With Jay reporting in two feet to Cannon’s one foot, the plan was to ski Jay. But thanks to mobile technology, I discovered en route via smartphone that Jay’s summit was reporting 60 MPH winds and that lifts would be effected. Despite my good luck with yesterday’s short wind hold at Mad River Glen, I pulled a page from my ski tactics play book: don’t get greedy going for the unknown when the sure thing is staring you in the face.

So I was the first car to pull into Cannon’s lot just before eight in the morning. After farting around in the lodge, I got my shit together and made it to the Peabody for third chair and then onto first chair up Cannonball to the summit. The ride up the Cannonball was unusual in that there was no wind. And I spied with my eyes a perfect canvas just below me on Profile.

I can’t remember the last time I skied Profile. It is normally a wind blown icy mess. It is a wide and straight shot without any redeeming quality. But with six inches of untouched fresh over groomed, it was a dream. I ripped it straight down skier’s left non-stop bouncing surfy turns to and fro. I’ve never said it before nor will I ever say it again, but my run of the day was Profile.

Traffic was light so I decided to stay on the summit and found nice cut up occasional untracked on Skylight and Vista Way to David’s. I was split on either dropping into Middle Hard or heading across the saddle. Upper Hard looked well tracked out so up and over I went.

I ripped a solid run down the race course and was dumbfounded to see ski patrol unloading from a spinning double. Cannon decided to give Mittersill a go. At first I was chagrined by this decision. On the flip side, with almost no traffic, I was able to take six Mittersill runs in just over an hour. Normally that would have taken me all day without the lift spinning (in fact, I’ve never hiked the saddle more than five times in one day). So I made lemons.

But so did everyone else. Despite extremely low traffic (the vast majority of chairs were empty), the place got hit hard and everyone seemed to know where to go. I hit all my favorite lines and always seemed to be one run behind someone else skiing their favorite line. And so on. The skiing was great but the experience just isn’t the same. Without having to cycle an hour and hike for a single run, it just isn’t as fun. But what can you do? Stick to the main mountain in protest? Hardly.

Conditions were a foot of moderately dense fresh over bare ground, rock, and stump. I experienced two potentially dangerous falls due to unseen obstacles. Nothing worse than a scrape but the falls certainly could have been worse. Conditions were much better on the lower mountain than the steeper and rockier sections of the upper mountain. Cannon is normally one of the most conservative mountains around when it comes to dropping ropes. So I am dumbfounded that they gave Mittersill the green light today.

Had this been November, December, or even January, I don’t think that lift would have run. It was run because of pressures from having bought a multi-million dollar lift that sits dormant most of the season. And for marketing value (Mittersill “Backcountry” area is “Open”!). But damned if Cannon will add a disclaimer to their web site stating that base damage is almost guaranteed if you ski that lift. Which I am fine with (took a major core shot today, worth it).

But the general public may not be so impressed. Hopefully no one gets hurt out there this week because the potential is certainly there. I took two diggers from unseen snow snakes that could have ended badly. I am one of the last skiers to question a ski area opening terrain. So you know it has to be bad for me to say so.

To sum things up, this storm provided a badly needed injection of snow for Cannon’s natural snow terrain but conditions are still rather thin and boney. And conditions will continue to deteriorate before the weekend as more traffic beats the surface down. I’d like to see another foot of fresh for Cannon before the mountain has everything in great condition again. Until then, there is nothing quite like a Cannon powder day, boney conditions or not. Or actually, particularly when conditions are thin!