Jay Silveira
New member
<I>(Note from the Administrator: This report was originally posted on 1/25/00. Due to our move to new servers, the date and time attributed to this post is incorrect.)</I> <BR> <BR>Since we spent last weekend at Sugarbush south, we figured it was time to visit north and ski some of the hopefully untracked powder in the woods. My previous day's investigations had revealed about 6 inches of powder atop a firmer base. The base was composed of granular snow, which did a nice job of protecting you from the underlying debris. The snow can be described as the type of granular stuff you can grab in chunks, and upon scraping two pieces back and forth against each other, they quickly disintegrate at the point of contact and form small granules, like very coarse sugar. So whatever nature did to create such interesting stuff, that was the end result. (My intimate connection to the base layer of snow will become apparent below) Above this base layer, the powder was actually pretty light. If I had to guess, I would say 7% H20, but it varied if you got close to the trails where the wind seeped in and compacted it into a more styrofoam-like windpack. <BR> <BR>We decided to wait out the morning (-9 F in Burlington) and head out a bit later as the day warmed. The wind had died down, and with sun and warmer temps, things were very comfortable (it seemed like temps got well into the teens by the end of the day). We started off our day with about 30 turns on trail before we hit the woods. The woods we were in were essentially untracked, so many good lines were available. Before long, everyone was whooping and hollering, shouting out about lines. E continued to forge ahead on her woods skiing, despite having one of those days where you just feel off the whole time. We discovered some nice cliff bands with drops of about 3-10 feet, and plenty of powder below for soft landings. At one point, James and I discovered a miniature bowl, about 150-200 feet in diameter, with huge open lines and fun obstacles. I think James was drooling as we looked up and saw the untracked expanse from below 
I'd never hit that section before because it is sort of guarded by a cliff band, and it starts out atop a rise that pushes you around it unless you really work to get there. We've stashed that one in our memory banks. We skied it once, and it will be even better after a big dump. <BR> <BR>Well, it looks like James will run away with another award this week, it shall be called the "MISPLACED EQUIPMENT AWARD". Because we ski a lot of woods, and because we've had more than our fair share of wrenched shoulders in cases where a pole gets stuck and we keep on going, most of our poles have no straps. This generally results in a short hike to retrieve a pole if it is pulled out of your hand, but I find it's better than the shoulder thing. In the case at hand, James had his pole grabbed, but in this case, the handle came off (it's one of those crazy twist on grips atop a Goode composite pole), and after a brief bobbling, poof, away it goes into the powder 
A fairly exhaustive (20-30 min) four-man search of the suspected area revealed nothing, although we did get to really know the powder and the layers underneath. A quick trip to the shop and some duct tape applied by the technicians created a nice spot for a new pole grip to be applied. James' new pole is now about 3-4 inches shorter than his other one because of the grip design. My poles have the same problem, since I lost one of the baskets, it took part of the tip with it and I lost about 2 inches. That is probably my biggest complaint about theses composite poles. I have to love the fact that I have not broken a pole in years, but when pieces come off, it's tough to get a cheap fix. <BR> <BR>Anyway, back to the skiing. After a few runs in the woods of Inverness, we decided that we should at least check out a couple of trails, so we headed toward the upper mountain. Both Bravo and Encore were bumped up with natural snow and great coverage. I'd have to say that there were only bare patches near 1 in 20, or 1 in 30 bumps, that is pretty darn good for no big storms in who knows how long. I think that traffic has been light on these trails which helps to support this. Sugarbush was up to 100 trails on Sunday, and they've been slowly adding over the past couple of weeks. Mango was very excited about the bump lines, while I was most psyched about the soft snow on the edges. You know coverage is doing OK though, when the steep face section of Bravo is covered, it can often be a rock garden. (I have heard that they can blow snow on this though by dragging snow guns through the woods, so that may be what did it. <BR> <BR>We finished off the day with a couple of runs in powder stashes off the Sunshine Double, followed by a return to the woods around Inverness. Mango also gets and award, although not a good one. He managed to jam his thumb on the half pipe and tore a tendon of sorts. He has to have a small cast for a bit. I hear that he will be getting another one soon, and the doctors said he could bring his ski pole in to get the shape right for holding his pole. They know what's important <BR> <BR>Images associated with this report (4 images) can be viewed at: <BR>http://www.uvm.edu/~jsilveir/23JAN00.html
I'd never hit that section before because it is sort of guarded by a cliff band, and it starts out atop a rise that pushes you around it unless you really work to get there. We've stashed that one in our memory banks. We skied it once, and it will be even better after a big dump. <BR> <BR>Well, it looks like James will run away with another award this week, it shall be called the "MISPLACED EQUIPMENT AWARD". Because we ski a lot of woods, and because we've had more than our fair share of wrenched shoulders in cases where a pole gets stuck and we keep on going, most of our poles have no straps. This generally results in a short hike to retrieve a pole if it is pulled out of your hand, but I find it's better than the shoulder thing. In the case at hand, James had his pole grabbed, but in this case, the handle came off (it's one of those crazy twist on grips atop a Goode composite pole), and after a brief bobbling, poof, away it goes into the powder A fairly exhaustive (20-30 min) four-man search of the suspected area revealed nothing, although we did get to really know the powder and the layers underneath. A quick trip to the shop and some duct tape applied by the technicians created a nice spot for a new pole grip to be applied. James' new pole is now about 3-4 inches shorter than his other one because of the grip design. My poles have the same problem, since I lost one of the baskets, it took part of the tip with it and I lost about 2 inches. That is probably my biggest complaint about theses composite poles. I have to love the fact that I have not broken a pole in years, but when pieces come off, it's tough to get a cheap fix. <BR> <BR>Anyway, back to the skiing. After a few runs in the woods of Inverness, we decided that we should at least check out a couple of trails, so we headed toward the upper mountain. Both Bravo and Encore were bumped up with natural snow and great coverage. I'd have to say that there were only bare patches near 1 in 20, or 1 in 30 bumps, that is pretty darn good for no big storms in who knows how long. I think that traffic has been light on these trails which helps to support this. Sugarbush was up to 100 trails on Sunday, and they've been slowly adding over the past couple of weeks. Mango was very excited about the bump lines, while I was most psyched about the soft snow on the edges. You know coverage is doing OK though, when the steep face section of Bravo is covered, it can often be a rock garden. (I have heard that they can blow snow on this though by dragging snow guns through the woods, so that may be what did it. <BR> <BR>We finished off the day with a couple of runs in powder stashes off the Sunshine Double, followed by a return to the woods around Inverness. Mango also gets and award, although not a good one. He managed to jam his thumb on the half pipe and tore a tendon of sorts. He has to have a small cast for a bit. I hear that he will be getting another one soon, and the doctors said he could bring his ski pole in to get the shape right for holding his pole. They know what's important <BR> <BR>Images associated with this report (4 images) can be viewed at: <BR>http://www.uvm.edu/~jsilveir/23JAN00.html