Solitude
Saturday 7 February 2004

Weather

Conditions

Story of the Day

After the end of The Open Group meeting in San Diego, I had one day before Chris arrived for the start of our annual week in Park City. When I left the hotel, near the airport, the sun was shining and driving up Cottonwood Canyon towards Solitude, sun shining through the windscreen caused problems with the sand kicked up from vehicles in front. By the time I got to Solitude, there was still sunlight on the distant hills but the clouds were beginning to build. The temperature was about zero Fahrenheit.

Ominous skies just before starting

Moonbeam lift is slow and relatively short, but in the 8 minutes it took to get to the top, I realised that it was very very cold.

Moonbeam II lift

The top of Moonbeam II lift

I started with a series of runs from the only high speed quad lift at Solitude, Eagle Express, a combination of cruises and slightly more challenging runs. Inspiration drops down from Eagle Ridge. It was mogulled and with the low temperature, the bumps below the surface powder were pretty hard. Challenger is steep but groomed.

Signpost on Eagle Ridge	Eagle Express Lift
The sun trying to break through	Lower Sundancer

I was already getting cold, so plan A was to stop at the Roundhouse for a warm drink. It was not open, but visiting the restroom provided enough warmth for a couple more runs.

Solitude Village from Main Street

Alta Bird, the run immediately under Apex lift waqs mogulled and skiing rather harder than it's blue rating would suggest. While I was riding the lift for the first time, someone fell quite spectacularly below the lift, leaving one ski behind. Retrieving his ski took me past the most difficult part of the run without thinking. For a final run before stopping for a drink, I took Powderhorn lift somewhat higher up the mountain and skiied back down to Moonbeam Center and the Link chair across to the Village at Solitude.

Powderhorn Lift	Alta Bird
Alta Bird	Alta Bird

Cirque	Cirque
Cirque	The top of Powder Horn
Mike at the top of Powder Horn

After the coffee break, the weather had warmed up slightly and the sun broke through the clouds for a few minutes. My strategy was to move round the rest taking a couple of runs from each lift. To start the process, I repeated Apex and Powderhorn and then cross across to Sunrise. I remember enjoying Roller Coaster on a previous visit in 1984! It is a relatively gentle slope under the lift, left ungroomed and made more difficult by a tricky cross camber. With lots of snow and in particular a lot of surface powder, it took more energy than I expected.

Eagle Ridge from the top of Apex	Cirque
Sunrise Lift	Looking down Roller Coaster
Looking down Roller Coaster	Looking down Roller Coaster

By the time I started on my first ride up Sunrise, the sun had gone and snow was starting. Lighting was getting very flat. I took one run back down to the bottom of the lift, more or less following the lift line and taking some of the more challenging options and the headed back to the top for a run into Honeycomb Canyon.

Shaft	Shaft
Mine	Mine

From the top of Summit lift, there was a queue of people waiting to make the traverse across the canyon to the slopes marked a little easier on the map. Just to the right of the lift, there is an entry gate, marked with a Double Black diamond and an "Experts Only" sign. It didn't appear to be particularly difficult as far as I could see, so instead of waiting, I headed straight down. The run was actually a bit of an anti-climax. There was nothing to actually justify the grading, although the run down the bottom of the canyon was long and ungroomed, with a couple of steep sections. This was a good run, so I decided to repeat it.

Honeycomb Canyon	Honeycomb Canyon
"Experts Only"

Getting back to the entrance to Honeycomb Canyon takes several runs, including 4 lifts. This time, on reaching the top of Summit lift, there were very few people, so I took the traverse. Because of the fresh powder, the drop down Black Bess was more difficult than the double-black run down the centre of the canyon. By the time I got to the new Honeycomb lift, I was tempted to take one last run back down into the canyon, but my legs were getting tired so I called it a day.

Before driving back down to Salt Lake, I phoned Sue and home and then located Chris, changing planes in Chicago. Somehow, I managed to bump my head on the car door and while I was phoning, I realised that blood was dripping down my face, from what proved to be little more than a scratch. I survived the skiing, but not the rental car. Chris arrived, about an hour late at Salt Lake City airport at about 8:30pm.

Moonbeam Center at the end of day

Runs

Last updated: 18th April 2004