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What a productive day I was having at work! Really busy week and I finally felt like I was making some head way and clearing off my to do list. The original plan was to leave around three o’clock and head up to Cannon for some turns. Though I was honestly thinking about working right through my normal departure time. And then I stepped outside for a moment and knew my day behind the desk was officially over.

Due to dilly dallying at work, I got a later start than expected. I also neglected to pack up the car in the morning so needed to do the seven minute door to door commute home to pick up my gear and grab a snack. Within a few moments, I was back on the road heading up to Cannon forty minutes door to outdoor. Life doesn’t suck.

Due to the late start, I hesitated as I pulled into the Peabody lot. The time was five o’clock and I said I would be home by seven. Unsure if I could pull off two thousand verts of skinning in about an hour, I decided to head Tramside and lap Avalanche a few times. I booted up Avalanche which was covered wall to wall and stumbled upon more wall to wall coverage on Extension. Well, sure glad I brought my skins just in case! In short time, I was at the top of Extension and “oh yell, why not” I was skinning up Middle Cannon to the unload station of the Peabody Quad. And then “jeez, the summit is right there…. oh hell, why not!”

I made good time but was definitely going to be running a little late. Oops. The air was electrifyingly perfect with a very slight breeze near the summit blowing cool over the snow. I was heating up something fierce and the temperature and wind were perfect despite my short sleeve. I soon had the summit all to myself. Had I stuck around, I would have witnessed a stunningly sensational sunset. But alas, a lot of snow was already in the shade and I was already delayed by fifteen minutes thanks to making good time on the skin up.

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The original plan was to burn one of my two remaining ticket vouchers at Mad River Glen. With free skiing being offered on the upcoming Share Holder day, I effectively had five potential days to use the ticket vouchers assuming Mad River Glen does not extended operations. Online reports from Southern Vermont ski areas indicated heavy wet snow on Friday. Northern Vermont received a few paltry but fluffy inches. Nothing looked like a lock for a great powder day based on initial reports Friday night, so the Mad River Glen plan seemed the most worth while option.

But last night the radar loop showed the Whites getting hammered. Another sign of possible White Mountain powder were the off and on flurries in Ashland. I had a hunch about Cannon and a huge craving to visit Cannon once more before lifts closed. Cannon’s snow report last night showed only 4-5″ which had me on the fence but leaning towards Mad River Glen. I decided to wait for the morning reports. With Cannon ringing the jackpot bell at 10-11″, I packed up my gear and sped up I-93 towards Cannon with dreams of powdery trees floating through my mind.

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Cannon got a foot Wednesday and at least a foot into today and it was still snowing when I left the mountain bringing the season total to date (with over a month of potential snowfall left) to an unreal (for Cannon) 214″. Untracked from mid-week combined with last today’s snowfall for many knee deep, and often times deeper, lines from open to close. Powder billowing over my shoulders and exploding into my face never gets old. I didn’t even bother counting the face shots. It would be easy to forget the best of days earlier in the season after a month or three delay, but I think I still remember them accurately when saying today was my best day of the season to date.

Earlier in the week, I had prepared for Jay on Saturday and had planned to meet Nhski for first chair. Last night things changed. Forecasts were leaving Jay out of the storm and the big prize was Ssouthern Vermont through the Northern Whites featuring a belt of snow up right through the notch. Cannon would not come out with the most snow but it will certainly be up there in totals. Last night I decided to bail on Jay and make plans for Cannon instead.

Fortunately, I was able to meet up with some sensational skiers I have had the pleasure of sharing turns with before and make a new buddy as well, sweet. Lifts were on wind hold when we got to the mountain and I was on the fence about heading north to Burke or south to Tenney. Ultimately, I decided to return to Tenney. But shortly after leaving Cannon, I got the call that Cannon was opening, turned around, and still made the 8:30am tram (barely). Sweet!

No pictures today but pictorial evidence is usually lacking on the best of days by design, not intent. When you are skiing boot to knee deep untracked on your favorite terrain, it is hard to slow down and pull out the camera. Today ranks right up there with the epic reports from seen previously this season from Northern Vermont. If Cannon received 300″ average snowfall a year, I don’t think I would ski anywhere else. Snowbanks just south of the notch were so high that you could not see the north bound traffic from the south bound lane. Still another month of the snowy season to go? Bring it on.

While the main mission of this morning’s outing at Cannon was a never-ever learn to ski package for my significant other, I had other objectives in mind during my free skiing time. Despite the cold and windy weather on this second day of the busy February holiday week, my significant other was jonesing to give skiing a second chance after being a ski widow these past four years. Her excitement was admirable but her timing for picking up the skiing bug was less than perfect.

We arrived around 9:30 A.M. along with the hordes of other skiers setting their sights on Cannon. Having last taken a lesson over a dozen years ago and having last rented equipment when I was too young to understand the process, I was feeling somewhat silly walking my significant other through the lesson and rental package. Lines in the Cannon rental shop were out the door and it took almost forty-five minutes to purchase the package, get the equipment, and miss our preferred lesson time. After waiting another half hour, I walked her over to the lesson meeting location and headed up the Peabody Express Quad for mission number one. After checking in post lesson and taking a few bunny slope turns, I ran off to the summit for mission number two.

Both top to bottom runs were stunning in their challenge, pitch, and degree of difficulty. The first run left me breathless and sweating heavily. The second run had me reconsidering what I considered steep and tight tree skiing. After two years of being a season pass holder at Jay, I have gone somewhat soft after cutting my teeth at Cannon for several seasons. The mellow and open powder full glades at Jay are incredible but can make a skier’s ability soften considerably. These two runs humbled me as only a top to bottom tree exodus off Mad River Glen’s Single Chair can. Cannon remains a spiritual home even if the powder falls less copiously than my beloved Northern Greens.

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Wincing in pain, I awoke without an alarm this morning after yesterday’s strenuous powder day at Burke. Everything hurt from my lower back to just behind my knee. Plans were already hatched to combine lift serviced and earned turns at Cannon to maximize powder potential almost a full week after the last storm hit New England. Original plans included the possibility of a full skin of Tuckerbrook but due to my tense and sore muscles I dialed plans back a bit.

Arriving at the Peabody Lodge, Cannon’s excellent staff were working the parking lots to alert potential customers that power was currently out but may be back online later. “No worries” I told a lot attendant. Pointing to my bindings I mentioned that “I have my own power.” Lifts were still running on backup power to get the remaining customers off the chairs before the bull wheels stopped turning. Since the power just went down, I decided to not wait for what could be a few minutes or a few hours.

Not long after I began skinning, I heard the tell tale hum of power being delivered to the lifts. No worries as I was off the grid regardless and heading for whiter pastures. I was baffled by the amount of traffic inflicted upon the mountain in the past few days and felt like a royal Johnny Come Lately as I picked up a well packed down skin track. There was plenty of fresh powder to still be found but I would not enjoy the pleasure of laying down first tracks today.

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After a rather long hiatus with only occasional lift assisted skinning, the One Run for the Price of None Tour 06-07 fires back up again with a vengeance… and man are my arms tired. My legs too. All of the powder and packed powder skiing this season has my physical condition less toned than usual at this time of year despite passing my season total of 39 days. Speaking of lifts turning, I can honestly say I am glad Cannon always shuts down the first week in April because boy oh boy was it nice having the mountain almost entirely to myself. This was the best day of skiing I have had….. in the past seven days.

Originally, the plan was some local BC but downed trees had me concerned. Opting on a summit from the M side, I was blown away by both the coverage and blow down. This is better coverage than I have seen during many years in January, wow! Also impressive was the wind and weather damage done to the summit tower. Many pieces of wood were torn clear off the tower making the summit tower access slightly dangerous but safe enough. Views everywhere were amazing. I spread my arms, felt the breeze, and smiled a big toothy grin. This was a truly beautiful Spring day and there was no where else I would rather be. Something about this mountain, I don’t quite know what it is, continues to leave me in various states of awe.

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After a Powder Day warm up at Burke due to the lifts being closed at Cannon on Friday, I made my way back to the promised land with Dave on Saturday. Despite Cannon claiming up to eight inches of fresh, the wind picked the mountain clean as we found out on after getting first tracks off the first tram down Taft Slalom to Upper and Middle Hard. The trails featured two to three inches of wind packed fresh snow on top of a firm base. Taft Slalom skied excellent as did Upper Hard but firm moguls under the new snow on Middle Hard proved difficult to negotiate for a first run.

Since no fresh snow was to be found on the main trails, we ducked into the woods and found more of the same with two to three inches of fresh snow on average. Things were starting to warm up as the sun came up and softened things up to the point of melting. We continued to hunt the woods until lunch time when we opted for burgers at The Lift and then headed to the summit to tackle Tramline. With barely more than one hundred inches of snow, it was hard to believe Tramline was open even with the dense base building snow from the recent blizzard. Sure enough, Tramline was a total disaster and should not have been open to the public. Tramline featured two pinches with a near mandatory sidestep over rock and dirt. The crux maneuver below Tower One was almost child’s play compared to the less than heroic side stepping in key pinch locations. Tree skiing continued later that afternoon with Dave heading home shortly after Tramline. Much excitement was head in the trees on my spiritual home mountain.

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Damn, I love this mountain. Season Pass to Jay Peak be damned; when Cannon Mountain gets hammered with snow, I am there and paying for a lift ticket. Especially when said lift ticket is only $25.00! Granted the price of admission provides access to only one chair and one route down, but it cuts back substantially on time skinning up and allows for multiple summit trips. Cannon reported in with just over a foot of fresh snow, but my adventures to the summit of the mountain brought boot to knee deep powder snow on multiple runs suggesting either the wind deposited all the snow in all the right places or Cannon under reported what accumulated at the Summit. Given my runs from the summit were down untracked trails, I suspect no one bothered to measure snow depths on the upper mountain.

Despite having a Season Pass to Jay Peak and both ski areas reporting in a similar foot of fresh snowfall, my suspicion was that Cannon was going to have better terrain accessible by skinning. Also, lift serviced on the Peabody Quad servicing Ravine sounded much more fun and relaxing than Haynes and The Jet at Jay Peak on Telefest Weekend, not to mention the two for one email campaign that Jay Peak launched for this weekend. At Cannon Mountain, I found modestly crowded slopes but not over crowded like at Jay Peak the past two weekends. Additionally, snow quality was substantially better and never deteriorated and the Peabody Quad was ski on almost the entire day. If I choose Cannon over Jay Peak just to enjoy a single groomed run, I would have made a sound decision. But there would be much more skiing to be had at Cannon besides the Ravines.

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Anyone that firmly believes a bad day of skiing is better than a good day at the office does not get out on days like this. There definitely are days on which I would much rather be working than skiing, this day was one of them. The only day of the season i can recall thinking “I should have stayed home.” [I repeated this same thought nearly a week later at Loon, NH due to similar but slightly worse conditions].

The original plan for the weekend was skiing Mad River Glen on Saturday followed by either Tuckerman Ravine or Gulf of Slides on Sunday. After the down pour at Mad River Glen yesterday, I was still optimistic that the Ravine might be an option for Sunday until Saturday night when I checked the summit temperature of Mount Washington which was reading 17 degrees!!! And that was not even the coldest part of the night. With the winds howling, temperature falling, and potential new snow overnight, it just was not going to happen. If the Sherburne had still been open top to bottom and in good condition, I might have considered it as the Sherbie is always worth a day trip by itself. But not when you can not skin and ski top to bottom.

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After nearly a three month recovery time from a broken elbow, I made my triumphant return to skiing this Sunday at Cannon Mountain. My recovery time eerily coincided with the snow fall of the season. October through mid-December were sensation early season months with copious amounts of natural snow fall with the biggest dump falling before the lifts even opened. After December 10th, fresh powder was slim pickings through the end of December, January, and February.

Enter the first week of March and a foot and a half of snow in Franconia Notch. Most of the snow fell Friday night and Saturday before my arrival unfortunately, so freshies were hard to find. But certainly not impossible for those who know where to look and are willing to sacrifice their bases for some of the best turns to be had. For a moment, I had doubted the accuracy of Cannon Mountain’s claim of a foot and a half of snow until I was knee deep in it, with an occasional unexpected balls deep shots where the snow drifted.

Originally, the plans was to take it easy on my first day back. Slowly work my way up from beginner and intermediate groomers and generally stay away from natural snow trails. I figured I would take my chances. Armed with an elbow pad and mischievous grin, I attached the mountain from my first run. Taking Middle Cannon to Extension, I sampled some wonderful freshly groomed snow followed by choice dust on crust natural snow fall. Uh oh. A foot and a half is sensational normally, but the scraped crust underneath was not as fun to contend with. Much of the natural snow trails featured either dust on crust, dust on dirt, or the rather unpopular dust on rock. Worth the base damage for every turn!

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The epic early New England ski season marches on! Today was my eighth day of skiing for the current season and sixth day earning turns. Why pay over thirty dollars for crappy scraped up man made snow when New Hampshire’s best powder stash was begging to be pillaged? Instead of paying for the ‘privilege’ of skiing crappy snow, I opted to take one run for the price of none.

I have been fairly harsh in my criticism of Cannon Mountain’s decision not to open Thanksgiving Weekend as scheduled. However, I would like to offer a big ole’ thank you to Cannon management for keeping New Hampshire’s best powder stash off limits to any one not willing to earn their turns. Powder lasts for days on end when the masses can not access it, whereas it normally only lasts a few hours when the lifts are spinning. So here it is, thanks cannon! If cannon wants to join NELSAP, I might even be okay with that if this weekend is the result!!!

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Cannon Mountain was originally scheduled to open for the season on Friday November 25th. After receiving over a foot and a half of natural snow and having snow making temperatures for the better part of the week, Cannon Mountain decided to push their opening date forward one week and not open Thanksgiving Weekend. The mountain’s web site claimed a lack of snow making temperatures as the main culprit while also citing that the snow that fell was blown off the trails by wind. While I love Cannon Mountain and its amazing trail network both on and off the map, I have no tolerance for a management that lies to its customers. As I found out and the following trip report and pictures will attest, Cannon had no excuse for not opening this weekend in terms of weather, snow fall, or snow making temperatures.

Arriving at the Peabody Base Lodge at 9 A.M., I began suiting up when my skiing partners for the afternoon festivities arrived. We gathered together our gear and prepared for the skin up the mountain. From the base area, it was obvious the mountain had received ample amounts of snow in the amount of well over a foot.

We began our trek up Toss Up with two of us on skins and the other two utilizing slow shoes. A mostly sunny sky allowed for wonderful views of Mount Lafayette and Cannon Mountain. While I knew we would not be alone on the mountain, I was amazed at how many other groups we ran into beginning at the Toss Up/Middle Cannon intersection. No less than a half dozen groups were slowly working their way towards the summit utilizing various routes. Some clouds started rolling in as we began up Middle Cannon with more threatening clouds rolling in from the Northwest over Cannon’s Northern Shoulder.

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Skinning up a foot and a half of fresh on Middle Cannon, I realized I was skiing Cannon the way it was originally done. Ski trails were cut long before the Tram began whisking skiers to the wind blown summit of Cannon Mountain. The truly devout skiers of the early 1930’s would make two or three ascents of Cannon on a good day following a big storm earning untracked fresh every run. I followed in their footsteps, earning turns on the best snow possible where ever and when ever it falls.

The development of Cannon as a ski area increased the mountain’s trail count and eventually widened many of its narrow and twisty classics. But the character and feel of the mountain still lingers including the dedication of its skiers. Nearly 70 years after the original Tram was constructed at Cannon, the die hards are still earning turns and being rewarded for their efforts. Our skin tracks paid silent homage to those early skiers who earned their runs without the benefits of short fatties, wicking clothing, and high tech touring gear.

An early season Nor easter materialized suddenly from the remnants of passing Hurricane Wilma. Weathermen scrambled to predict an erratic storm with unreliable models. The consensus developed that upper elevation terrain was going to be slammed by heavy snow. I canceled my Wednesday 2:30PM car appointment and changed plans to include dropping into a foot and a half of fresh. Tuesday evening the reports began boasting of snow fall measured in feet, not inches. The second major snow storm of October roared into New England much to the glee and delight of turn earners across the region.

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Last week before the rain storm Saturday morning, the entire mountain was fully covered. This week there was barely any snow on Paulie’s and no snow under the Zoomer Lift with lots of bare spots showing on Avalanche and Zoomer. Not totally unexpected but the damage is considerable when you take into account just how deep the snow cover was a few weeks earlier.

Brian and I met at the Peabody Lodge to share some turns today on this late season foray. The snow surface froze hard overnight and was teeth chattering frozen granular in the morning. I stuck to the groomers which skied okay but were begging for some sun. Things didn’t warm up as fast as i had expected, but around noon time, every trail on the mountain was gold. But by early afternoon, it was mostly mushy mashed potatoes.

Pick of the day was Vista Way for nice soft bumps and fine views with hardly any clouds. Yet another fantastic day at Cannon! I have had more good weather days than bad this year at Cannon, it has been an amazing year. Honorable mention goes to Middle to Lower Cannon for a great run to let the skis run. It is how I opened my season at Cannon and how I closed my season at Cannon.

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My predictions of Sunday being an epic completion to three days of incredible skiing at Cannon went wrong. The snow storm never materialized in full at Cannon. I would estimate a three day total of about 5-8 inches (matching the actual numbers provided on Cannon’s web site). Not much snow fell after I left Cannon Saturday night. Sunday brought out a huge amount of people which would explain why the crowds were light on Saturday. The Cannonball Quad went down for two hours during the morning which sent massive amounts of people to the Tram (people were queued up over the bridge!) and the Zoomer Triple Chair (5 minute wait). These were the longest lines I have ever seen at Cannon by far due to the Cannonball Quad being down.

I was feeling significant pain after nearly back to back powder days on Thursday and Saturday. I did not think I was going to make it past noon time as the turns were hard and painful. Bumps were solidifying across the front face trails with regularly groomed sections of Zoomer and Avalanche featuring ice between the bumps. The regular bump lines are okay in the troughs except Zoomer Lift is a tad thin. Lakeview was very packed down but skied rather well. A lot of scraping was featured everywhere on the mountain, despite the fact that it was still snowing during the day and loose snow bumps were forming on nearly every trail by day’s end.

Snow report at 7:15 A.M. stated that all 55 trails were open but Kinsman and Tramline were roped. Did they close it due to the crowds and to keep the joeys from hurting themselves? Honestly, Tramline was definitely skiable from the view above. I was disappointed for my skiing partners who wanted to give that trail a run as it skied fine Saturday and looked fine Sunday as well. I still found some untracked Sunday, but it was very heavy snow and I would rather have been skiing through something more tracked up.