Mont Cascades QC - Jan. 12 2005 - i love skiing in the rain

Patrick

Active member
After hearing the comments (at work and elsewhere) about me skiing last night, I decided to write a ski report of a small area outside Ottawa (167meters vertical) (approx. 1m=3ft)

Wednesday night, as always, a Masters race was scheduled. This week, it was at Mont Cascades. Last week, the race was at Camp Fortune (same size about 20km from downtown Ottawa). Cascades is located 30km away from downtown.

Some believe the conditions must have been terrible and icy, the only terrible conditions were the driving and weather. Snow conditions are very often great when it's raining. The weather last night was -6c with Freezing Rain, Drizzle and Fog. An interesting mix indeed.

The base was soft and easy to carve. It's was a lot fun to ski. Unfortunately the race had been canceled 'cause the part of the hill that had the equipment was shut down for the evening. The word went out late so a few of us never heard it and made our way to the hill. Once there, why not ski a bit. The hill were operating the triple and the small beginner. The other two doubles elsewhere on the mountain were closed. There were 3 runs if I exclude the small beginner one. Amazing conditions, my race wax combination was dead on for once. :x

Anyway, I had fun, however I had to remove the ice from my goggle each time when I got on the lift AND off the lift. My whole body was like a statue covered in a sheet of ice during the ice storm. I called it quits at 9pm (after 2 hours of skiing), hope everything dry off by next week. :lol:

SKIING IN THE RAIN CAN BE FUN:

Need to dress in layers. Have a change of dry clothes in a gear bag including underwear (unless you are using t-bars). If you are wearing a hat, very helpful to have a hood on your jacket. The hood keeps you head dry and warm.

So next time it's raining and you have scheduled to go... go anyways, you'll have fun if you are dress properly. 8)

Here are some Great Ski Days I had in the Rain.

Grand Montet (Chamonix) March 28, 2003
Tremblant, April 21, 2003 (closing day)
Alpe d'Huez (near Grenoble, France), Jan 2, 2001.

http://www.montcascades.ca and http://www.ottawamasters.ca
 
We usually don't put up with that out here. But I made an exception and skied all day in the rain at Coronet Peak, New Zealand on Aug. 30, 1982. My infamous quote at the time when my now ex-wife questioned my sanity, "We're 7,000 miles from home. When am I ever going to ski this place again?" On July 31, 1997 our son Adam and I skied Coronet Peak in a morning whiteout and bluebird powder afternoon.
 
i usually like skiing in the rain too, since the snow tends to be really soft.
And skiiing within 2 hours of toronto in march means you'll often get rain if it's cloudy out.
the one thing that i like to do (ok, maybe "like" isn't a great word) if its really coming down is break out the old grabage bag an put it on.
It isn't pretty,and everybody thinks you're a moron, but it works.....
 
r@!ny days can be good since there are less people there, but there are
less people there for a reason. they don't want to get wet. good thing we
spend all our money on really expensive gear that will keep us dry when
it's wet out there, aye? :lol: .......or wear a trashbag until you've had
enough of the wet arms and wet butt from sitting on the lift.

wet days can be good, as long as it's not to warm and the snow gets to be
sticky. colder, r@!ny days (the one's that get you sick) are the good ones
when the snow is good. not to cold though. if the snow is good, why
not? we don't wear $1000 worth of gear for fashion (most of us anyways).
can it perform? these are great days to put them to the test.

oh, and i've had a few wet ones ( :roll: ), but i don't remember dates. i
don't know about you guys......remembering dates of r@!ny ski days.
how many laps did you get in? :wink:
 
13,700 vertical at Coronet Peak. Coronet has rolling terrain and the hills are covered in tussocks (a thick grass) so you tend not to damage skis much even with a thin base. What was amusing was that my ski tips started to delaminate (my now ex-wife said they were waterlogged) and by the end of the day they had collected quite a few tussocks. A local Queenstown shop fixed the delamination overnight for $7.
 
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