Stowe Feb 4th: Better than expected

As others have found, we definitely avoided the worst case scenario lately and conditions today on Mansfield were surprisingly good. Still pretty variable overall with all of the following encountered on any given run: soft powder, dense windblown, rain crust, sun crust, breakable crust, unbreakable crust, edge-able ice, and pure blue ice. Luckily, the good turns far outweighed the bad turns and life was good.

http://tinyurl.com/yvo9jn

I bummed a ride over with Aaron L. It felt good to be on the mountain again; two full days had passed since my last dance on skis. The shakes were setting in and I didn't like the idea of three days without skiing. I don't think I've taken 3 full days off in quite some time (possibly only once since Jan 1st)...so it felt good to get out there

http://tinyurl.com/2gm7l7

Deep blue skies with low puffy clouds around for a time made for some good views of Mansfield. Later in the day the clouds moved in for good...felt thankful for at least a little sunshine and indigo blue skies.

First we went for Chapel Woods which proved to be a very, very good run. The conditions in there were grade A. We did two runs there, searching out different variations on the lower sections. Chapel Woods has been up there on my list of favorite runs this month.

Aaron and I then bypassed Bypass Chutes for the woods around Balls Falls. Good skiing and good views of the Kitchen Wall.
http://tinyurl.com/24q4v8
There's a few nice booters in that area and Aaron decided to try one.
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We moved on to the Gondi and took a few runs on and around a certain ridge the boys have been hitting a lot...for good reason, its a fun ridge run with plenty of options. And good views of the notch. The snow in here wasn't as grabby underfoot and the moderate-at-best pitch worked great for the conditions.
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And in here, you can always bank off onto slightly steeper pitches if you want.
http://tinyurl.com/2zdmaa

Lastly, we took the big Easy to Spruce to finish it off with some Big Spruce runs. Its sort of like the transfer gondola opened up a whole new mountain to explore when you're looking for something different to do. I still don't know Spruce's expert floor plan by heart yet but I'm pretty close. New stashes are still out there and we viewed a bunch of prospects from below but time was running out. We saved some stuff for another day but went into a stair-step hardwood glade on our last run; terrain would pitch off just enough to take some faster turns and gather speed to cruise the flatter sections below.
http://tinyurl.com/2hds2d

Another fine ski day...
-Scott

Scott how is the career going as a weatherman?

My heart is freakin' breaking you hadn't skiied in two days..............................next you'll be singing that "it ain't easy to be me" song..............................
Serious now - thanks once again for the pics/report......... and all your weather insight past and future...................must get back to Stowe this year!

More lame ass photos. Please stick to weather forecasting....

For those inquiring about wx....I just posted a forecast for tomorrow with a nod towards the weekend.

http://forums.alpinezone.com/23648-tomorrows-snow-possible-weekend-fun.html

I was wondering, is the kitchen wall able to be hit on skiis/snowboards? Is it hard to get to? Is it a locals only spot?

SnowRider said:

I was wondering, is the kitchen wall able to be hit on skiis/snowboards? Is it hard to get to? Is it a locals only spot?

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You definitely want to know where your going. There are routes down it though...but the casual skier/rider shouldn't go near it. I haven't skied directly down the Wall yet but there are two routes I'd like to do. It has massive exposure and a wrong turn can be very, very bad.

-Scott