powderfreak

I’m down in NH this weekend. Bedford and Merrimack. Beautiful down here. But holy crap I’ve never seen so many political signs in my life. This is incredible.

Snowing now down through 1200ft it looks like.

Do we have snow in the air this evening?

I love turning the clocks ahead… daylight jumps from 6pm to 7pm instantly. But put me in the camp of I want more daylight later in the day. I’m up in the dark in AM regardless in the winter.

The older I get the more I wish the summer solstice lasted all year.

My ideal spot is elevated valley. I’m only at 750ft so I’d like to do this same climate but at 1,500ft… like Alex or an SLK. You want thermal extremes, elevated mountain valley will do it. Can pop 95F or -40F… but need that surrounding high terrain a couple thousand feet up around you. 1,500ft on its own and you are ranging from like 85F to -10F annually up here. But throw some walls up around you and the delta grows rapidly. I love the extremes and then you also have the elevation to snow efficiently when that CAA comes in.

No. This is unbelievable. Every single day.

It almost feels like you are always trying to convince yourself too. Never getting too cold there, and never getting too hot. Enjoy a bit of both. Freeze in the AM, shorts and tees at the summits in the PM. What a day. Also, not a single leaf left.

27F for the low.

That’s super impressive. Driest two month combo on record? Of all two month combos? The chances of randomly running into some precipitation events over a 60 day period are high… even in a dry pattern. Not one good rain event snuck through the webbed fingers? I’m impressed.

Next day the sunsets after 6pm here is March 10th. Here comes the darkness.

Light rain falling at 67F in late October is a vibe. Wets the ground, probably leads to more fog. Love having all the windows and doors open as the weak FROPA moves through a good 30mph breeze.

The conspiracy theories that would come from that...

This is pretty funny from the official NOAA social account…

lol 79/29 for 16% RH. It’s like the desert SW with winds gusting to 30mph too. We’re like 9 degrees over the record high (granted MVL only goes back about 33 years).

Yes, good nuance. It’s usually precip or maritime influenced… vs just like a straight yore air mass. I find the trend-line warming very interesting from a science observation standpoint (don’t care for the deeper sociopolitical undercurrents that often bleed into these discussions though).

Ha, right? It checks out. MVL's normal high is 54F. Yesterday was 79F for a +25 on the max. Today is already 75F before noon. Last week when it was cold with mountain snow the departures were -4 to -8. We are off-setting that with a +17 (Mon), +17 (Tue), and probably near +20 today. So we swing from like a few days of -5F to a few days of +15 to +20 and it's easy to see how it averages out.

It is 75F at 11:05am. Holy crap. Previous record was 70F in 2020. METAR KMVL 231505Z AUTO 19015KT 10SM CLR 24/08 A2992

Another banner day coming up tomorrow.

DIT is going down with that ship/take, no matter what. I’m sure there is nice foliage scenes nearby or throughout. If his environment is largely dry oaks during a multi-month stein stretch, I’m sure that’s not vibrant. Oaks usually aren’t to begin with. But once the species mix changes along with soil/precip, it’s probably great. When you live on the warmest hilltop with the latest frost/freezes and longest growing season, with all oaks, and dry antecedent conditions…. probably not ideal for vibrant neighborhood color.

Back when I was at UVM, I took a course on non-profit recreation and we went to Maine for a week to travel around the state checking out some of those local community hills. The focus was on the Maine Winter Sports Center, and it was an awesome scene checking out places from Black Mountain to Big Rock in Mars Hill. Big Rock was an awesome little ski area that rips.... 1,000 verts of fall-line terrain, I remember loving that spot way up on the NE Canadian border. It was easy to get behind their mission statement and see that there are so many organizations in Maine that are dedicated to using winter sports to promote a healthy lifestyle in the cold, dark winter months and economic stability. A big part of the MWSC then was trying to confront the childhood obesity and issues that arise when rural kids are stuck inside for multiple winter months in a row, without the economic means to get winter sports equipment and access to recreate (and therefore better themselves, in physical and mental health). The Maine Winter Sports Center (MWSC) is a 501(c)3 non-profit, economic development corporation, founded in April 1999 with a grant from the Libra Foundation in Portland, Maine. Our mission is to re-establish skiing as a life-style in Maine for lifestyle and economic opportunity for rural communities of the state. Our assets include world class cross country and biathlon venues in Fort Kent and Presque Isle, Big Rock Alpine area in Mars Hill and Quoggy Jo Alpine area in Presque Isle, Maine.

Definitely have no memories of that ski area. But back then when I was growing up, the "camps" or cottages the family had in Woodstock were not winterized and we always drained the water and locked them up for the season... so for most of my childhood I would spend June-August in Woodstock but then we wouldn't come back after a final weekend in October. So I never was around in the winter back then.

What an afternoon. 60F at the picnic tables and hiking in shorts and a T-shirt… one week after mid-winter up here.

52 here and sliding doors open. It got hot inside with full sun and mid-70s. Feels like a crisp summer day. Not full summer humidity, but the temps line up.

Luckily we can still get good snow up here in +4ish temps. It’s when we start pushing the +6 to +8 up here that things get bleak in a hurry. Of course the margin for error with positive departures decreases as one heads south… with almost no margin of error by the time you’re in NYC and south latitudes.