Jay Peak 1/10-1/11 (Brrrrr!)

[Lezek Les Debski]

I went to Jay Peak this weekend with my father and brothers and it was cold. Actually, I don't think people understand the real meaning of the word until they really experience it. 15 degrees above is not cold, nor is 5, or 5 below. It was -25 degrees COLD Friday night and saturday night. The high on Saturday was a balmy about -15 degrees COLD. So, the next time the weatherman says that its gonna be chilly outside, call him and tell him to reconsider. Lets put it this way; today back at home in CT its about 20 degrees above outside, and thats about FORTY-FIVE DEGREES WARMER than friday and saturday night. <BR> <BR>Anyway, back to Jay. If you ask if they had snow, the answer would be yes. Well, what kind? "BOILERPLATE" would be the answer. On saturday there were less than 500 crazies like us on the whole mountain. It was so empty that you could ride the just abotu any chairlift (besides state triple, still broken) by yourself time after time, and the line for the tram was only about 1 tram long (you would get on the second car to come down) and that was only becuase the tram was the warmest and most windless lift there. So, with the triple down, and very little snow in the past week or two, Jay was hurting pretty bad on the snow side. Powerline and Liftline (Can-AM was evry windblown, bare, and bony = CLOSED) were really the only accessible bump runs, and they were solid ice with only small pockets of this powder in the ruts. There was grass and rock showing in many places on those runs as well. As for groomed runs, there were really only a few ways down the mountain, and they were skied off to boilerplate by about lunch. Off of the Bonaventure there was northway and its lower variants, and because all the skier traffic was on that trail it was very icy. Northway past where angel's wiggle comes off was an ice rink, as always. I ventured out to the tram for one run, but it was just too cold. Ullr's Dream was the best bet for any kind of non-ice snow but even that wasn't an excellent option (very very rocky, esp on top on skier's right). During the best part of the day you could do 3 runs before your boots and toes were froze and you had to come in and warm up, and by afternoon when the sun went over the ridge, that went down to 2. There is almost nothing worth looking at in the terain park, as they only have like 2-3 jumps made and are almost done with the skier's left side of the pipe (blowing it at least). Al told we made about 10 runs on Saturday, and that was an achievement and a half. <BR> <BR>Sunday was better. but a double edged sword. It was much warmer (about 10 above at base) but it was so windy that it would screw you up,. You would have to be competely covered to avoid frostbite on the way up the chair, but as soon as you started skiing you would break a sweat. This means foggy frozen goggles and soaked jacket - not a good combination. The new snow that was falling from the morning was, as stated in the snow report, "falling lightly" at a rate of nearly two inches an hour in a horizontal fashion. The glades were luscious. I managed to convince my comrades to go to the Flyer, and by 10 or so there was some powder to be skied on the skiers left of Ullr's Dream, thanks to the high wind (natural snow machine on that trail). The upper pitch of exhibition (right under flyer) was closed because it was all rocks, but if you went through the expo glade or went down upper river quai and got enough speed and skated a little you could get to lower exhibition, and it was most definitely worth it. About 5 or so skiers had been on it all day, and it was perfectly groomed. Around one there was about 3-4 inches of snow on it, and it was an absolutely epic run. After that we packed it in after eating because it was snowing sideways at a good clip and we were all soaked and tired with a 5 hr ride home. CONDITIONS WILL BE GREATLY IMPROVED AS THE "LIGHT SNOW" THEY GOT YESTERDAY TRANSLATED INTO ABOUT 10 INCHES OF SNOW. WITH A LITTLE MORE SNOW, AND SOME CAREFUL SNOWMAKING (AND FIXING THE JET TRIPLE) THEY WILL BE BACK AT 100% IN A WEEK OR SO. <BR>~Les

 

[Admin]

I'll second that subject line. We stayed in Sutton (Quebec) on Saturday night, where we awoke to -15F, and hit Jay on Sunday. After a morning of riding the tram and the Bonnie quad (we weren't foolhardy enough to ride the Green Mountain Freezer with a head-on wind), we crested the top of the Bonnie to be greeted by a 60-mph facial blast. That was enough; the rest of the afternoon was spent working with my wife's budding technique off the new Metro Quad beginner chair. <BR> <BR>Before that, however, was a blur of good times and good friends on vastly varying conditions. Valhalla was a wind-scraped hell, revealing little more than grey-ice bumps in the trees. Aside from a couple of decent turns, I found little else satisfying in there. Cross Northway from the Valhalla exit, however, and the woods were divine, including a crossing of Angel's Wiggle into Hell's Wiggle woods. <BR> <BR>Beaver Pond Glade? A delight. Ullrs? Nearly perfect cord, but when did they widen the middle section? Yuck! Expo Glade? Fun, fun, fun. "Beyond Expo Glade" and The Flash? Even better. <BR> <BR>As Les said, the weather moved in quickly on Sunday. After lunch, under temperatures hovering close to a relatively balmy +10F, the wind and snow left what appeared to be 4 or so inches of light fluff coating the lower mountain green cruisers, such that even tooling around with my wife down there was a pleasure on runs such as Deer Run, Bushwhacker, Interstate (the edges, anyway) and Harmony Lane (where snowmaking in progress left some fairly funky whales). With the weather up above barely worth tolerating, it was the perfect afternoon to enjoy relaxing, low-angle powder turns down low. <BR> <BR>Once again, too bloody cold to shoot pics or video.