Sharon
New member
9" of snow fell on Gore Mtn friday.
There was plenty of fresh snow to ski saturday as well as perfeclty groomed packed powder surfaces.
The powder was not like the powder I skied at Utah 2 weeks prior. It was more dense and less fluffy. It would slow you down, sometimes very fast. When patrol dropped the ropes people thought they were going to have fresh powder frenzy, but many of those people left deep holes in the snow. Even with fat skis you could get subbed out and stopped abruptly. The 120mm shovels of my Pocket Rockets helped keep me afloat and I never biffed, but my skiing companions were not so lucky. They ate a lot of snow. When they abandonded me licking their wounds, I hit the Dark Side.
They opened Hullabaloo, L Steilhang, Lower Darby with untracked snow, natural conditions. At first these were fresh powder pleasure, with some rock looming beneath. But as soon as they got skied up a bit the rock really began to surface. With careful navigation one could get through without ripping out the bases of their skis though many were not so lucky. The float of the fat skis really helped, but there were times I'd feel the skim of a rock on my p-tex...but leaving barely a scratch.
They ended up closing these trails after a couple of hours. Eventually there was hardly a rock-free line to ski. Closing these runs at that time was a good decision. We were grateful they opened those trails at our own risk. I'm sure some were not too thrilled with the rocky conditions, and lesser-skilled skiers were likely to damage their skis. These trails were not for those who were not skilled advanced skiers.
By the end of the day, all the upper trails were gettting skied off and exposed their slick man-made bases. Topridge trail held out the best and is a helluva lotta fun. All the lower mtn trails were in excellent shape all day long.
They had a big air contest on the lower mountain. They discouraged inverted jumps, however, while we were sitting in the bar watching the action, we saw a kid launch a backflip and landed on his face. There were many ski patrollers working on him...strapping him to a board. They cancelled the end of the contest. We found out later he just suffered from a lot of snow-rash on his face which was quite a mess, but he should be fine. He didn't break his neck, which is what we had imagined based on what we saw.
Sunday we had a group of 6 who didn't want pay to ski at Gore so instead we hit the backcountry on xc skis. We broke trail from Barton Mine to Garnet Hill in No River. Really beautiful and the snow was deep.
There was plenty of fresh snow to ski saturday as well as perfeclty groomed packed powder surfaces.
The powder was not like the powder I skied at Utah 2 weeks prior. It was more dense and less fluffy. It would slow you down, sometimes very fast. When patrol dropped the ropes people thought they were going to have fresh powder frenzy, but many of those people left deep holes in the snow. Even with fat skis you could get subbed out and stopped abruptly. The 120mm shovels of my Pocket Rockets helped keep me afloat and I never biffed, but my skiing companions were not so lucky. They ate a lot of snow. When they abandonded me licking their wounds, I hit the Dark Side.
They opened Hullabaloo, L Steilhang, Lower Darby with untracked snow, natural conditions. At first these were fresh powder pleasure, with some rock looming beneath. But as soon as they got skied up a bit the rock really began to surface. With careful navigation one could get through without ripping out the bases of their skis though many were not so lucky. The float of the fat skis really helped, but there were times I'd feel the skim of a rock on my p-tex...but leaving barely a scratch.
They ended up closing these trails after a couple of hours. Eventually there was hardly a rock-free line to ski. Closing these runs at that time was a good decision. We were grateful they opened those trails at our own risk. I'm sure some were not too thrilled with the rocky conditions, and lesser-skilled skiers were likely to damage their skis. These trails were not for those who were not skilled advanced skiers.
By the end of the day, all the upper trails were gettting skied off and exposed their slick man-made bases. Topridge trail held out the best and is a helluva lotta fun. All the lower mtn trails were in excellent shape all day long.
They had a big air contest on the lower mountain. They discouraged inverted jumps, however, while we were sitting in the bar watching the action, we saw a kid launch a backflip and landed on his face. There were many ski patrollers working on him...strapping him to a board. They cancelled the end of the contest. We found out later he just suffered from a lot of snow-rash on his face which was quite a mess, but he should be fine. He didn't break his neck, which is what we had imagined based on what we saw.
Sunday we had a group of 6 who didn't want pay to ski at Gore so instead we hit the backcountry on xc skis. We broke trail from Barton Mine to Garnet Hill in No River. Really beautiful and the snow was deep.
