NNE Cold Season Thread 2021/2022

[powderfreak]

4 hours ago, alex said:

I’m still on vacation but Diane says 8” at home! Eeek

Damn!  Pasted.  That's a healthy stack on that truck.

[#NoPoles]

Yep, got about 8 inches. Could have been more but it was so heavy, lots of compaction.

Pretty impressed. The snow is sooooo wet and heavy. We could have used this in dec/jan

[J.Spin]

As it’s been for the past few days, it was quite windy yesterday in the Champlain Valley, but with partly cloudy skies providing some sun, and the temperatures getting into the 50s F, it seemed like there might be enough warmth to make the slopes worth a visit.  That thought was tempered somewhat as I headed into the mountains on the way home; the skies became notably cloudier, and the temperatures felt several degrees cooler, even at valley level.  At that point I was definitely questioning if there was sufficient warmth at elevation for softening the snow, but it still felt like it was worth the quick trip up to Bolton for some turns.

On the way up the Bolton Valley Access Road, first signs of old snow snowpack were at ~1,400’, and first signs of the new snow left from our most recent storm appeared in the 1,800’ – 1,900’ elevation range.  I’d contemplated skiing at Timberline if the snowpack was continuous enough, but it’s too broken up down at those elevations to be worth it.

As expected up at the main mountain, there’s still plenty of snow for top-to-bottom turns on the main routes like Beech Seal and Spillway.  Sherman’s Pass seems close to continuous, but there’s at least a break or two in the snowpack there.  While the quantity of the snow is looking quite good, we’re still going to need some more warmth and temperature cycling to get the snowpack to some quality corn.  Even with Bolton’s western exposure and afternoon sun, a lot of terrain still needs some rounds of softening.  The combination of temperatures, which I guess were somewhere in the 40s F, and the cooling breeze that we’ve had the past few days, just isn’t enough to really soften the snowpack.  Granted, I was out on the mountain in the later afternoon period when the sun angle is getting lower and temperatures are starting to drop off, but it was obvious that only areas in direct sun had seen much cycling of the snow to get to appropriate quality corn, and even those areas still need work.  Heck, most of terrain above 2,000’ that was not in the direct sun, still had snow from our most recent storm earlier this week.  I toured up to about 2,500’, but didn’t push above that elevation that because it was only getting cooler and windier as I ascended, and the quality of the snow just didn’t seem to be worth it.

So while spring snow conditions weren’t quite there yesterday, the recent snows and good preservations we’ve been seeing do bode well as we head into the next several weeks of the season.  Today’s forecast around here seems sort of similar to yesterday’s, so I wouldn’t expect primo ski conditions, but tomorrow is supposed to kick things up a notch with temperatures around 60 F and more sun.  That might be enough to get some of that south-facing terrain into good shape.

A couple of shots from yesterday at Bolton:

[J.Spin]

On 4/27/2022 at 8:52 PM, powderfreak said:

Wife and I were at the Matterhorn for dinner and since it's close to the base of the ski area, I of course had to go the 2-3 miles up the road to see what was going on.

It's been snowing even down in the valley since like 3pm but hasn't stuck down at 750ft.  You start to see some accumulation around 1,000ft on this side of the mountain whereas the west slope has much lower accumulation down to 500ft or lower like @Froude posted.

Anyway, up at 1,500ft Barnes Camp boardwalk we took a snowy evening walk to enjoy the wind/snow/cold.  Felt like mid-winter.  Car said 29F.

Found ~2" on the ground in that area.

Roads were a mess above 1,300ft but only because it was so incredibly greasy.  Only like a half inch of slush on the roadway but had very little control as the sub-32F temps finally were icing the road up.  No one around though so could stop in the middle of the state highway and take photos and then drive down the middle of the road, ha.

All in all, dinner at the Matterhorn and a weenie drive home.  Fun evening.

Oh, just an FYI about that most recent storm that I noticed as I was entering data from it – that was our 60^th accumulating snowstorm of the season here at our site.  I doubt it will contend for top spot in my records, which is 2018-2019 with 64 storms, but it’s second on the list, and still quite notable when the mean and median number of storms for a season is in the 50 to 55 range.

It looks like Jay Peak also sailed past the 300” snowfall mark on the season with this last storm, so while it’s presumably going to end up below average in total snowfall, the average or near average behavior over the past couple of months has helped to keep it well ahead of some of those really poor seasons.

And, checking out the Matt Parrilla plot, Mansfield snowpack is actually ahead of average now, so hopefully that sets us up for a decent May.

[J.Spin]

On 5/1/2022 at 9:07 PM, powderfreak said:

Beautiful sunny day for some May turns. Plenty of snow with still 4.5 feet of snowpack at the summit stake. Numerous 2,000+ vertical foot routes still available. Liftline skied great and is probably going to last the longest. It's fat right down to Crossover.

Nosedive still goes, Perry Merrill looks like it's about to completely melt out below the Pumphouse, Hayride still went when I skied it yesterday, Lord to North Slope and Sunrise to Standard, Gulch, T-Line, slow side snowmaking trails all good still. Takes a long time to melt all that snowmaking.

Fantastic views today of the Chin and also Mount Washington out on the horizon in New Hampshire. Also had a bear run out in front of me on Sunrise; he came out one snow gun uphill of me. I wasn't fast enough to get a good photo while he ran across the trail but did get a grainy one of him in the woods on the other side.  He looked at me quizzically (I'm thinking, that's a weird looking dog) as I couldn't see his whole body... then as I slowly tried to get my camera out without startling him, he took off running.  They are very docile creatures and afraid of us.

Good sized crowd out there earning their turns today. Perfect day for it. Probably have another two weeks left?

Over at Spruce on Sunday was really deserted when I was there in the afternoon, so here’s a quick update and a few photos:

While Friday turned out to be a bit too cool and breezy to really soften up the slopes around here, and Saturday didn’t seem much better, Sunday saw more warmth and sunshine as the forecast had suggested.  Mother Nature wasn’t messing around at that point, with temperatures moving up into the 60s F, a cloudless sky, and the disappearance of those persistent winds.

There was no question about whether or not the snow was going to soften up today, so I decided to head to Stowe for some afternoon turns.  I hadn’t been to the general Stowe area in a while, but the usual views of Mansfield started to appear as I headed through Waterbury Center, and the alpine terrain was certainly lit up in the May sunshine.

I’d hoped that the south-facing terrain of Spruce Peak still had enough coverage to provide some nice uninterrupted turns, and indeed as I approached the resort I could see that the Main Street area and surrounding trails still had nearly continuous snow down the base of the Sensation Quad.

With the route I took on the lower part of the mountain, I ended up hiking about 1/3 of the ascent, and then skinning the final 2/3.  I was initially questioning my decision to bring skins as I navigated the lower slopes, but once I hit the point where I started skinning, it was definitely the right choice in terms of efficiency; the upper slopes of Main Street have so much snow that it would take more effort to find dry areas for easier hiking.

In terms of the skiing, it was far superior to what I had experience on Friday.  The warmth and sun took care of getting the spring snow into something that was definitely worthy of turns.  It wasn’t perfect, because there were still some sticky areas from recent snows on terrain that hadn’t seen the sun and/or skier traffic, but those were generally avoidable by skiing the sunnier sides of the trails.

With such a gorgeous day, I was surprised that I didn’t see a single other skier out there during my entire tour on Spruce.  I did see two other cars when I first arrived at the MMSC Clubhouse parking lot, but they were just hikers.  I saw them finishing up their hikes while I was ascending, and the entire parking lot was empty when I got back to my car.  Everyone must have been skiing over at Mansfield!

A few shots from the outing:

[powderfreak]

8 hours ago, J.Spin said:

Over at Spruce on Sunday was really deserted when I was there in the afternoon, so here’s a quick update and a few photos:

While Friday turned out to be a bit too cool and breezy to really soften up the slopes around here, and Saturday didn’t seem much better, Sunday saw more warmth and sunshine as the forecast had suggested.  Mother Nature wasn’t messing around at that point, with temperatures moving up into the 60s F, a cloudless sky, and the disappearance of those persistent winds.

There was no question about whether or not the snow was going to soften up today, so I decided to head to Stowe for some afternoon turns.  I hadn’t been to the general Stowe area in a while, but the usual views of Mansfield started to appear as I headed through Waterbury Center, and the alpine terrain was certainly lit up in the May sunshine.

I’d hoped that the south-facing terrain of Spruce Peak still had enough coverage to provide some nice uninterrupted turns, and indeed as I approached the resort I could see that the Main Street area and surrounding trails still had nearly continuous snow down the base of the Sensation Quad.

With the route I took on the lower part of the mountain, I ended up hiking about 1/3 of the ascent, and then skinning the final 2/3.  I was initially questioning my decision to bring skins as I navigated the lower slopes, but once I hit the point where I started skinning, it was definitely the right choice in terms of efficiency; the upper slopes of Main Street have so much snow that it would take more effort to find dry areas for easier hiking.

In terms of the skiing, it was far superior to what I had experience on Friday.  The warmth and sun took care of getting the spring snow into something that was definitely worthy of turns.  It wasn’t perfect, because there were still some sticky areas from recent snows on terrain that hadn’t seen the sun and/or skier traffic, but those were generally avoidable by skiing the sunnier sides of the trails.

With such a gorgeous day, I was surprised that I didn’t see a single other skier out there during my entire tour on Spruce.  I did see two other cars when I first arrived at the MMSC Clubhouse parking lot, but they were just hikers.  I saw them finishing up their hikes while I was ascending, and the entire parking lot was empty when I got back to my car.  Everyone must have been skiing over at Mansfield!

A few shots from the outing:

Nice J.  That's some good skiable coverage for south facing Spruce this time of year.  Spruce takes the brunt of the solar effects and I haven't been up there much lately.

I should probably try one last ski up there before hiking season starts there.  I love Spruce in the warm season for a quick after-work jaunt to the lookout rock at the top.

Liftline and Lord to North Slope then T-Line are likely the two routes that last the longest on Mansfield.  Nosedive at the "Shambles Turn"  around 2,300ft (because your legs are usually in shambles by then and trying to run it out to the lower pitch) is worn down to a ribbon on skiers right.  That section up to Cliff Trail was weaker than usual this year.  Liftline, Centerline and Lord/North Slope to T-Line seemed deeper than usual.

[J.Spin]

On 5/4/2022 at 9:39 PM, powderfreak said:

Nice J.  That's some good skiable coverage for south facing Spruce this time of year.  Spruce takes the brunt of the solar effects and I haven't been up there much lately.

I should probably try one last ski up there before hiking season starts there.  I love Spruce in the warm season for a quick after-work jaunt to the lookout rock at the top.

Liftline and Lord to North Slope then T-Line are likely the two routes that last the longest on Mansfield.  Nosedive at the "Shambles Turn"  around 2,300ft (because your legs are usually in shambles by then and trying to run it out to the lower pitch) is worn down to a ribbon on skiers right.  That section up to Cliff Trail was weaker than usual this year.  Liftline, Centerline and Lord/North Slope to T-Line seemed deeper than usual.

Thanks for all the updates PF – based on the way the snow was starting to break up on Main Street, I’ll probably be checking out the Mansfield side for my next Stowe outing.

Today I actually headed to Bolton for turns, since it might be the last weekend for practical/productive touring there.  Based on what I saw on my last Bolton outing a couple weeks ago, I figured the lower mountain would be discontinuous at this point, but the amount of snow on Spillway was obviously going to last a while.  I decided to hike today vs. skinning, and I think that was the right call.  The bottom half of the mountain has some decent areas of snow, but it’s discontinuous enough with plenty of dry ground for walking, that hiking is the more practical option.  Above Mid Mountain, one could skin up Spillway, but that’s really steep, and they’ve plowed Sherman’s Pass most of the way to the Vista Summit, so I used that for a lot of my ascent today.

The snow on Spillway is still continuous, and it was skiing great.  There must have been some productive freeze/thaw cycles recently, because it was the best corn snow I’ve skied during this April/May period.  Spillway is quite steep, so you get some of those nice fall-way turns, which are so much fun in good snow.  At Mid Mountain on my way up I met a couple that was on their way down.  They said that “Spillway was about as frosty as it’s been in a while”, and they weren’t kidding.

It’s fun traveling around the area right now and taking in the views as spring begins to make its presence known.  You can see that greenery is appearing in the lower mountain valleys, and it’s just starting to make its slow creep up the mountainsides.

A few shots from today: