Apruary

Ah Spring; that time of rebirth, of the sudden greening of the world, when the tulips start to bloom, the birds greet the day with song. . . and the Wasatch get pounded like the 3rd grader for their lunch money.

Coming from MT, I'm used to Spring being fairly wintery and extremely PMS-y, with 70 degree temps one day and a blizzard the next. Or the same afternoon, it really doesn't matter. So when moving to UT I felt prepared for whatever weather was thrown at me. Oh how naive I was. This past weekend I got in two of the best ski days ever, with tons of freshies that were as soft and fluffy as any good mid-season powder day. It was tough to remember it was April. Not just April, but the 20th and 21st. LATE April. And the snow just kept coming.

Saturday was. . . let's call it interesting. It was actively snowing down low which made lighting fairly flat and visibility was variable. Up higher, specifically on the Little Cloud chairlift over in Gad Valley, visibility was more of an existential concept than a solid idea. As soon as you got off the lift and headed on the traverse to Regulator and the Cirque Traverse you were swathed in a world of white. The sky and the snow surface blended together and you were doing good to see 5 feet ahead. I subsequently almost took out a boarder and was almost taken out by a few skiers while heading down to somewhere with some sort of definition. As soon as you were below the cloud it was pretty damn epic though. Coming through the trees between the bottom of regulator and the Little Cloud lift was moguly but fluffy and you could just tear it up. Unfortunately you had to go through the freaking Twilight Zone to get there so we headed to Gadzoom instead and lapped that. This was the first day I'd explored the trees right along the lift line; damn that's a fun zone with good snow. We kept going until our legs were ready to give out, knowing it was going to be a bluebird powder day on Sunday.

We were right on that one. First day of the season we'd gotten there more than 10 minutes before the lifts were open; we got 3rd chair on Gadzoom and headed straight to Mineral Basin. Tons of people were there and I was wearing my new boots which made the first few runs trickier than I'd like (I know, no excuses, play like a champion), but once I fell into a rhythm. . . mmmmmmm so good. Hit up some fun chutes on the back side, and no one was heading skier's left in Mineral so we had some great stuff all to ourselves. Then they opened Road to Provo and the shitshow of powder-junkies looking for first tracks began. The traverse (i.e. the actual Road to Provo) was so crazy windblown that it was a weird maze of moguls and spines that everyone and their brother was heading down to the untouched powder that lay below. It was actually amazing how quickly it got tracked out; we were some of the first people down and our tracks were easily visible, perfectly parallel in a field of powder. They were still picturesque when we got to the lift line and I intended to get a pic once I got on the lift, but in those 4 or 5 minutes it went from being barely tracked to almost completely tracked out. Bizarre and amazing all at once, but people follow the powder, and they were all heading back to Gad Valley to eat it up. After a few good runs on that side we went back to Mineral and I skied until I couldn't. I'd "fallen" (like I literally fell over because I couldn't control it and got too far in the backseat) 3 times and decided to call it quits before I died. Good thing too, if the way my knee feels today is any indication.

Skied my little heart out this weekend and it felt oh so good. It's been a long time since I've had back-to-back epic days, and longer since I've needed to just pass out from sheer tiredness. I didn't get ANY studying done for the many many things I have due for the end of my first year of grad school, but I honestly don't care. My priorities may be skewed according to many in my program, but I follow my heart and it lead me to powder. Welcome to Apruary and keep those powder skis waxed and ready; I think you may be needing them.