riverc0il
New member
since i still haven't managed to dig my car (which is no longer visible) out fro 4-5 foot snow drifts, i figured i would post a report from yesterday while dreaming that maybe some fresh might be left for night skiing later tonight.
MRG offered up a deal too good to pass up, "Freeze Your Butt Off" weekend had the only VT ski are 100% open offering lift tickets for $25! it wasn't that cold, but i am not complaining! actually, the morning started off pretty cold and had me exchanging my helmet for my hat which i find is warmer and offers better coverage. however, i only had my base t-shirt layer under my ski jacket and was fine all day... i've definitely skied in much much colder than yesterday. the absence of any wind what so ever surely helped, the wind always hurts more than the cold.
skiing was fantastic! innitially i was a bit discouraged in my skiing, but i quickly realized this was my first day out on any terrain of any challenge this season (last week's judgement error aside :lol: ). most of the groomers were scraped down pretty ugly which made warming up not too fun. birdland was the worst with several patches of scraped down and glare ice sections. easily avoidable, but wow it looked aweful. simple solution was to avoid the groomers as much as possible.
conditions off the groomers were variable with lots o' geological treats and some flora to be discovered and/or avoided. some awesome snow was to be had if you could find the right lines, if you found the wrong lines you got scraped or worse.
sunnyside in the AM where i found lower slalom hill had some of the best snow on the mountain, upper portions of slalom hill at the trail juncture was pretty hairy though. quacky was damn fun too with upper panther and upper gazelle serving bumps up right, lower panther was dicey in places but doable and i avoided the steep section of gazelle, not because it was unskiable but rather it didn't look like much fun. one way was pretty darn rocky and not too pleasant and canyon was okay in places, pretty nasty in others. the rest of the sunnyside area didn't have anything notable.
from the single, upper antelope was edgable but left something to be desired for a groomed run. cat bowl excellent far skiers right, not so excellent down the middle. first time skiing chute and it skis less steep than it looks but man was it a work out. tons of thin areas and rocks, i was doing a half dozen turns then stopping to re-evaluate my line and conditions ahead. ick. first time down fall line today too, and the top part of fall line was insanely delicious after the paradise split (the first drop before that was u-g-l-y). things on fall line got really dicely down below. i managed to pre-release from my binding and lost it in front of four patrolers practicing sled drills. i've been debating cracking up the DIN for a few weeks now, that's the fourth unnesicary release in two weeks, this time occuring in a fairly ugly section of trail. fortunately i didn't interfere with the drill, and finished off the run in style despite the progressively worse conditions towards the bottom of the final pitch.
headed back up the single for another shot at cat bowl followed by my first look into lower antelope. what a run! i was mentally comparing it a longer and slightly narrower upper/lower hardcrabble at cannon. pretty thin in places, fantastic turns in others, what a wonderful trail. finished the day going cat bowl to lynx/panther. lynx was ugly in places but i found some awesome lines, panther was a bit scraped up in the troughs and not a heck of a lot of fun.
i left right when the snow started to fall and the 4-6 they were suppose to get surely will help fill in some of the problem areas. not quite enough to ski with no worries though. only my second time at mrg and quickly realized i need to get up there more often.
gotta put forth the no bull on the basebox cafeteria though. i usually bring my own lunch, but generally buy lunch on discount ticket days such as this. the guy at the grill screwed up three orders at once throwing on a veggie and two cheese burgers when no one asked for those. seriously? i had already waited 10 minutes and wanted to get back outside, so i went to get pizza instead and stood under the pizza sign with an employee looking off in the distance for a few minutes then just walking away. when she finally came back, i asked for two slices and only got one! everyone makes mistakes, but three rather silly service errors in the course of a few minutes after waiting in a long line is not cool. very weird experience considering the steller service every other employee offers at the mountain including the lift guys, seriously best lifties in the business at MRG.
MRG offered up a deal too good to pass up, "Freeze Your Butt Off" weekend had the only VT ski are 100% open offering lift tickets for $25! it wasn't that cold, but i am not complaining! actually, the morning started off pretty cold and had me exchanging my helmet for my hat which i find is warmer and offers better coverage. however, i only had my base t-shirt layer under my ski jacket and was fine all day... i've definitely skied in much much colder than yesterday. the absence of any wind what so ever surely helped, the wind always hurts more than the cold.
skiing was fantastic! innitially i was a bit discouraged in my skiing, but i quickly realized this was my first day out on any terrain of any challenge this season (last week's judgement error aside :lol: ). most of the groomers were scraped down pretty ugly which made warming up not too fun. birdland was the worst with several patches of scraped down and glare ice sections. easily avoidable, but wow it looked aweful. simple solution was to avoid the groomers as much as possible.
conditions off the groomers were variable with lots o' geological treats and some flora to be discovered and/or avoided. some awesome snow was to be had if you could find the right lines, if you found the wrong lines you got scraped or worse.
sunnyside in the AM where i found lower slalom hill had some of the best snow on the mountain, upper portions of slalom hill at the trail juncture was pretty hairy though. quacky was damn fun too with upper panther and upper gazelle serving bumps up right, lower panther was dicey in places but doable and i avoided the steep section of gazelle, not because it was unskiable but rather it didn't look like much fun. one way was pretty darn rocky and not too pleasant and canyon was okay in places, pretty nasty in others. the rest of the sunnyside area didn't have anything notable.
from the single, upper antelope was edgable but left something to be desired for a groomed run. cat bowl excellent far skiers right, not so excellent down the middle. first time skiing chute and it skis less steep than it looks but man was it a work out. tons of thin areas and rocks, i was doing a half dozen turns then stopping to re-evaluate my line and conditions ahead. ick. first time down fall line today too, and the top part of fall line was insanely delicious after the paradise split (the first drop before that was u-g-l-y). things on fall line got really dicely down below. i managed to pre-release from my binding and lost it in front of four patrolers practicing sled drills. i've been debating cracking up the DIN for a few weeks now, that's the fourth unnesicary release in two weeks, this time occuring in a fairly ugly section of trail. fortunately i didn't interfere with the drill, and finished off the run in style despite the progressively worse conditions towards the bottom of the final pitch.
headed back up the single for another shot at cat bowl followed by my first look into lower antelope. what a run! i was mentally comparing it a longer and slightly narrower upper/lower hardcrabble at cannon. pretty thin in places, fantastic turns in others, what a wonderful trail. finished the day going cat bowl to lynx/panther. lynx was ugly in places but i found some awesome lines, panther was a bit scraped up in the troughs and not a heck of a lot of fun.
i left right when the snow started to fall and the 4-6 they were suppose to get surely will help fill in some of the problem areas. not quite enough to ski with no worries though. only my second time at mrg and quickly realized i need to get up there more often.
gotta put forth the no bull on the basebox cafeteria though. i usually bring my own lunch, but generally buy lunch on discount ticket days such as this. the guy at the grill screwed up three orders at once throwing on a veggie and two cheese burgers when no one asked for those. seriously? i had already waited 10 minutes and wanted to get back outside, so i went to get pizza instead and stood under the pizza sign with an employee looking off in the distance for a few minutes then just walking away. when she finally came back, i asked for two slices and only got one! everyone makes mistakes, but three rather silly service errors in the course of a few minutes after waiting in a long line is not cool. very weird experience considering the steller service every other employee offers at the mountain including the lift guys, seriously best lifties in the business at MRG.
