Greetings holiday skiers. Welcome to the party. Just a few weeks too late. Today was a mixed bag of conditions ranging from two to four inches of untracked to frozen wet packed down concrete. Holiday crowds overall were minimal in volume but overbearing in terms of effect on the experience. Overall summary is Northern Vermont just dodged a bullet and early birds got some frosting before the warm weather eroded the fresh snow and glazed and crusted the snow. Which heading into New Year’s is only a minor set back given new snow and two nice powder days this week.

Rolling out of bed thirty minutes after the first alarm did not bod well for today especially considering the road conditions of I-93. Snow started last night but rain took over in central New Hampshire just before morning. My thirty minute delay put me into the front range of I-93 day trippers. As I merged onto the highway, I noticed that a SUV was in the center ditch at the Plymouth exit ramps. Oh boy, this is going to be a fun commute! Roads were nearly clear as per usual on the other side of the notch and mostly clear on I-91. Three hours later, rather than the standard two hours later, I arrived at Stateside and was on the lift one hour after Jay opened.

I quickly skied over to the Jet and instantly found plenty of two to four inch untracked lines. Jay was reporting four to six inches which was bull shit. We all know Jay pads a few “Jay inches” onto their reports on occasion, but I didn’t find more than four inches any where.

I was surprised, honestly, to find any fresh untracked being an hour late to the lifts on a holiday weekend. But I managed to rack numerous untracked runs up during my first hour and a half before the crowds arrived en masse. The powder was a dense and consolidated variety that was a little on the wet side but still powdery at high elevations early in the morning. Things were pretty well played out by eleven when the crowds showed up but lines were rather respectable, all things considered.

Weather was rather interesting. It never rained but we did get snow, hail, and sleet off and on with a touch of wind in between precipitation sessions. I almost decided to shed my parka for a soft shell after my first two runs but enjoyed the extra insulation when the winds kicked on early afternoon.

After lunch, much to my dismay, all lower elevation snow was wet and starting to firm up. The gig was up. Some consolidated wet untracked could still be found after noon time, but dealing with the holiday crowd just was not worth the effort and snow at lower elevations was too wet and firm for my liking.

It is just amazing how different the crowd was today which really blew my mind. Lots of attitude in the lodge. Lots of lift “stop and go and slow” due to the inexperienced holiday crowd. But crowds aside, I jot what I was looking for this morning, so it was worth the trip if only for four hours of skiing. Since I never skied more than four inches of powder, it definitely did not make my powder day list for the season. But still a surprise this morning all things considered.