January 6, 2007

We hit a cold snap. After getting 17 inches of snow mid week, we have dropped into a deep freeze. The temperature today was predicted to stay below zero, but they got that wrong. I think we almost reached plus eight.

Late this week at work, I was imagining all that new snow sitting on the mountain above Anchorage at the local ski area that is only open on weekends. Kris had the same thought so we set our sights on Alpenglow for today. We had our doubts about the temperature, but with no minus sign showing up on our thermometer this morning, we decided to bundle up and give it a try.

Apparently many other people had the same idea as I have never seen it so crowded there. Crowded means that they were running only one lift and there was a line. The lift moves people up the mountain so slowly that it never looks like there is anyone skiing down.

The snow was surprisingly heavy, not the light fluffy stuff I had been imagining at work. It was hard work to make turns, but I was doing pretty well until things got a little skied up. I was able to make good powder turns, but when I got into more cut up, bumped up stuff, I felt like a beginner. I finally decided my boots were too loose, but by then I was pretty tired.

The snow actually held up pretty good all day. They opened two other lifts which expanded the amount of terrain available and spread out the ‘crowd’. The heavy snow and low temperature probably thinned the crowd as well. We seemed to be following the crowd. The crowd moved to one lift and we hung back enjoying what was left of the lightly tracked snow. Then the crowd moved to another lift and we moved to recently abandoned one and found plenty of lightly tracked, often untracked for several turns at a time. Then we moved to the last lift and as we rode up, I noticed that the line directly under the lift was virtually untracked. People tend to shy away from the lifts. I am not sure if they are afraid of the poles, afraid of getting spit on, or just embarrassed to be skiing with so many spectators. Since none of these things worry us, we headed down a virtually untracked line for our last run of the day. Another typical day at Alpenglow. The snow lasts longer than our legs.

We keep getting more snow. This evening, the windows on the car were covered over while we did some grocery shopping. We really don’t need anymore snow, but I am amused. I think we got a couple inches last night and another inch or two here this evening. It seems like such a minor thing, a couple inches of snow. Alyeska even set a record in December. It was the most snowfall in a month ever. I think the number was 283 inches. If my math is right, that is just short of 24 feet! Snow packs down and it even evaporates when it doesn’t melt, but it still is piling up deep. It is getting difficult to see pulling out of side streets and driveways. Snow is being hauled away from almost everywhere, but some parking lots are starting to disappear. You can only get it to pile so high with a plow and every snowfall claims more area. Huge Caterpillar loaders cruise around the city streets and move snow from public areas. If this keeps up, it could get interesting.

By sharp contrast, the eastern half of the country seems to be having a heat wave. Most of our old ski areas are either closed or barely open. It looks like it will be a devastating winter for some of them. If snow doesn’t arrive soon, some of them may not even open. Maybe we can sell them snow by the truckload.