March 12, 2000

Same Old, Same Old

The nice snow on top was a bit more used and the not so nice stuff farther down seemed a bit cruddier, but the pattern of the last while continued pretty much unchanged. Only White Pass seemed to be high enough to reliably nice snow, but I later realized that while showing some folks around, I had pretty much stuck to the South facing slopes and effectively avoided the North Facing ones. Perhaps I am just not mentally tuned to spring skiing yet or perhaps I was subconsciously leading them astray. They were ski journalists so perhaps my leading them to a succession of crusty and cruddy pitches was an unintended effort at crowd control. I think it may have worked, for after negotiating some truly ugly stuff off the side of lower Red Tree, one commented that these weren't death cookies, but death muffins. :-)

Some of the high traffic areas like North Ridge and Heartland were very slick, but down low it was pretty warm and soft.

At 6:15 it is 2 C at the house under a mainly cloudy sky that doesn't look all that promising despite the earlier flurry teases.

New to the mountain? Try taking a free tour with one of the mountain hosts. Most are more attractive than these guys, but all are tame, knowledgeable and friendly. ;-)

Looking back along the traverse under the Knot Chutes rocks that provides access to the Anaconda Glades and other delights.

The whole bottom of Currie is now fenced off and you are required to go through a gate. While the gate is rather icy, I think this is a great idea as the other side is main beginner area. Having folks in dubious control rocketing out of Currie and through there always made me nervous (unless it was me <g>).

The top of the Timber Express with Timber Bowl in the background.