luckyweather

Hit 58 on the slopes at Chestnut in northwest IL. Their base is pretty solid for the most part, about 3-5’ on most runs, but today sure was eating at it. This winter sucked, but it seemed like less rain events than the much better late half of winter 18/19, which kept the ski areas manmade snow in okay shape. Unlike the majority I will be the voice of dissent and say never summer, don’t want to see winter go.

A few snowscape pics from last night in Wausau, WI. Seems like all our posters these days with a few exceptions are from semi and northern IL. Central Wis got a nice snowpack replenisher with this system. Came up here powder chasing again and while the snow was a little wetter than I prefer it was buttery smooth to ski on.

Good thing, the rainier glacier has been releasing more than it recharges ever year for the past 50.

Not in the sub, but the spigot has shutoff in Colorado, at least for now, and so the snowpack is transforming into a fragile structure, developing facets that will probably produce some big slides after the snow comes back, as they’ll be the trigger layer for sliding. Thought I’d share as it’s interesting stuff, though not really a topic we’ll ever get the chance to discuss here, except maybe this season, at the rate we’re going ;-)

Little Switz in mke is turning their lifts this weekend, Tyrol Basin in Madison opened their terrain park last weekend, Lutsen is already open, almost a lock alpine valley will open next weekend, no problem making snow in this environment, granite peak in wausau opens next weekend. The area ski hills have had record late seasons with the lingering cold into spring the past few seasons, now getting open about as early as possible this season - should be another good year for snow sports enthusiasts.

holy cow, glad you made it out okay, wow. Did you have a personal locator beacon or did somebody just come upon you? The current situation down here at 43north isn’t great for much of anything outdoors, snow is trashed, can’t ride mountain bikes, too icy for studded fat bikes, ice isn’t solid enough on the water to do anything, ski hills are trashed, can’t snowshoe or XC ski. So I’m going ice climbing this weekend, the late season cold is good for one thing - freezing up the waterfalls and keeping the ice climbing season active.