The Trailer was covered in a icy crust this Wednesday morning with low clouds hanging over the canyon.  I got an early start with the promise of  some fresh sauce .  It was just barely flaking when I parked in the lot, though there was a full 3” of fresh evident , and the visibility  was marginal at best.  The first few runs were epic despite the lack of visibility.  The new snow was dense and bonded extremely well to the hard surface.  The wind was also fully in play as the holes filled in all over.  Some areas got scoured, as in knolls and ridges, but other areas got filled in becoming just smooth and buttery.  The Temps. dropped as the day progressed and the wind increased just under the Tram threshold, fortunately it stayed up and running making back to back runs a simple feat.  I took a run out on the Cirque Traverse to get a sense of the deep off trail.  Areas are filling in nicely with most of the nasty stuff underneath or just barely exposed.  Good snow quality and low bump relief made the turning out there quite nice and challenging.  With more snow shots are going to be Good to Go.  The Traverse itself was no problem, however the very top of the ridge line is very bony, use caution.  Mineral Basin was good with Zero visibility.  That sounds like a contradiction , and I would agree with you, but the smoothness factor made up for the lack of vision.   Snow was pounding when I left with the wind not abating at all.  There will be some interesting wind loading in the AM .  Wind waves could be present on Regulator so be prepared.  Very low traffic for this time of year makes the roomy Trams a pleasure.  Be there early for best results.   IBBY!!

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 6th, 2010 at 3:17 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.