The winds turned at 3am from a cold northeast flow to a western marine flow. That put us in a transitional state for skiing today. What does that mean? It means I put away my powder skis for now and enjoyed more of the groomed slopes today. Because we still have a more winterish snowpack, the grooming was perfection again this morning. You have got to hand it to that team, they are making it happen.
My pick of the day was Wolverine Bowl. It reminds me that it might be best for all of us if they removed the speed tracking feature from the Palisades Tahoe app, as today was a great day to let your skis rip on Wolverine. But today I did not set a record, in fact I was 15 mph off of my best. The other groomed runs also did well, although I never ventured far from Summit and Roundhouse today.
As the day wore on, so did some of the groomed slopes. Some slick patches started appearing, reminding us that we did not get all that much new snow. These slick patches are in the high traffic places, and usually at a higher angle: top of Alpine Bowl, top of Wolverine, Sunspot, the breakover at the top of Ladies Slalom.
Off piste, conditions are transitioning from fabulous to variable. It was tougher today to just go into any ungroomed snow and assume it was soft and fluffy. Solar radiation and slightly warmer temperatures, as well as the marine flow, have all conspired to make some areas a little bit more dense and clumpy. That’s absolutely true in sun exposed areas like Lower Idiots and Solar Flare. North facing snow remains much softer, but still variable as it gets skied in. Out of bounds, people are still finding some stashes of powder.
I tagged rocks in a few places yesterday in my off piste skiing. Again, it’s a reminder that the last storm was just a little refresher and not a complete reset. I know I tagged rocks on Gods Knob, Rolls and Knolls and on the traverse out to Teigel Chutes, but there’s other places that remain dicy with thinly covered rocks. Looking at you Sherwood.
It’s still ski and skate week, with the mountain relatively busy for mid-week. The upper lots filled again today. Liftlines were non-existent and only the main corridors felt busy. I really enjoy seeing families out skiing this week with kids. I’ve had the pleasure of tagging along with Ben and Griffin and their family the last two days. It’s amazing how quickly kids can progress, and it’s fun to be a small part of that progression. I would expect that the upcoming weekend will be very busy. The “KCRA effect” will be strong and the weather will be gorgeous. Next week, things will look empty again mid-week.
Is there any new snow headed our way? February is going to end with a whimper. I can’t really see any big signs of a March Miracle just yet. One thing I do see is that all ensemble members are seeing a negative trend in the PNA index as we head into the second week of March. That means that the troughing component will be there.
That’s an important factor, but not the only factor affecting our weather. You also need the moisture component. One of the indicators for that is the Madden Julian Oscillation (MJO). There are 8 different phases for the MJO, and at this time of year, generally only Phase 3 brings us the wet systems that bring us good storms. We are just getting out of Phase 3 and forecasts seem to be trending into the drier Phase 4.
So big picture, the ensemble model runs today indicate the setup for occasional inside sliders into mid-March. The GEFS and Canadian are in pretty good agreement there. I didn’t get a look at the Euro. The last run indicates a total of only about a foot of snow over the next 16 days. Yeah, there’s no miracle there. So don’t wait for a change, just go skiing and enjoy what we have. I’ll keep looking for something different to tell you.