New Year, Old Skis

All this talking about snowmobiling probably makes you wonder if I ever ski anymore. Well, I have to say we have been disappointed by the snowpack, or actually the lack of snowpack so far. The deepest snow we have had was back in October when we had that weekend of winter. That snow melted away in about a week. Since winter has really been here, we have had plenty of cold weather, but not enough snow has accumulated for decent skiing. Here is a picture of the snow in October, and then a picture of the same spot now:
The weather has been so variable - it actually warmed above freezing for a few days around New Year's day. The snowpack shrank as the sun melted it. So the snow doesn't cover the bushes, and it has been hard to ski anywhere but on the road. I've tried a few of times to use my skinny track skis on the road, but they are really designed for groomed tracks, and didn't work very well on the un-groomed road. So Tom and I got out our rock skis - our oldest backcountry skis. These are the skis we learned to telemark on, back when telemarkers used skinny cross-country skis with double camber and three pin bindings and leather lace-up boots.
We couldn't find the skins we have for them (they're around here somewhere, but all we could come up with were the skins for our fat, shaped skis), so the day after Christmas we rubbed on plenty of Extra Blue kick wax, and headed out for a walk in the snow. It was fine on the road, but when we went off into the woods, we kept gouging the bases of the skis on rocks and logs and other obstacles that weren't buried well enough yet. We were glad we hadn't used our fancy telemark skis. But we had a good time slogging around anyway.
The next day the temperatures rose so high that the snow all turned to soup. Then it dropped again, and the soup became ice or crust. Then it warmed up again, and so on. On January 2, the temperature dropped from high 40's to 10 degrees in about half an hour, and it dumped snow. The next day it was 4 degrees and the wind was blowing hard. The new snow was flowing like a river over the old crust, blown by the wind. Walking out there felt like wading in a creek with the constant current pushing against your legs, but this was a snow current instead of liquid water. The snow that had accumulated was redistributed into drifts.
Today the sun was shining brilliantly and the wind was gone. We decided to try out the rock skis again. The bushes still are not covered, but the snow, especially where it has drifted, is deep enough to cover rocks and most logs. Unfortunately, because of the freeze-melt-freeze-wind cycle, the snow has lost all its sharp points and edges, and is exactly the consistency of granulated sugar. So it is unconsolidated and easy to sink through. On top of the layers of ice and crust that are down there because of all the melting, this unconsolidated snow is really dangerous. The radio and newspaper (and television, I'm sure) are full of warnings about avalanche danger. So the steep and deep backcountry where we like to go telemark is probably out of the question. Even if there is deep snow now, on top of these layers of ice and sugar, it will probably be unstable all winter. Too bad.
Still, we had a lovely day. We skied up the ridge above our house and cut through an open area above Jeff's house. Here is the view of a mountain range called the Crazy Mountains from high on the ridge:
Here is a different view of the Absaroka Mountains, which we have such a stunning view of from our porch:
Tom broke trail and then spent lots of time waiting for me to catch up, as always.
When we skied back down, it was great to be able to ski right to our back door. No long drive home after skiing. That is the luxury of living here. We can go for a short ski or a long one - on the road or up the hill - whatever the weather and snow and our inclination leads us to. Just walk out the door. It's great.
After skiing in the cold (it was about eight degrees outside), we came in and made popcorn and hot chocolate and warmed up by the fire.
So the skiing isn't as good as we had hoped, but it is skiing just the same. And since our neighbor Jeff is spending most of this winter in town with his girlfriend, we have the whole valley to ourselves which makes every trip out into the snow feel like a privilege. And we love playing outside in the snow.