Powder Pow-Wow!
Today was a rare powder day in the upper midwest. Vacation day!
Oddly enough, there may been a greater amount at my house than at some of the ski areas around here. (Usually, of course, it’s the other way around.) Driving took a bit longer than normal, but not unbearably so. The various road crews had done a good job of cleaning up at least one lane on the state highway, and the county road was dry. The greatest delay came from following some slow vehicles on the two-lane county road.
Much to my surprise, when I got to the ski area at 11 am, there were no more than two dozen (or so) cars in the parking lot. Given the people required to staff the rental shop, front office, food service and the like, I wondered if there were more employees than paying customers.
Speaking of employees, one time I shared a ride on a quad with a man who asked “So are you playing hooky today?” We talked about work, and he explained “this IS my job.” He was, he says, on ski patrol, though in a rain suit rather than the traditional red jacket. Better for snowy days, he said. But the most notable part of the encounter is that he asked to see my lift ticket. In all the skiing and riding I have done, this is the first time that anyone has asked to see a ticket. Not wrong, just odd. (I believed he was on ski patrol; he had the typical radio transmitter attached to his coat.)
There’s something about a powder day that unleashes a voracious appetite, as in “Look at that snow. I want to be the one to lay down tracks on it!” And put down tracks I did. Sometimes I was the first person to “set foot” on a trail (aside from some snowmobile tracks, presumably from a worker of some sort), but even when I was not, there were plenty of areas of each run to explore, well into the afternoon.
Without thinking, I found myself jumping up and down as I rode. (Now I read that this is one thing a person should do while in powder–it lifts the board higher in the snow). On the other hand, I did not bother to set my bindings back a notch on the board, which is something often recommended. I tried to compensate a bit by doing what is normally a no-no, which is leaning back towards the tail of the board. It did seem to help.
There are two problems with powder, though given the delight of riding in it, they are bearable. One is that a rider is more prone to get stuck in the flats.
A second problem is that snow often got into my binding, requiring several minutes to remove the excess snow with a small hand tool. (The price I pay ….) So having a pocket screwdriver is good not only for adjusting bindings, but cleaning them.
After four hours, the snow started getting pretty chopped up on a few trails. One trail, in particular, reminded me of a day out west, last season: chopped powder. During a trip to Colorado, I alternated between board and skis. Unfortunately, I took my skis out on a chopped powder day. It was a lot of work, what with two legs sometimes going at different speeds, with one slicing through chopped powder and the other sliding on hard pack. Two legs, two different speeds: not good. At the time, I thought “I should have brought my board out here, not my skis.”
After taking a board down similar conditions today, I have to say that I was right. It was easier on the snowboard, with both legs attached to the same piece of equipment.
The most amazing part of the day, though, came shortly before 2 p.m. There were a couple of black diamonds I had not been on, at least on a board and I wondered what those were like. I thought there were fairly narrow, but with the powder, I felt I could handle it.
The powder did present one problem, though: I didn’t have enough speed to get to the start of these two trails, which sits at the top of a small rise. So I had to get out of the back binding and drag the board up the hill.
But once I got to the start of one trail, I had a pleasant surprise: no tracks. At nearly 2 in the afternoon, on a powder day! How this could happen, I don’t know, but it was great.
The first half of the trip was easier than expected: “How can this be a diamond?”, I thought. Well, it dropped off pretty quickly. So did I, on the toeside to heelside transition (always my more difficult side). I’m thinking that what might help in this situation is to shift my hips toward the tip of the board as the transition to the heelside traverse begins. It has been useful whenever I have tried it.