Powder Sunday at Schweitzer

It was darn fine to be at Schweitzer for the first time this season. This is pretty much my favorite mountain in the Pacific Northwest, and just like every visit last year, the snow gods were on our side. It started snowing as we drove up the hill on Saturday evening, and was still coming down when we left the St Bernard to go to bed. I do like the St Bernard – it’s a fine little ski bar. The music was rather interesting too – the Shook Twins – a couple of talented Sandpoint locals who seem talented enough to have promising future.

 

Sunday was cold, with plenty of freshies everywhere. We mined the pow in the trees off Stella early, as the visibility was better on the back side. And when the cloud lifted before lunch, there was treasure to be found on any line you wanted off the Great Escape. And it lasted all afternoon.

All in all, an excellent Sunday. And notable for a remarkable lack on people. It wasn’t as much that there were no lines. More that there was no people waiting at the lift when we loaded. Quite amazing – something to do with being the last day of the New Year holiday, we summarized. But to be honest, I really didn’t care 🙂

1 day – 8,700m

Season Totals: 15 days, 114,200 vertical metres. 4 powder days

We finally get to stay at Apex

When, a day before arriving, we managed to book a room at the Apex Mountain Inn between Xmas and New Year, I probably should’ve guessed it wasn’t going to be too busy on the slopes. Surprising really – this should be a busy period, and the snow was in top shape.

  

But no one was really there. In fact, apart from the 30 minutes after lunch, lift lines were non-existent. This left plenty of time for exploring the mountain from laps off the quad. On three previous day trips over the years (pics here), I’d hugely enjoyed the terrain at Apex. A small mountain with a big kick.

And 2 full days here only helped cement these feelings. When the snow is decent – as it was on this visit – this is a great, massively underrated expert mountain. I’m reliably informed a base of 140cm ensures nearly all logs and rocks are adequately covered on the steeper terrain. The snow report said 127cm for our two days, and only 3 runs were closed. Everything else I went down was skiable – the rocks were eminently avoidable 🙂

We were also lucky enough to meet up with a couple of Penticton-based Aussies who contribute to the Aussie Ski Forums. It’s always a pleasure to follow around a local for a few hours, and get a more educated perspective on a mountain. So thanks Wally and Phil – we’ll have to do it again sometime. Especially as the snow report has a base of 170cm right now!

2 days – 16,400m

Season Totals: 14 days, 105,500 vertical metres. 3 powder days

A day at Manning Park

Friday night at Whistler saw the snow start to fall. A report of 16cms Saturday morning though wasn’t sufficient incentive for us to buy a pass and head up along with the newly arrived New Year crowds to trash the pow in minutes. With such limited terrain open, it would’ve been, like a small tub of Ben and Jerry’s between 6, a short-lived pleasure.

So we headed to Vancouver, stopping to gawp at an amazing number of monster bald eagles at Squamish. These birds feast on spawning winter salmon, and seem to enjoy sitting silently in trees surveying the terrain for food. We saw a couple flap their wings and soar impressively to another perch, but mostly we just wandered along deep, snowy river banks and enjoyed nature’s impressive offering.

In Vancouver we walked along deep, snowy streets and enjoyed the impressive beer and food on offer at the Yaletown brew pub.  But an early night was in order, as the next day we were driving to purportedly better snow in the Okanagan at Apex.  And to break up the 5 hour drive, some turns at Manning Park were in order. Located in the northern Cascades, just across the US border, this little hill is literally in the middle of nowhere. As we drove through deep, light blower into the magnificently empty car park at 11am, the chances of having some fun seemed as high as a night on the town with Ozzy Osbourne.

The 20cm of fluffy new had fallen on a slightly shrubby base, but there was still plenty of untracked turns to be had, especially in the trees accessed from the traverse on the skiers left of the chair (pics here). Care was needed to avoid the tops of small trees protruding through the snow, but the potential of the terrain at this little hill was obvious. With full cover (a week later, at the time of blogging, the base has doubled!), there’s enough lines to have a fun day or even weekend. Still, there was plenty of snow for Ethan to practice some jumps.

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Ethan at Manning Park

We only rode, along with maybe 150 others, the orange double chair, which gave access to about 330m vertical and a variety of blues and blacks, plus many tree lines. There was no shortage of choice, and some really nice lines to check out. But after 3 immensely enjoyable hours, we hit the road to Apex, with another new ski area under the belt.

Season Totals: 12 days, 84,100 vertical metres. 3 powder days

Pre-Xmas Olympics training at Whistler

Any 2010 Olympic hopefuls out there needing tips, give us a call. After 5 days I think we know every nook and cranny, dip and dive, roll and plunge, on the Dave Murray Downhill and Franz’s run. This is simply because, in an unusual reversal of Whistler conditions, the lower runs had more snow than up high due to a severe blast of Arctic weather. In fact the alpine was closed due to lack of snow. Luckily, snow-making and Arctic blasts are fine bedfellows – they saved our trip. And the weather was clear and cold.

Blackcomb was only really decent on Springboard and Zigzag, and I guess on the glacier if you could be bothered going up there for short runs, with only greens or rock-ridden runs down. Hence we gravitated to the lower runs to Whistler Creekside, where firm conditions, a consistent pitch, and light-ish crowds made for some fast and fun cruising. Other advantages were Dusty’s and Chickpea for lunch – yep – when I’m talking about food on the hill you know  it wasn’t vintage Whistler.

Still, we got in plenty of vertical, demo-ed some skis (the Canski demo tents are a great deal), and hey – we were skiing. In nasal hair-freezing cold, clear weather, with ice crystal-created rainbows floating across the mountains. You sure knew you were alive 🙂

5 days – 45600 verts

season totals:

11 days, 80,800 vertical metres. 2 powder days