Deer Valley
Wednesday 21 February 2001

At the start of the day, the weather was terrific. When we left Powderwood, we were in thick fog, but by the time we got to Deer Valley, the fog was below us. The temperature was just below freezing and the sun was shining from an almost cloudless sky.

Chris and I left Sue in the lodge working on her reports and headed up the mountain as soon as the slopes opened.

The top of Mount Baldy in the early morning sunlight ..

.. from the top of Bald Eagle mountain.

Looking back towards Kimball Junction from the top of Flagstaff Mountain.

Moguls under Red Cloud lift; the glade on Square Deal

Empire Canyon from Northside (Jupiter Peak behind)

It took just over six minutes to ride the lift up and ski down. Before 10am, we had managed to ski all the runs down from top to bottom of Northside, all easy blue runs, well groomed and perfect for loosening up the leg muscles. 

Immaculate grooming under Northside lift

Empire Canyon lift and bowl

Chris at the top of Orion

The face of Buckeye

For our first run, we turned left and took the slightly easier Conviction. Both of us handled the moguls reasonably comfortably, with fresh legs, properly loosened up. On the run out, we cut across to the top of Buckeye, a steep slope on the face of an old mine heap. From the entry gate all we could see was the edge. The 45 degree slope was easier than it looked from the top.

After a cruise down Orion, we turned right and tried the slightly steeper Domingo side of the bowl. Again, no real problems, although there was more powder and the bumps were less formed.

We did two runs in Lady Morgan and then finished with a cruise down Tycoon and back up Ruby to the rest rooms!

On the way back to the base area for lunch, we took one run through Guardsman's Glade and then the easy run to Crown Point.

For the rest of the afternoon, Chris and I set off to visit all 5 summits again. We seemed destined not to succeed as we had to wait for Deer Crest lift "to be reset" and then had to queue for the rest room at Little Baldy Summit because one of the two was out of order.

We got across to Empire just in time to fit in a high speed run down Supreme to get back to the lift just before it closed for a more challenging mogul run down conviction.