The bright Sun was short lived this morning, as the storm front was sitting on the horizon, moving in rapidly.  The wind was cranking out of the South ahead of this system, stripping the West facing aspects, and moving it into the adjacent shots, filling them in.  As I pointed out yesterday, a quick survey on the way up the Tram revealed those few smoothed out shots to the attentive rider.   The Cirque Traverse was stripped down to the ratchet chop, making the approach to the desired aspect, very interesting with such strong wind at your back.  There were some slight pockets of dust to dig into, providing points of required deceleration.  The accumulated Essence was slightly breakable, but responded to a shmoozed turn keeping you on top.  Overall, the off trail was fully set up, lacking the softness of yesterday.  The clouds moved in at 11:30 AM., with the snow beginning to fall, reducing the visibility with flat light.  The North facing aspects were benefiting from the high winds, and those shots will be the best choice for tomorrow, where the ride will be significantly smoother after being covered by the new installment.   We can look forward to improved quality with any amount of new Essence, but bear in mind the underlying rumble, which will be tricky indeed if the density is not sufficiently dense to provide the cushion effect.   Look to the North facing, and low lying hollows, to have caught the prefrontal deposits for your line choices.  I was out early today to the far borderline in Mineral Basin, to take advantage of the short morning Sun, and check out the big slide that ran out there.  The deposition field is covered with huge blocks and chunks all the way down to the flats, so if it gets marginally covered, it will be a very tricky decent.  BE aware!!!  While I was out on the rope line, all by myself, looking into May Ellen Gulch, this Andromedan ship materialized in front of me, so I broke out my camera and caught this rare shot for your consideration.  Muldar was Right!!!! IBBY

They are here!!!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011 at 3:33 pm and is filed under Snow Reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.