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The first Monday of the new year marked the start of the Pat’s Peak Corporate Race Leagues. Not having raced since college and long having given up high speed ripping for low speed bark chewing, my primary aim of joining a race league was not the skiing but rather the camaraderie. Not to mention night skiing and racing beat my normal Monday activities. Which do not consist of doing anything other than browsing the internet and perhaps an occasional movie.

The Pats Peak course is a typical nearly straight line Nastar course without challenge or much variety week to week. I quickly discovered the novice friendly course required little advanced racing technique which allowed older groomer lovers with high handicapps to top out the results with marginal times. The handicapping system also assumes that younger racers are faster than older racers which is not always true. The best ski racers are never those fresh out of college but rather the seasoned pros and veterans that have logged many seasons on the tours. A benefit for our team was the telemark handicap which suggested that a racer on telemark skis needs a huge point advantage which is not necessarily the case for telemarkers that can alpine turn. Unfortunately for our snowboarding member of the team, the handicap system does not assist snowboarders at all and assumes that they are nearly as fast as skiers.

Regardless of handicap or point structure, our team has a great crew of guys that are fun to ski with.  After warm up runs down Cyclone, we made our way over to FIS for inspection and two rounds of dual format racing. I took fourth place on the team with an overall middle of the pack finish. We finished the night out with three runs down Pat’s bump run called Hurricane including a final non-stop top to bottom bump run.

Day two of White Mountains backcountry revealed rugged terrain and conditions in all their wickedness. Weather was a factor as the temperature rose throughout the morning. Upon reaching the summit, we suspected a temperature inversion was at play (though being steamy on the summit was perhaps due to other factors!).

A long and tiring traverse followed by a horrendously wet bushwhack brought us to the goods. With spruce trees essentially raining on our parade due to melting snow, we made the best turns we could through the soaking wet snow. Challenges included continuously having to free our bases from stuck snow. Certainly not for the faint of heart, today’s foray in the White Mountain backcountry would have revealed much better conditions before the warm up began. Despite the challenges of this epic tour, we were out of the woods well before dinner with big toothy grins and clothes soaked to the bone.

With powder long since been tracked up and packed down at ski areas, it was high time to hit the backcountry and sample week old powder. Thus, I voyaged north to the backyard of my heart and sampled what the White Mountains backcountry had on tap. Offerings were substantially better than expected given how many days have passed since the last storm. Six inches of fluff was pillaged with deeper sections up high and in drifts.

Epic turns were had on a particularly sweet and perfectly pitched tight chute featuring sporadic trees and a meandering double fall line. The run ended with somewhat boring final turns on a switchback like route that ended with a skin out to white pastures. Evidence of recent animal tracks of all varieties were abundant in the snow. Most notably, at one point, I was following the tracks of a rather large moose which was somewhat concerning. The silence was blissful and the contact with nature and true rugged backcountry terrain was stunning.

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Sensational boot to knee deep untracked powder was found today in Ashland, NH of all places. Two runs were made, each consisting of approximately four to five sensational powder turns. When life gives you snow and you have some time to kill and an fifty foot drop off your back porch, ski off the back side and rack up some powder vertical while the neighbors look on in disbelief!

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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Already four days behind last season’s epic start, I had resigned myself to no October turns for the first time in three seasons. After a massive snow making push by seven New England ski resorts this past weekend, I was chomping at the bit to boot up and make some turns. Attitash posted some impressive pictures and video of their snow making efforts using their new line up of SMI Polecat Fan Guns. Unfortunately, the man made white gold fell on unfrozen ground which quickly melted out the snow and any chance for top to bottom turns.

On this day before my twenty-ninth birthday, I find myself one year older but no less the wiser when it comes to pursuing skiing adventures and the pursuit of turns the hard way. After jetting out of work an hour early, I pointed my car north and drove up through Franconia Notch and the down through Crawford Notch. Driving past Bretton Woods en route to Attitash, I was dumb founded by the lack of snow. While I figured Bretton Woods used the snow making more for publicity than anything substantial, I held out hope that Attitash would have the real deal. Stepping out of my car and gazing upon Roland’s Run was disheartening but I was not about to let any amount of grass between snow patches get in the way of my first turns of the season!

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Met up with Patrick for some July desperation turns on this fine Canada Day, eh? This is my third season in a row skiing the Ravine as late as I think can safely be done without excessive stupidity (only moderate stupidity was required today). Despite there being more snow at the patch than the previous two years, the overall safety level was much less which resulted in Patrick and I only skiing half of the snow patch.

We made a late start leaving Pinkham around 9 A.M. and made steady time. We incurred the normal barrage of questions and comments but not as many as experienced in prior years. The doubters were incorrect as always displaying amazing ignorance, on occasion even claiming superior knowledge of the Ravine in that they knew no snow was left. Halfway up the TRT, the sun was shinning and I dared remark that “What was up with that 30% chance of rain?” Fortunately we made it to HoJo’s and cover before it started coming down heavy. The two other skiers that passed us did not fair as well having already pressed on to the ravine.

After the rain showers passed, we made our way up to the Bowl. En route, Patrick got a little sarcastic and told a passerby that there was snow in a cave up there. A short while later, we caught up to the same hikers and they asked “is there really a cave up there you guys are going to ski through?”

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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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My 2005-2006 Ski Season began just over eight months ago on a snowy October 23rd. During the Summer of 2005, I had predicted that October 23rd would bring the first significant snowfall to New England and that I would be skiing that day. What I could not have predicted was the amazing amount of ups and downs my season would take. From epic early season hike-to-ski powder dumps to an injury that put me on the Disabled List for almost three months and then right back into the powder in March and onto some phenomenal late season skiing on the Presidential Range, the season was a wild roller coaster that I hate to see come to a close. Most people will remember the 2005-2006 Season as terrible at best, but I end the season with many fond memories. And I picked a fabulous day to end the season.

Perhaps the worst botched forecast of the year occurred this past week when forecasters suggested that Saturday had a 40% chance of rain and 50% for Sunday. By Saturday, the forecasts had been changed to mostly sunny with highs in the low 80s for both days. But I am glad for the screw up, as I had committed to attending an outdoor party that got postponed due to potential rain. Sweet!

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After many weeks of anxious anticipation, the Mount Washington Auto Road finally opened to the summit this weekend to the delight of many a New England Skier. With exception of Left Gully and Airplane, the East Snowfield currently has the longest continuous vertical drop in New England for skiing. This bright, sunny, and hazy afternoon brought well over a hundred people to the East Snowfields to partake in a final farewell to winter in New England.

Plans to carpool up the auto road were scrapped yesterday due to logistical issues. Since my Saturn does not have low gear, it would not be allowed on the Auto Road. Believing that the Auto Road folks would not look kindly on my sticking a thumb out near the gate, I opted for a one way ticket setting me back $26 big ones. Plans were to either Hitch a ride or hike back down. Fortunately, I was offered a ride by a kind person which saved me the hike down. Since I paid for the lift, I am unsure if this afternoon qualifies for my “One Run for the Price of None Tour.” Doesn’t much matter about the payment as all the turns had to be earned regardless.

Crowds were already filling up the Snowfields upon my arrival at approximately 9:30 A.M. It did not take me long to realize that I had over packed, but without a car to base operations from and a potential hike down, I took no chances on over packing gear. I booted up practically laughing with glee; this looked like it would be damn fun.

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Sometime during the halfway point of my third run down F.I.S. at Sugarbush yesterday, I recalled that due to the injury and other variables, Saturday was my first day of the season pumping out big bumps on a steep slope. Also at about the same time, I realized I needed to save some leg for Tuckerman Ravine the next day. But I am never one to save up potential energy for potential good skiing when I already AM experiencing good skiing. So three more F.I.S. runs later…

I got the days backwards this weekend. I figured Sunday would be warmer and the Ravine would experience less freezing over night so I thought it would be the better day for the Ravine despite tiring my legs out on Saturday at da’ Bush. Turns out it was too hot on Sunday so I should have reversed days. Not that the skiing in the Ravine was not fantastic, but hot days are not fun for lugging forty pounds of skiing equipment a few miles.

The parking lot was slammed more than the previous week’s Inferno Race, likely due to perfect weather this weekend and less than acceptable snow conditions the previous weekend. I tossed the skins in my bag based on a report indicating traction on the upper third of the TRT would have been helpful. Glad I did, as my fair weather hiking sneakers did not like hiking up the snow. I switched over to skins about 100 verts above the second bridge and only needed to take off the skis once until reaching HoJo’s, woo hoo! Better traction and less weight for around a quarter of the hike to HoJo’s is cool by me. Next weekend I would not have bothered.

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After three glorious days of bright sun shine and warm temperatures ideal for corn snow, the weekend delivered a horrible blow to Mount Washington in the form of an evening freeze, overcast skies, and no softening in sight. Far from ideal conditions for the annual Inferno Race sponsored by the Friends of Tuckerman, the race would go on and so would my tour.

I arrived at Pinkham Notch Visitor Center (PNVC) shortly after 7 A.M. anticipating the huge crowds the events draws. However, I obtained front row parking at the Gulf of Slides trail head with plenty of spaces remaining on both sides of the lot. I managed to escape the crowds and secure a primo parking spot by getting a slightly earlier start than normal. Starting too early might not have allowed the snow to soften up sufficiently; but alas, there would be no softening of the snow today. The weather forecast had predicted partly cloudy skies warming to the mid-forties but the mercury combined with the wind chill likely never pushed out of the thirties.

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What is better than one bluebird day on Mount Washington? How about two straight bluebird days on Mount Washington?! After last Sunday’s epic day in Tuckerman Ravine, I figured my best days of the season were behind me as the snow cover began to recede. But Gulf of Slides had more than enough snow to delight under a canopy of blue. Warm temperatures and bluebird skies dominated the afternoon as we found ourselves thinking at times that it was actually too warm.

At 8 A.M., I met up with Jim and Sled at Pinkham Notch Visitor Center. The sky was completely bluebird with temperatures on the rise. We discussed what to leave behind based on the warm temperature and the desire to travel as light as possible. Essentially, the more we decided to leave behind the better. Almost no extra layers besides our base layers were truly needed though Sled and I donned the wind shells for the descent.

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