Craig's Report - December 02, 2005

Cold and Snowy - Mmm, Mmm, Good

It is snowing! Hard! Yeah! Okay, enough of emulating my eighteen year old's style, but indeed it has been snowing all day and with the temperature staying below -10 C, it has been that premium light and fluffy stuff - perhaps not ideal for base building, but it sure is purty!

I was out this afternoon on my cross country stuff and so didn�t venture any higher than the bottom of Deep Sea (about the same elevation as the Bear�s Den), but even there the powder was well over my boots and coming down hard. Even the skinny devil sticks didn�t keep it from being enjoyable powder ploughing my way down Timber Trail, although it was rather embarrassing when a couple of boarders zoomed by, undoubtedly wondering why anyone who clearly couldn�t ski would be out before the lifts open.

This should fatten up the thin bottom slopes considerably and the ones I was on today all seemed pretty good, despite not having snowmaking. Whether this will stand up to lift traffic will probably depend on the weather going forward. Where there is snow making, they seemed to have every gun going full tilt and those areas should be in excellent shape by next week.

Coming up to 18:00, it is -12 C at the house, with nice fluffy flakes falling.


Lots of folks were trudging up Lizard to sample the fresh treats.

Big mounds of man made snow were awaiting placement by the cats.

This part of Meadow does not benefit from snow making, but seemed pretty good.

The last pitch on Diamond Back is still not ready for prime time, but probably closer than it usually is at the beginning of the season.

That is the Timber Chair with Black Cloud on the right. It still has lots of stuff sticking up, but I have certainly come down it when there was more. A little later I noticed a couple of boarders give a try.

Timber Trail from the bottom of Deep Sea. There was nothing wrong with this at all.

Black Cloud is on the left and Surprize is on the right in this shot taken from Timber Trail. A couple of the specks on Black Cloud are the boarders I mentioned a couple of shots back.

This is the first time I have noticed this snow plot. It is at about the elevation of the middle of Meadow and for what it is worth, was reading just under 40 cm when I happened by.

The odd twig notwithstanding, Silver Fox seemed fine.

Between natural and man made snow, the Mighty Moose beginner area has been transformed in the last week or so.