Location: Kirkwood
Date: 1/31/2010
Conditions: Packed Powder
A bluebird powder day at Kirkwood can make your entire ski season. Today was one of those days. We caught 3rd chair (thanks two snowboarders who cut at the last second) and hit some cord before lapping chair 11 for some fast groomers to warm up.
Before too long, we took the traverse to the backside and found awesome snow and no lines. Kirkwood's backside is a mini-resort to itself with 4 lifts, including Vista which just recently opened for the season. After a shot at launching off the cornice and a punch save,wWe opted for the other surface lift, Covered Wagon, which opens up a large section of the Wave and Fawn Ridge.
Fawn Ridge held the best snow of the day. Plenty of powder lasted in the trees from the several feet that fell at the 'Wood over the past 10 days or so. With a low to moderate avalanche danger, and plenty of company, we ventured into side-country territory.
View Track 7 in a larger map
After a quick break, we went to Cornice Express, the entire other side of the 2300 acre resort. Again, there was some great snow in the gullies off Sentinel Bowl, thought the slope itself was fairly firm.
We made one more pass at the backside to hit the Wave again and then started the long journey back to Timber Creek to meet up with the Bay Area Ski Bus for our return trip home.
Squantch'n in the PNW
5 years ago
2 comments:
I've never hit Kirkwood on a Pow Day. But I've heard it's pretty good. The snow on the back side can be pretty awesome even long after a storm.
-M
I've been lucky there Mike. Kirkwood is probably the most difficult mountain to get to on a powder day because of road conditions on Highway 88. Still, I've probably got a half dozen or so powder days there. Sunday was almost a week after the bog storm so its hard to call it a pure powder day. I tried to reflect that in the conditions I posted.
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