How Cold Was It?

Beat Ya!

Colleen and I were standing at the top of the Roundhouse Chair ready to head down one of the various groomed runs available to skiers this morning. I was not aware of the fact that we were racing to the bottom, but when I arrived at the bottom of Roundhouse, someone (Colleen) screamed out, “Beat Ya”. I lost the race. A proud woman stood with a big smile on her face. Her smile proves that there is good in every day.

I mention this because the last couple of days runs were overcrowded and, at many points during the day, dangerous. I thought that Mark’s comments regarding the elimination of the accumulation of statistics with regards to the number of runs a person takes during a day, and the number of vertical feet a person skis during the day was a good one. Perhaps people would slow down somewhat, and take into consideration other people on a slope if they were not racing to be first on a leaderboard at the end of the day.

Although I do not think anyone should be racing from top to bottom at high speed at any time when other people are on the slope, today would have been a good day to let go a little bit. This morning a number of the trails were relatively empty.

Fairly vacant trails with winds blowing across them.

Lines were not particularly long, especially for Monday of a holiday weekend. Yesterday the slopes were filled with people and today the slopes were empty at times. Perhaps the lack of patrons occurred because the weather was not fully cooperating. It was bitterly cold this morning and the winds were howling. Windchill was just above zero when lifts opened for the day. Unfortunately, the Summit Chair, Alpine Bowl Chair, and Yellow Chair were closed for the day because of the winds. The Base to Base Gondola was also closed for the day. The somewhat lower attendance at Alpine might have been partially due to the close of the B to B.

                                                                              I tried to catch winds howling over the ridge top.

We skied several runs between 9 and noon today before heading in with frozen fingers and generally cool bodies. Most of our skiing was off Roundhouse on a groomed surface. We did find some soft snow at various points along some of the groomed runs. Skiing over these short areas where winds had deposited snow was joyful. I must say I enjoyed watching snow being blown across Dance Floor as we rode up Roundhouse Chair. Watching snow blowing over the ridge top above Alpine Bowl confirmed the resort’s need to close the upper area.

Skiing on uncrowded slopes kept my friends and me on the hill longer than we originally anticipated. We did not venture over to Sherwood, Lakeview, or Scott believing that the slopes would have been firmer than we cared to ski.

How cold was it, you might ask? Well, one of our good friends who rarely, if ever, wears a cover on his head was spotted with his parka hood securely attached to his scalp.

I understand tomorrow will be warmer with less wind.

Enjoy your day,
Andy