Mark Renson
New member
As usual, it was an arduous trip from the Flatlands though I did marvel at the enormous snowbanks along I-89 in NH. As usual, I made some fresh tracks in the MRG parking lot. <BR> Saturday morning dawned with a few new inches of fluff on top of a gargantuan base. Trail signs are getting close to being buried and the skiers left jug handle on Chute is almost impassable because the snow depth is up into the forest canopy. <BR> First run was to do trail check on Gazelle Glades to Chipmunk. This enabled me to bag some UTTD (UnTracked Thigh Deep) in the woods between Gazelle and Panther before I repeated this again in Gazelle Glades. The run started with me singing out loud in the knee deep virgin pow covering the soft easy bumps on upper Gazelle. For the next run, I gorged on some <BR>more UTTD in the woods along Panther and through some shots that I helped cut before I made it back onto Chipmunk. <BR> I caught up with an old friend, John - a seemingly terminal imtermediate skier with a big heart. He had blown out his knee in Jackson Hole with me in Jan 1997 and then tweaked it again in March 1999 with me at MRG in P-Bowl. He has not been doing very well over the last few years, but I did not have the heart to blow him off, so I caught up with him at 10AM. No problem - since these are the best of times, powder can be bagged anywhere. I'd ski with John down a green or blue and make some turns in the woods on the side where I got the UTTD. Later on, Heidi joined us because she had never been to MRG and was in her words "tired of these absurd developed ski areas". With our team of 3, I was able to ski with them and bag some UTTD in some unlikely spots like the skiers right of the Quacky headwall and Ski School Woods. It was not long, before I became a guide and taught these 2 the rudiments of powder skiing/tree skiing and was able to cautiously hold their hands in the woods. By emphasizing the 'ol "bounce on your feet to find the center of gravity" before you launch into untracked and coaching them to "ski into the open spaces between the trees" and "ski where you want to be", our team made great progress and the 2 weenies became very happy !! <BR> Towards the end of the day, they became smitten with a particular expert run which started on the novice Fox and then led into Ferret, a stretch of Upper Glade and onto a steep headwall on Liftline where we were able to <BR>practice on steep skiing skills in addition to some chowder skiing. Yes, there are friends on a powder day. <BR> Sunday, I discovered some of the best packed powder skiing that I have ever seen. Yes, even better than Alta or JHole. For trail check, I went through Liftline when it dawned on me that I had to go to Waterfall. No problem, this just gave me an excuse to cut over to Lower Glade via a tree shot that I had helped cut where I found UTTD. <BR> Fantastic lightly packed chowder was found in Cat Bowl before 10PM when our team of 3 re-assembled for another day of ski boot camp (relax, it was fun). <BR> The Single had to shut down for a mechanical problem which left us all on sweep on The Double. I forgot what I did - this season is all one surrealistic white blur. <BR> I took Monday off in the hopes of getting some light snowfall. What did fall was less than hoped for, but I gotta' admit the 1-2" of new fluff was nice. For trail check, I was assigned Fall Line-Ferret-Glades. Skiing was nice, but I was exhausted - the season is catching up to me and my nearly 40 year old body. The day was mellow and enjoyable. At 3:30, I was ass <BR>igned to close and sweep Lower Antelope where great bumps were found and I found some heavy untracked in the elbow to the 20th exit. <BR> It was my last day at MRG for the season, so it was only fitting that for sweep, I was <BR>assigned my favorite sweep assigment: Cat-Lynx-Beaver. Lynx was epic with big soft easy bumps through the birch glade. Beaver was stellar, as well.