It's Still Snowing

The first real dump of the season fell mostly during the day yesterday. It had been preceded by 83mm of rain and strong winds. Yesterday's freshies were initially slow due to the moisture content and the base was soft and thin. I made first Snowgums chair and got some nice, if not thin, freshies on my three runs and then I gave it away due to crowds, lack of freshies and the increasing moisture level in my clothing.

After a fab night at Segretto for Bastille Day dinner and celebrating Frank's and Marion's birthdays I made a special effort to get up early. The snow cams revealed a couple of dozen people already queued at Kosi chair at 8:00am. At 8:15, I was walking to the back of the now massive queue on Kosi chair when I heard someone say, "There will be a 10 minute delay". I immediately jumped on my planks and skated to Snowgums where a single boarder was in front on me.

Within seconds of me settling down to doing some stretches while waiting for the Snowgums to open, Leatherbarrel Phil had joined me in the queue. It takes big Kahunas to leave first chair spot on Kosi for 2nd chair on Snowgums! We allowed another skier to take the single spot with the boarder on first chair. At the top Phil and I passed both and dropped down World Cup and into the deep (30cm) freshies under the Kosi chair. The snow was a lot heavier than the freshies of yesterday. Oops, I made a mistake and took a fall.

As we arrived at Kosi base, they were just loading first chair. Phil and I both instinctively skied straight past and back to Snowgums which now had a queue. Second run was into True Blue where there were still some freshies and Phil did what I did the run before - oops. Another run, this time down Sundance and it was coffee time. The queues were enormous and we arrived at Black Sallees after 10am where Marion and Lynne joined us after only one run. I did two more runs and that was it.

It is snowing again as I write this report, despite the forecasts of clearing weather.

Upper Supertrail last Sunday

Mid High Noon last Sunday

Dream Run on Monday

Upper Supertrail and mid High Noon on Monday

Crackenback and Sundance on Tuesday

Crackenback and Sundance on Wednesday (yesterday)

First chair up Snowgums today

Third chair (and many more) behind

Singles queue for Kosi going beyond Ramshead
Short side queue for Snowgums

FunnelWeb and snow covered Ramshead chairs today

It was very entertaining riding Snowgums today and watching all the school kiddies attempt to ski Bushranger and adjoining areas. They were hitting rocks and stumps, getting skis and boards stuck under shrubs and performing some spectacular falls as well as going in hip deep into the snow while trying to climb out of areas that were clearly posted ‘closed'.

The next big front is due Sunday- Monday with a fine weekend in between.

Antons may be open tomorrow. I haven't seen the Basin but people were obviously getting through (past ‘closed' signs) to ride FunnelWeb. The runout appeared very deep, slow and heavy as I skied past them from the bottom of True Blue.

A word of warning from a friend who got booked a few days ago for speeding at the ranger ticket booths - "don't".