This is perhaps my most delinquent trip report ever. But here it is for the sake of posterity and record keeping. The use of the “Powder Day” tag for this report is stretching the definition of that tag to the breaking point.

Killington got rocked as the epicenter of the immediate storm. The new snow was enough to make everything skiable at Killington, including trees. However, I didn’t venture into the trees because untracked snow was extremely challenging. Not to mention packed down snow was skiing better than untracked.

Many skiers often refer to “dense snow” as “cement” just as many skiers often refer to “scraped hard pack” as “ice”. Supportive dense snow is very fun to ski when you learn to adjust your balance and turning technique. But Killington’s bounty truly fell into the cement category, as deep and dense as I have ever skied. Tracked up snow skied better than untracked. I quickly lost the powder hound mentality and just sought out quality snow on quality trails.

The lifts opened in a cascading fashion starting with Snowdon Quad, then Northridge Triple, then Canyon Quad, and finally Superstar. The gondola never opened but they kept the line running in an effort to reducing icing and open it the next day. I didn’t quite make it to the Superstar opening before my legs gave out shortly after noontime.

The Canyon Quad stalled out for a little over ten minutes while I was on the lift and near the unload station. The wind was honking but it was not entirely uncomfortable since the temperature was hovering around the freezing mark, as evidenced by the sleet that was falling from the sky. Killington offered everyone on the lift a voucher for $10 off their next ticket for the minor inconvenience. The weather and the wait were mildly uncomfortable but hardly noteworthy in hind sight except for Killington’s gracious offer. Kudos for Killington for stepping out when they really didn’t have to.

Ropes were dropped everywhere and I skied most trails in the Canyon basin and ended the day on Ovation. While dropping over the rocks on Ovation’s steepest section, I managed to score my biggest core shot to date proving that the deep and dense snow was not bottomless and fell over no base.

It was a fun and tiring day but less epic than the snow totals might have suggested.