Snowbird UT, 02/13 - 02/14

They weren't the best days ever, but It was certainly lovable.    

Day 1: Snow was in the forecast for both days.  Along with stormy conditions, we got some wicked winds.  The morning of the 13th started slow.  It started snowing early, but wind holds across the mountain constrained the fun to Wilbere and Little Thunder.  The place was empty, but a bottleneck was inevitable.  Patience was key.  There was no expectation of afternoon tram rides, but we thought upper mountain turns were not too far from a reality.  Shortly after lunch, Gadzoom and Gad2 opened, and we enjoyed a diverse array of routes left and right off of Gad 2 in shallow pow through last chair.  It was pretty sweet.

Slow start


Bottle Neck


Lapping Gad2


Westside Weave Weaving




Day 2: We started with high expectations.  17 inches reported overnight.  Still pretty windy.  The road was scheduled to open at 8.  We were in the line-up pretty early.  We got second tram.  It was still really windy.  Visibly was OK by PNW standards (poor by local standards).  Did I mention that it was windy?  It was wind hammered in spots and wind enhanced in others.  Variable, but more in a good way than bad.  It didn't seem like 17 inches.  We lapped Little Cloud until it got tracked out, and then got in early when they eventually opened Peruvian.  It was pretty much ski on the entire day.  We missed the opening of Mineral Basin.  It had warmed up considerably, so by noon, the lower mountain felt a bit PNWish.  We didn't do too much beyond the same tree routes off of Gad2 from the previous day in the afternoon.  By mid afternoon, wind driven snow had returned.  We left around 3.  The lower mountain had turned crusty, and the upper mountain wind has tired us out.  It was a great day.

Canyon Road Line-up


Second Tram


Looking up Little Cloud

Looks pretty good to me