Category: Earned Turns

2005-2006 Season, April, Earned Turns, Gulf of Slides, Mount Washington

Gulf of Slides, NH

Steve at the Top of Main Gully

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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2005-2006 Season, April, Earned Turns, Hillman's Highway, Mount Washington

Blue Bird Day on Hillman’s Highway

Hillman's Gullies from HoJo's

Driving through Jefferson on Route 2 passing by people ascending the stairs to their houses of worship, I spotted the white caked peaks of the Northern Presidentials dead ahead. While the faithful of small town northern New England filled into their neighborhood churches, the skiing faithful of New England descended upon the Mecca of backcountry in New Hampshire.

My church is the snow covered mountains and the stairs leading up to the church are skin tracks. I worship the snow and get down on my hands and knees to pray when I am ascending the steep boot ladders. My deity of choice is the Earth which brought me here and can take me out when ever it deems I have had my time to enjoy life. At which point I will rejoin the Earth and have my ashes dumped out across the mountains I worship. Today would not be that day though.

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2005-2006 Season, April, Burke, Earned Turns, Powder Day

Thick Powder Earned Turns at Burke

Burke!

In hind sight, I should have Dawn Patrolled this tour. But the storm went by faster than I had anticipated which resulted in no snow during the morning or afternoon. My timing was all out of whack. I left work early to go earn some turns down the road at closed Burke Mountain. I arrived to find a snow covered Burke Mountain begging for turns to be made on any untracked line I desired.

The untracked was not exactly powdery due to a warm afternoon baking under the sun. I was in a race against the time of consolidation when I first began skinning. But I slowly shook off my haste as untracked is untracked regardless of consistency. The snow was moist but not completely wet and packed down, but rather wet with a little fluff which is an odd combination. It looked like fun as it proved to be.

I tracked up Lower Warren’s Way to Bear Den to Willoughby on the skin up. As I approached mid-mountain, I noticed the wet snow was slightly slabbed on the surface of open slopes with a more powdery and lighter consistency on skier’s left under the trees. Duly noted for the descent! Four inches of the thick consistency stuff was the rule with deeper pockets occasionally. I suspect Burke picked up six inches at mid-mountain before the snow began consolidating.

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2005-2006 Season, Cannon Mountain, Earned Turns, November, Powder Day

Earned Turn Powder Day at Cannon (Day 2)

Skinning Mittersill

The epic early New England ski season marches on! Today was my eighth day of skiing for the current season and sixth day earning turns. Why pay over thirty dollars for crappy scraped up man made snow when New Hampshire’s best powder stash was begging to be pillaged? Instead of paying for the ‘privilege’ of skiing crappy snow, I opted to take one run for the price of none.

I have been fairly harsh in my criticism of Cannon Mountain’s decision not to open Thanksgiving Weekend as scheduled. However, I would like to offer a big ole’ thank you to Cannon management for keeping New Hampshire’s best powder stash off limits to any one not willing to earn their turns. Powder lasts for days on end when the masses can not access it, whereas it normally only lasts a few hours when the lifts are spinning. So here it is, thanks cannon! If cannon wants to join NELSAP, I might even be okay with that if this weekend is the result!!!

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2005-2006 Season, Cannon Mountain, Earned Turns, November, Powder Day, Video

Earned Turn Powder Day at Cannon (Day 1)

Porter Skins Middle Cannon

Cannon Mountain was originally scheduled to open for the season on Friday November 25th. After receiving over a foot and a half of natural snow and having snow making temperatures for the better part of the week, Cannon Mountain decided to push their opening date forward one week and not open Thanksgiving Weekend. The mountain’s web site claimed a lack of snow making temperatures as the main culprit while also citing that the snow that fell was blown off the trails by wind. While I love Cannon Mountain and its amazing trail network both on and off the map, I have no tolerance for a management that lies to its customers. As I found out and the following trip report and pictures will attest, Cannon had no excuse for not opening this weekend in terms of weather, snow fall, or snow making temperatures.

Arriving at the Peabody Base Lodge at 9 A.M., I began suiting up when my skiing partners for the afternoon festivities arrived. We gathered together our gear and prepared for the skin up the mountain. From the base area, it was obvious the mountain had received ample amounts of snow in the amount of well over a foot.

We began our trek up Toss Up with two of us on skins and the other two utilizing slow shoes. A mostly sunny sky allowed for wonderful views of Mount Lafayette and Cannon Mountain. While I knew we would not be alone on the mountain, I was amazed at how many other groups we ran into beginning at the Toss Up/Middle Cannon intersection. No less than a half dozen groups were slowly working their way towards the summit utilizing various routes. Some clouds started rolling in as we began up Middle Cannon with more threatening clouds rolling in from the Northwest over Cannon’s Northern Shoulder.

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