The wind was the big feature this morning as we begin to feel the first fringes of the Powder Vortex predicted for later this week.  Mineral Basin, Gad 2, and the Little Cloud Chair were closed due to the wind, and the wind was certainly threatening the Tram operation as the direction was ripping out of the South.  The wind had stripped all the deposited snow from the High North exposures, carving them down to the old bump layer. To say that surface was interesting is being kind.  There were very thin veins of transported snow  filling some of the bump troughs, but they did not have enough cushion to relieve the rumble that was throwing me all over.  The Wind was blowing so hard out of the South, that the descent down Peruvian Gulch left you keeping up with the wind speed, where it felt as if there was no wind in your face. The Chef says” ski faster than the wind for fun.  That was a tall order  keeping that pace with the present conditions.  Some big Grooming work had been done on the lower mountain, providing some excellent lines to make up for some of the other distortions.  The Tram went down due to wind at 11:30 AM. sending the faithful to the chairs, where the wind made the ride up very uncomfortable.  The air was warm, but the wind just beat you senseless, so I bailed as  I could not handle the lines that backed up on the Chairs and the relentless wind pressure.  Tomorrow, look for the Groomers to provide the best options for fun, and look around to see what the wind did over night.  Even the deep trees were getting scoured out, so I really don’t know where it will all end up.  Little Cloud was getting better by the minute as the snow blew in off the Twins.  Here is a shot of the wind doing it’s thing under Old Reliable.    See you on first Boat.  Peace Out!!

This entry was posted on Monday, February 14th, 2011 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Snow Reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.