Mt. Baldy (CA) 04/06/06

[baldyskier]

A great day at Baldy; see report at:

http://www.skisocal.org/cgi/ski.pl/detail/32;current

Not sure if Snowave made it up. Maybe we need to wear firsttracksonline stickers on our helmets for easier identification!

 

[snowave]

glad you made it up! My buddy called at 6 this morning and we both were less than enthusiastic having only a few hours sleep.. so we decided not to go.

So...I slept til 11 then took the pup up to Buckhorn/Waterman area and went for s snowshoie hike.. was beautiful, but boy that April sun was doing a job on the snow.. even in the shade..

looks liek maybe one more storm next week, then I think we're done... I hope to make it to Baldy yet this year!.. I still have all day passes to use!

 

[SoCal Rider]

glad you made it up! My buddy called at 6 this morning and we both were less than enthusiastic having only a few hours sleep.. so we decided not to go.

So...I slept til 11 then took the pup up to Buckhorn/Waterman area and went for s snowshoie hike.. was beautiful, but boy that April sun was doing a job on the snow.. even in the shade..

looks liek maybe one more storm next week, then I think we're done... I hope to make it to Baldy yet this year!.. I still have all day passes to use!

Slaacker! You have time during the week and you can't force yourself to get a decent night sleep? I'm jailed in my own home waiting for my wife to burst. All I got left are vicarious thrills. C'mon.

 

[Tony Crocker]

I haven't noticed so much in April, but on May powder days the morning sun effect is dramatic in affecting different slopes than in winter:
http://www.skisocal.org/cgi/ski.pl/detail/337;97-98 at Baldy, and http://www.firsttracksonline.com/boards ... php?t=1016 at Mammoth. West slopes last the longest and nothing much lasts past noon if there is any sun.

As I had lots of catching up to do after Egypt and I'm leaving for Mammoth this afternoon, I was not tempted by Baldy yesterday.

 

[snowave]

glad you made it up! My buddy called at 6 this morning and we both were less than enthusiastic having only a few hours sleep.. so we decided not to go.

So...I slept til 11 then took the pup up to Buckhorn/Waterman area and went for s snowshoie hike.. was beautiful, but boy that April sun was doing a job on the snow.. even in the shade..

looks liek maybe one more storm next week, then I think we're done... I hope to make it to Baldy yet this year!.. I still have all day passes to use!

Slaacker! You have time during the week and you can't force yourself to get a decent night sleep? I'm jailed in my own home waiting for my wife to burst. All I got left are vicarious thrills. C'mon.

You nailed it! I am kicking myself a bit.. I think I'm getting old (and somewhat lazy). But on the other hand, my defense is: being tired and out of it at baldy are not a good combination. :wink: I'm turning into somewhat of a hermit living up here in the mtns in the middle of nowhere.. I don't want to deal with peopel and freeways much anymore... as long as I have my vodka and blue cheese stuffed olives (for martini's).. I seem to be content.. :lol:

Will be in BB next week for a few days... so I might try to ride Thurs and/or friday..

 

[baldyskier]

Some pictures from 04/06/06, for SoCal rider's benefit. It was really awesome in the morning.

 

[SoCal Rider]

Some pictures from 04/06/06, for SoCal rider's benefit.

Thanks for thinking of me. I'm so stoked on Baldy and I'm hardly an advanced rider. The power of ego snow on my first and only visit, I guess. (And no, I don't regulary drop "so stoked" into conversation.)

 

[Sir Felgar]

I thought I'd throw in my report, too. Only did a half-day, but the snow was still really good. The snow level was much lower than I thought it would be- all the way to the school in town c.4000 ft. I saw that hail-like snow, esp. at lower elevations on the parking lot runs. South Bowl, Goldridge and the chutes from Emile's to Robin's Run were the best snow-wise. The snow was heavy, but for April in SoCal, I'm truly not complaining. My legs were dead for a day or so. I also fell hard on the parking lot run trying to avoid two rocks.

The temp was not ridiculously high, but with the April sun, it felt like 90! I'm going to Mammoth this weekend, and based on the forecasts I've seen, I'm going to miss the weather at Baldy very, very much.

 

[baldyskier]

Technical (photography) question: How do you guys retain decent sharpness in your photos, even when you reduce the size to less than 60KB? My pictures start out at 1.5 MB or so, but they look pretty grainy when I reduce them to 60KB.

 

[Admin]

Technical (photography) question: How do you guys retain decent sharpness in your photos, even when you reduce the size to less than 60KB? My pictures start out at 1.5 MB or so, but they look pretty grainy when I reduce them to 60KB.

Reduce the image dimensions first to 640x480 max (increased earlier this season from the previous 480x320 limit), then compress the JPEGs. It may require a bit of monkeying around, for different images will require different rates of compression to achieve 60 KB or less (i.e., more diverse and vibrant colors result in larger file sizes), so for the purposes of resizing images for FTO Liftlines I use my image viewing software, CompuPic Pro. This allows me to preview different compression rates before saving the resized file. (I use Paint Shop Pro for serious image editing.)

I have to say that I encounter little difficulty in achieving satisfactory results within the parameters -- see my photos from today at Snowbasin for example.

 

[Sir Felgar]

I use a Mac and GraphicConverter has a preview option in the Save As JPEG dialog box that not only controls the quality of the image, but also sets absolute size limits for the saved file, eliminating any time-consuming playing around with the file.