Alpental WA - Cinco De Mayo

Brownski wrote a great piece on Skiing In The Rain...  Heck rain in the Winter always puts a damper on the day.  That said, to be perfectly honest, I actually like skiing in the rain.  That is... if it's not a cold rain.  Obviously, the experience is very gear dependent, but with proper preparation, it's not too difficult for me to find the bright side of a grey day at the mountain.  

Now, a rainy day at the Mountain in May has bit of a different spin... add to the mix a Mexican Themed Blow-Out, and you get a day where the weather doesn't really matter... unless, of course, it rains so hard that you really can't see.  Then you spend most of your day in the lodge, reminiscing about a great season, while doing your best Mexican hat dance... fueled of course, by lots of booze and collective debauchery.

It rained the entire day... at times it was like a tropical down pour.  The night before, there were several thunderstorms that dropped lots of dime to quarter sized hail.  The water logged upper mountain snowpack was completely destabilized.  There is still tons of snow on the mountain, but the un-groomed, rain soaked surface was so variable that aggressive turns felt very risky.  Most of the gated terrain was out of play due to slide danger.  The main mountain was a mix of variable sized soft bumps mixed with large swaths water logged slush.  We made 10 runs... we were done by 1, but didn't end up heading home until around 8.  A great day to close out my lift serviced season.  

It looks like the party was 1 day too early... for the last 2 days of lift service in WA state, it looks like Blue Bird with mild temps. Oh well... there's always next year.  

If you can get over here tomorrow... closing day looks to be pretty sweet.



If only the line-up looked like this on a Powder day...


Still trying to figure out why this is called Chair 18


No lines for Chair 2


Great new booze out of Hood River


Lots of Costumes... I think this guy is an anchor for one of the Seattle News stations


The battle ground of Dance


Parting shot from the balcony of the Backcountry



 

 

looks like a fun day, rain or no rain. Day drinking in the lodge isn't as good as actual skiing but I can think of worse ways to spend my time.

Cinco party HAD to include lots 'o te-kill-ya.  1 to 8 of that would not have ended well for me!

Looking forward to a trip next year to check out Alpental and the Snoqualmie backcountry (Chair Peak or the Slot Couloir).