Toggenburg, CH: 12/17/17

jamesdeluxe

Administrator
Utards: if you're wondering where all your snow has gone, it's over here in the Alps -- and I've been skiing it! Per Weather to Ski's Fraser Wilkin, I seem to be in the crosshairs of the biggest recent accumulations:

Sunday: Yet more snow has fallen across many northern parts of the Alps in the last 24 hours. The heaviest falls have been in the northeastern Swiss Alps where 20-40cm has fallen quite widely, with as much as 60cm of new snow very locally in some resorts to the east of Zurich. Monday: Snow conditions across the northern Alps are simply incredible right now with masses of fresh snow even to low levels. It is difficult to highlight any particular area, but it is probably the smaller resorts of the northeastern Swiss Alps (e.g. Amden, Flumserberg, Mythen) that have seen the most snowfall, with 1 meter (3+ feet) or more of new snow in the last few days.

Yesterday's storm continued through the night and early Sunday morning Toggenburg's website reported 70cm/28 inches of new precip, so that sealed it for me. My car at 7 am conveniently lit by the snowplow out of frame to the right:
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The drive down to the valley from my hotel in Amden took me past the fjord-like Walensee ("whale lake"):
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Toggenburg was only 12 miles as the crow flies from my hotel, but getting there required a circuitous drive of almost an hour. I arrived around 9:30 to one of the three base areas, Unterwasser, featuring an old-school funicular:
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Stretching three miles wide with 4,100 feet of vertical drop, Toggenburg has trees 2/3 of the way up the mountain and is crowned by some incredible rock formations. The three terrain sections are connected but require a bit of poling and/or skating in spots, thus not optimal for boarders.
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The snow continued through the early afternoon. While conditions were fantastic, it was a drag to realise that I wouldn't be enjoying the incredible views I'd seen in dozens of trip reports, like this and this. The top of the mountain was socked in so they weren't operating the cable car to the Chäserrugg peak in the middle
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Digging trenches just a few yards from the piste:
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Little kid skis off the trail and face plants. Dad ain't helping him out of it.
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Low-angle chop alongside a groomer:
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Connecting through the woods to the middle sector:
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Teleskier on the lower mountain:
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Stopping for lunch at the Stöfeli restaurant -- looks like a mountain hideout during WWII:
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When I came back outside, we got maybe an hour of partial clearing:
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Lots of snow right down to the valley:
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Back in Amden that evening, a donau kebab for dinner with a weissbier:
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