Sunday was deemed as a good day to explore a long-closed ski hill up in the Laurentians. We left under raining skies and drove through huge puddles next to soggy snowbanks. Undaunted, we put on our skins and started sliding upwards. It didn't take long before the rain turned to snow. Heavy, wet, slushy snow, but snow nonetheless.
Conditions were obvious: wet and gloppy, but fresh since we were the only ones foolish enough to be out. Equally obvious was the fact that we had a great time.
By midday not much of anything was falling from the sky and we headed off to get some lift-served at near-by Olympia (have to put the Jay season's pass to use...). Imagine our surprise when we learned that they were closed and had only been running the one lift to serve a ski-race. Seemed silly to me as the coverage looked great, the weather had cleared, and the conditions were spring-like. I guess since it's the same owner for so many hills they figured they could shut everything and let St. Sauveur handle the few clients they expected.
In any case, we played around on the lower slopes and the parking lot before heading home. With colder weather coming, I'm sure the northern hills will survive this minor set-back.
d.