good time, even if the powder was a bit old. The snowpack is well past that stage where the off piste is sufficiently covered, and after finally getting in on a couple of synoptic storms, things are now at the stage where brush is becoming so buried that most hardwood areas between trails, even those that don’t receive trimming attention, have opened up enough for turns. We were finding that aside from zones with tight evergreens etc., you’d just poke your head in the trees and go. Click through to get to the full report from Stowe today.
Ty making good use of his wider skis as he hits steep powder above Green Acres
We were at Stowe all day today and got to experience the skiing associated with last night’s thundersnow event. The snow was certainly dense, very much like Cascade Concrete/Sierra Cement etc., and one typically sunk down into the powder only a few inches when skiing it, but there didn’t appear to be any detrimental effects from whatever mixed precipitation fell. While not the top of the line snow for fluffy powder skiing, we picked up 7.6 inches of snow down at the house comprised of 0.99 inches of liquid, and the Bolton Valley through Jay Peak area picked up about a foot, so it was a good shot of moisture to add to the base. There was also a touch of wind crust in exposed areas, but in general the skiing was awesome and it was a nice day for some reasonably fat boards as Ty demonstrated. Thanks to the hearty snow, coverage on steep terrain was really nice, so the boys had several runs in the Green Acreas area. To read more about the day and see all the pictures, click through to the full report from today at Stowe.
Riding up the Sensation Quad amidst the snowfall and caked evergreens today at Stowe
E and Claire canceled Sunday Stowe program on the 23rd due to the cold, but today we were back at it. After a fairly dry week, we’d received some nice new accumulation up at Bolton to freshen up the slopes yesterday. Down in the valley at the house, we wound up with 1.4 inches from that event, and there was more on the way for today. In my update from this morning, I summarized yesterday’s storm that had just gone through, discussed the next shortwave that was about to cross the area, and mentioned talk about a larger midweek system that might actually deliver something more substantial to Northern New England for a change.
We got up to the mountain around midday, and there was already some nice snow in the air. Our group started off with Ty, Dylan, and Luke, and while Claire worked on organizational issues like Ethan forgetting to bring his skis and Sam having his skis taken by accident by someone with an identical pair, I took the boys for a run. With plenty of untracked powder in the lesser used areas off piste, it was a great day to jump into the trees and get Luke more experience in there. The boys gobbled up the fresh snow in the Upper Meadows trees, and Luke not only got some good tree skiing experience, but some practice extricating himself through a brushy exit. Jack joined us next, and I brought all four boys through the Meadows East Glades. The main lines were tracked or packed, but boy there was still plenty of fresh powder all outside the formal glades. Even at that point before the subsequent pair of bigger synoptic storms, Stowe’s snow depths were getting to the stage where many of the natural tree areas open up just like the glades because the brush has been buried under the snowpack.
Claire continued to work out program issues, so I headed to the Sensation Quad with the boys. From fairly light snow at the base of Sensation, we ascended into quite a winter wonderland as more vigorous snow and some winds quickly greeted us on the ascent. The conifers were caked in snow just as if we were in the middle of a larger storm cycle, and Powderfreak had some great shots of the intense snowfall. We kept gawking at the awesome powdery routes below us on Spruce Line, and lamented the fact that it was closed, whether due to coverage or the race that was taking place on Main Street. I vowed that if those race or coverage issues were gone by the following week, we would definitely be hitting that terrain. Even more than the main routes of Spruce Line, I was drooling over the steep shots dropping off the Main Street traverse into the evergreen glades that had been created alongside the trail. I’m not sure if I just forget that this terrain exists every season, or if they keep improving it, but I’m immediately reminded of Red Mountain in British Columbia. I couldn’t find any images of what I’m recalling in my collection, but runs like Cambodia and Short Squaw come to mind. To read the full text and check out all the pictures, click through to the Stowe report from today.
At the end of our day at Stowe today, I found our Subaru covered in a deep coating of fresh snow that had accumulated during the afternoon.
Today was our first school program session of the season, so we were off at Stowe for the afternoon. With the level of skier traffic, especially weekend skier traffic that Stowe sees, Sunday afternoons don’t typically offer optimal snow surfaces. However, last season had to be a low point in that continuum; not only was the snowfall below average, but an inordinate number of times the next round of snow seemed to come in for Monday, after we were done skiing.
So far this season however, things have been much better. We had fresh snow for our training day back on Sunday, December 12th, and as we moved into our first session with the students, it looked like Mother Nature was going to try to help out with fresh snow again. On Friday, an inverted trough system had set up shop over New England, and while the focus was south of our area, we’d managed to pick up a couple more inches last night. This morning’s snowfall report from the house at 6:00 A.M. revealed that we’d already picked up almost a half foot of snow, and it’s easy to imagine what the skiing was like at Stowe today when the snow just kept pounding down – for all the details and pictures, head to today’s trip report from Stowe Mountain Resort.
