Alta, UT 5/1/11 - Closing Day

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Day 85: Saying goodbye to the ol' girl.

It's been an amazing winter at Alta this year from start to finish. It came in right before Thanksgiving and it never stopped coming. We really never had the usual January dry spell, at least to any significant degree. One thing we never got, though, was a spring corn season as it stayed full-on winter until the very end. Alta closed yesterday with 207 inches of base, a season-long high, thanks to 723.5 inches of snowfall during the season. On Saturday we skied a bottomless powder day with the top layer a delightful 5.2% water content. The sun shone brightly on a cold Sunday morning with temperatures in the teens, promising a fitting way to close out a stellar season.

Thanks to Colin, one of Alta's jovial parking lot attendants, for reserving the southwest corner of the Wildcat lot for our annual closing day tailgate BBQ. We spotted Tony Crocker's car down on the Bypass Road in anticipation of a later run and parked my car at the BBQ site next to Marc_C. I unloaded the dinner accoutrements and booted up, heading for Collins.

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We caught the opening of Ballroom/Baldy Shoulder, which while untracked I thought stiffened up a bit in the cold overnight air, although I was the only one complaining. Crocker, Dale and Pat had no such criticism to levy. They took a second lap while I simply cruised down Main Street. While the day started out quiet the Collins liftline quickly grew to a significant delay, enough to prompt the mountain to open Wildcat for a few hours. While in line we spotted Bobby Danger and rdwore. Bobby wanted to take more adventurous lines instead of spending time waiting in line, so we struck out for Cecret Saddle, finding wonderfully pleasant untracked snow.

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While we were there, however, we spotted the first set of tracks being laid in Devil's Castle:

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That just looked too delicious to ignore. Again, Sugarloaf closed for the season last week and everything south of Germania Pass was designated backcountry. On Saturday, the signage was explicit: no Cecret Saddle, no Devil's Castle. On Sunday, however, such limitations were dropped. I drove Tony down to his car at Snowbird to retrieve his beacon, shovel and probe, and I grabbed a small daypack to loan Tony as well as my skins. By the time we got to the top of Collins Bobby had already skied down into the bowl between Collins and Sugarloaf and started to hike. I put on my skins and set off on the EBT, with Tony hiking behind me. Also skinning up I was surprised to bump into Alec Hornstein, proprietor of Tushar Mountain Tours with whom I toured earlier this winter east of Beaver in southern Utah.

I skinned up past the top of Sugarloaf, arriving at the center of Devil's Castle where the tracks began (now five sets) in about 30 minutes, with Bobby pulling in about 5 minutes later and Tony about 10 minutes after him.

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While I waited for the others I deskinned and popped open a celebratory beer to enjoy in a very special place.

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While we waited, though, the weather changed dramatically as clouds began to envelop the area. I waited for the sun to break through momentarily to drop in. It was amazing...smooth bottomless powder for about 1300 verts on May 1.

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While I waited for the others the two ladies who had skinned up from Cecret Lake descended, donned skins and headed back up for a second helping.

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Bobby dropped, choosing an interesting line through what remains of the cliff band at Castle center, followed by Crocker.

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High fives were exchanged just above the shores of Cecret Lake before setting off to skier's right to catch the protected lines of the lower Castle. By now, however, the clouds that had moved in started dumping snow in earnest.

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I strongly dislike touring with a helmet and had left my helmet and goggles in the car in favor of a hat and sunglasses. With the snow falling, though, I was really starting to regret that decision. We returned to the Wildcat lot to retrieve my helmet and goggles and found Tony's friend Liz as well as rdwore. Bobby and rdwore headed for Watson Shelter for a bite and something to drink while I led Liz and Tony along the long traverse out Ballroom and across Baldy Shoulder, beneath the Bad News cliffs to the top of Wildcat, now closed again. We had to retrieve Tony's car on the Bypass Road anyway so we opted to introduce Liz to Comma Chute.
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The line literally blew her mind, but my legs were absolute toast.
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We chatted with a couple of tele guys parked next to us in the Bypass Road lot before heading back to the BBQ at around 3:30 p.m.

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I had a turkey fryer and 20 lbs of buffalo wings to prepare, so I fired up the burner to heat the oil while Tony and Liz headed to the High Boy party with a bottle of champagne, accompanied by Bobby D and rdwore as well as a bunch of Tony's friends. Marc_C and his better half Karen were already dining in what turned out to be a cold, sometimes cloudy, sometimes snowy parking lot.

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Tcope picked up Mrs. Admin in the Valley and brought her up to the parking lot party, which was somewhat more subdued than in previous years. Tony, Liz, rdwore and Bobby Danger eventually arrived, as did Tony's other friends. Colin occasionally passed through on parking lot duty to grab a couple of wings. Alec swung through to do the same. Wings were shared with neighboring partiers as the sun dropped through the sky toward Mt. Superior.

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Once the sun did eventually dip behind Superior, though, the temperature immediately plummeted. We quickly packed up and headed down canyon to warmer environs, basking in the glow of both the setting sun and another phenomenal Alta ski season. The lift served season may be done, but we've still got a couple of months to enjoy the old girl's slopes.
 
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Looks like it was quite the closing. I'm sure you guys are going to love skiing there after close!
 
As ever a superb report, so jealous sitting at work this morning.

Nice to see Marc_C's picture there, amazing how you read people's posts and form an opinion of them. He must be 20+ years older than I expected him to be :lol:

Great stuff =D>
 
q":11w4e5fk said:
Nice to see Marc_C's picture there, amazing how you read people's posts and form an opinion of them. He must be 20+ years older than I expected him to be :lol:
90% of the time, when I guess what someone looks like without seeing him or her, it's completely wrong. For example, I recently met Jay Peak Marketing Director Steve Wright. Based on his FTO posts from a few years ago, I pictured him as a stocky guy in his mid-50s with a gray beard -- couldn't have been more inaccurate.

But when Rog posted this a while back:
icelanticskier":11w4e5fk said:
Marc... you grumpy ole goat
at least I had something to work with! :)
 
Just a fantasic TR. Saw the facebook lead in and just didn't get over here until now.

Dig the patrol sign and Bobby D's lines and all of it.

Beauty pics. You must be on cloud 9 to close Alta like that.
 
rdwore sent me this photo of Bobby and Tony at the party atop High Boy:

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there was somewhere between 400 and 500 people standing up there when that pic was taken . what a GREAT way to end the lift served season !!!! i will remember this closing ceremony for along time and for alta patrol too let us have devils castle on the last day only shows how committed they really are to their loyal customers . and yes i did help tony empty that bottle !
 
Bobby Danger":1ooejap5 said:
there was somewhere between 400 and 500 people standing up there when that pic was taken
How does that compare to other years when the weather is more springlike?
 
jamesdeluxe":3h7i051p said:
Bobby Danger":3h7i051p said:
there was somewhere between 400 and 500 people standing up there when that pic was taken
How does that compare to other years when the weather is more springlike?
That's about the usual number. Conditions really don't seem to affect it much, in either direction.
 
That picture of superior is crazy, there is so much snow, barely any bare rock is showing. Simply amazing...
 
rfarren":30w6lf2s said:
That picture of superior is crazy, there is so much snow, barely any bare rock is showing. Simply amazing...

And remember that aspect is south facing.


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Admin":13jgrhoy said:
rfarren":13jgrhoy said:
That picture of superior is crazy, there is so much snow, barely any bare rock is showing. Simply amazing...

And remember that aspect is south facing.


Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk

You guys had a heck of season this year. I suppose the backcountry will be skiable at least until mid-June perhaps even into July. It's amazing to me that almost all of that snow will melt and futhermore you guys don't have massive flooding in Sandy.
 
rfarren":2qc73bq9 said:
It's amazing to me that almost all of that snow will melt and futhermore you guys don't have massive flooding in Sandy.

Hold that thought, I'm busy building my ark.


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let's see come the month of june !!! just cause it's warm this week doesn't mean diddle- by this time next week there could be alot more base . only difference between april and may is it's warmer between storms - so eventually you do start to lose snow at the base . looks good for some corn this weekend it's been cooking for a couple of days now .
 
rfarren":2e3mc34s said:
It's amazing to me that almost all of that snow will melt and futhermore you guys don't have massive flooding in Sandy.
We do get some serious flooding during melt, but not in Sandy. LCCreek drains through only a few blocks of Sandy. The primary towns for the drainage are Cottonwood Heights, then Midvale and Murray, with Murray usually getting the worst of the flooding.
 
jamesdeluxe":1lqssuol said:
How does that compare to other years when the weather is more springlike?
It was really the best of all worlds Sunday. I was there on a closing May 1 in 1988 in a full-on blizzard and I don't even know if there was a party as the weather was so severe. That little squall in the pic of me skiing the lower Castle was the only time it was like that. It cleared up between 4:30 and 5PM, so very comfortable on top of Highboy with normal skiwear. Of course not many people were up there in "normal skiwear."
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Here Liz chats with some people from SoCal who staked out the prime Highboy viewpoint early, complete with grill and music.
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Highboy was completely in the sun when we skied it ~5:30 under ideal conditions with very forgiving, still packed powder snow.
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For those with more party endurance Highboy remained in the sun past 7PM.
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