Snowbasin
Friday 26 January 2007
 

Weather

Conditions

Story of the Day

Today, we decided to go to Snow Basin, the site of the 2002 Olympic downhill, and now renowned for the quality of its lodges. We left our hotel in Salt Lake at around 8:15am and by time we had driven to Snow Basin, I was able to start to ski around 9:15am.

Flags around the base area	Flags around the base area
Mike at the start of the day

The main uplifts at Snow Basin are two gondolas. To start the day, I took the Needles Gondola and then traversed across to the runs around the Strawberry Gondola, which were in the morning sun.

Conditions off the groomed trails were not good, but the length of the runs from the gondola are long enough to provide some challenge. As on most lifts, the gondolas are numbers. One challenge to make life interesting on groomed runs was to "beat the gondola" and get a lower number on each run.

The top of Needles gondola	Rocks surround Needles lodge
Looking down from Main Street

At one point, Elk Ridge seemed to come to an abrupt end, with nowhere to go. Actually there was snow making in progress which created a minor blockage.

Strawberry gondola	Looking across the valley from the top of Strawberry gondola
The top of Strawberry Gondola	A snow covered tree

Wolverine run introduced a degree of challenge. Narrow along a ridge line, the run has not been groomed for several days.

I agreed to meet Sue around 11am. That did not quite work out. Strawberry gondola stopped for 5 minutes and then I miscalculated how long it would take to cross over to Needled Lodge via Middle Bowl lift.

The bottom of City Hill run	The area below Allen's peak
Needles Lodge	The entrance to Needles Lodge
Rocks above Needles lodge	Trees below Needles lodge
Looking across the plateau	Needles lodge
Rocks above Needles lodge	Open bowl above Needles

By the time I stopped for coffee it was around 11:25. The weather was warming up nicely with water dripping off the roof of the lodge. I stopped for around 15 minutes and then set off for another session.

Sue was trying out my new camera and took a few photos around Needles Lodge and then as I skied away.

Mike about to ski away after the coffee break	Mike skiing away
Mike skiing away	Mike skiing away

Porcupine is a very slow triple chair, dominated by the rocks above Mount Ogden, with a terrain park at the top and a long run down to the base area.

Porcupine lift	Face below Mount Ogden
The top of Porky's lift	The top of Porky's lift
Run below the top of Porky's lift

My original intent was to take the John Paul Express chair to the top of Mt Ogden bowl. However, there were warnings at the bottom of the lift that many of the runs were closed because of poor snow cover, so I took the Needles Gondola back to the Needles Lodge area.

For the next run, I kept right and headed down Moose Mound. This relatively easy black run included moguls, nicely softened in the sun and a natural half pipe. I followed a little girl (around 6 years old) who had no problem at all with the contours of the pipe, followed by her dad, who didn't look comfortable at all.

Nearer the bottom of the run, I turned on to Steins run, marked blue on the trail map. A group in front of me stopped suddenly with some expletives; the run stopped abruptly and the only way down was via a field of moguls, interspersed with areas of grass.

It was now nearing lunchtime. I just about had time to take one run off the Becker chair before meeting Sue back at Needles Lodge. I coped with the moguls on Steins lat time, so I took the same run down.

By the time I had got the gondola back to Needles Lodge it was a round 1:15pm. Needles Lodge has an excellent reputation for the quality of its food. We enjoyed an excellent Wiener Schnitzel sitting in the sun on the terrace.

Following lunch, I skied down to the base area to meet Sue who took the gondola. Once again, I found moguls on a run marked blue on the trail map. The race to the base resulted in a draw.

By the time we got to the bottom it was just after 2pm.

Runs

Last updated: 4th February 2007