A surprise foot of fresh fell at the northern end of the Green Mountain Spine on Thursday. Friday was the powder day and I cleaned up the leftovers on Saturday. I had not skied in two weeks due to a toe injury that was still on the mend. But the powder was calling so I took a Snow Way prescription: take three vitamin I’s, wrap the toe, and pow me in the morning.

It worked! At least until I got a little over zealous. But after a quick warm up run down the Jet to test the toe, I went exploring and found just what I came for. Some tracks were left from yesterday but there was plenty of untracked for a day-after-the-powder-day powder day. I milked it four times and found no visual evidence that any one else was doing the same.

I wanted to go further a field and find something less tracked so I could really open things up. And I just wanted that adventure element of touring for powder. So I went back to the lodge and swapped to my touring boots and skis. Unfortunately, I quickly discovered that my toe was not ready for the touring boots. I made painful turns back down to the lodge and decided to call it a day despite ample untracked still remaining in harder to get to locales.

The on open trail report, for those interested, was respectable but deteriorating fast. Jet and Haynes were groomed edge to edge (naturally) while U.N. and Derick were open in their natural states. I was surprised about upper U.N. due to the rocky nature of that trail and sure enough, those rocks were present and hungry for ski bases. Derick looked good up top but very thin lower down due to traffic. The warm weather and rain will surely take U.N. and Derick out until additional natural can augment whatever is left by Wednesday.