Snow for the Euros.

[subtle plague]

ullr has proposed something different to me.
in case i can get any money soon

[TeleAl]

We are getting nuked this morning!

And it snowed last night too.

[Ripzalot]

We are getting nuked this morning!

And it snowed last night too.

around the same time as al's post....

i'm only about 2km from the leysin turnoff, the rain went to sleet to heavy snow in all of about 10 seconds. my traction control warning light starts to flutter and continues to get worse as i approach the turnoff. behind me is a stream of angry and impatient swiss drivers. either i am going to have to chain up or hitchhike the rest of the way up. i park at one of the rare free parking spots in switzerland, hop out eagerly and as i start to rummage thru the trunk for the chains i realize this is going to be impossible with my hand in its condition (see avatar pic for details). so i gear up and stick my thumb out. no one came by for about 10 min and by then i was frosted with white. i didnt think anyone would want to pick up a 6'4" 220lb wet frosted freak with an equally large and freakish snowboard (my trusty 178 swallowtail), but someone did. bernard ranger, socialist candidate for mayor of leysin. he stopped in the middle of the road and i scrambled to get my board and bag in the back of his subaru, and in my rush to hop in, i grabbed the rain gutter with my bad hand and somehow slammed the door on the ends on my fingers. if i had any feeling in my fingers, it would have hurt like hell. i yanked my hand out, leaving my glove caught in the door and we both had a good chuckle.

i made it with time to spare. lifts were delayed till 10am due to high wind on top, but that quickly subsided. al made first chair, i made second, and we were greeted by a ton of fluffy goodness. how much? no idea, but at least 50cms i'd say. other than the 50 or so people on the first lift rush, there were very few people on the hill. it pounded snow for the first hour or so, then started breaking. by noon we could see across the valley to g3000 and les diablerets. i split from al and the gang and did laps entirely alone thru les fers and solepraz. seems the people that were there were content with the boot deep pow on piste.

great day, EXCELLENT day, i just wish i had me legs back - this was day two after my 10 week injury timeout. i feel like an old man!

not much time for pics, a few from the chair...

[wildstyle]

I love this picture .... its €€€€€€€€€

Good to see you're back in the swallowtail saddle .......

[verbier61]

just back from verb. 25 cm of snow in the village during the night, but strong gusty wind forced televerbier to switch off every lift over 2400 m. The bowls around ruinettes were OK, though, with 30-40 cm of snow to track. A bit wet and heavy, but much better than no new snow.

[bbirtle]

Haha! Finally Chamonix was the epicenter. Here's the latest estimate: 50cm of heavy pow on the 16th, plus 30-40cm of light pow on the 17th. All lifts closed today the 18th and snowing like mad all day - perhaps another 25cm fell? Add it all up it's well over a meter - more likely 150cm, and those numbers are from Longon - the Grands Montets midstation. There's a rumer that Le Brevent has 3m of fresh snow.

Storm of the year, no, of the last THREE years. And it ain't over yet, there's another 30cm in the forecast through Monday night and continuing into Tuesday... nobody can remember this much snow ever falling at one time before...

All lifts closed today due to avo danger and high winds so we're on call for an 8 AM CompanieDuMontBlanc.com lift status check tomorrow morning. Guess is that it will stay closed tomorrow too, unfortunately.

Happy powder dreams, Euroland.

[subtle plague]

sooo if no one can remember it there can be two possibilities: they've lost memory of 99 or they haven't been there very long.

BUT it may be the best storm in 3 years. granted

[powstash]

Get it boys, GET IT!! (please get it for me) Unblievable. Birtle, you're killing me but keep it coming. Geeze, what a time for brain surgery. (as if there is ever a time for it )

It about killed me as well to call Delta last week and cancel my flight to Euro later this month.

You can all thank me now - I predict the first two weeks of March to go off like it is now.

Edit: Top page!

[Ripzalot]

sooo if no one can remember it there can be two possibilities: they've lost memory of 99 or they haven't been there very long.

BUT it may be the best storm in 3 years. granted

99 was my first year in euroland. seems every weekend i went i was in knee deep pow. i took it for granted that it was normal. sadly i was mistaken.

btw, there is a spot that is up 90cms over the last 3 days (more coming) and has been closed since. can u guess where?

[subtle plague]

i don't really care which spot. i cannot come down anyway.
but i hope it stays closed until you have to work again....

[Ripzalot]

i don't really care which spot. i cannot come down anyway.
but i hope it stays closed until you have to work again....

sorry, that wasnt directed at you specifically, but to all.

btw, i'm on 50% disability until march 12 but also have the ability to take off any day i want. (that was directed at you )

[bbirtle]

ROAD TRIP! Who's in?

Guys, I'm sick of Chamonix skiing. I had an OK day today at Les Grands today but I'm fed up with the baggage that comes with this resort. I won't go into the "why" 'cause I'm trying hard to stay upbeat.

I have three free days in any Aosta resort, at Verbier, Zinal, Portes du Soliel. Anybody want to meet up and rip some turns? I *know* there's amazing skiing to be had somewhere out there, and I want to rip it up! My local friends seem incredibly stuck in the valley... Suggest something, PM me the when and where I'm in. Verb? Al? Ripz? My only request is that I want to ski pow pow and more pow.

PS - On the bright side, there's around 120cm fresh snow at Longon-Les Grands Montets!!

[TeleAl]

ROAD TRIP! Who's in?

See my email. Lots of suggestions proposed.

The silence from La Grave is suspect.

If any maggots there hear some Telemarker bellowing "CHARGE!!!"
you'll know it's me.

Otherwise, game on, let's go, I'm in.

BTW, Leysin had great snow today. On the snow update:
Temps on the rise, Foehn blowing, snow getting heavier. Think COLD!

[subtle plague]

damn it's snowing like hell down in turin.

the slf expects 70-100cm in the tessin OVER NIGHT.

road trips to the western alps won't get as much, but you can still harvest the remains of the past storm.
the new storm is southbound.(ok new branch of the storm )

[verbier61]

I'll be in verb from the coming saturday to March 5th. Yeah I know it's carnival holiday but this is why I can stay permanently there for a week. My kids have no school.

[Ripzalot]

The silence from La Grave is suspect.

i heard from vertigo - no specifics but he said the snow's great and the mountain is empty.

no road trips right now for me. need to ease myself back into the game. i'm local boy for the next cple weeks.

[bbirtle]

Suddenly I'm hot on Chamonix again. La Flegere, manage to get on the fourth chair up of the Index just after they cranked it up. That's 3x6 = 18 tracks ahead of us, plus a handful from the patrollers on the entire mountain. Knee-deep fluffy goodness on an endless base. For whatever reason, no queues all day on L'Index... first three runs weren't just fresh tracks they were fresh BOWLS to shred up. Last five runs on the high traverse to Lac Blanc, rarely crossing a line all day.

[Ripzalot]

update from vertigo in la grave - knee deep to village this morning, above thigh yesterday during storm. tomorrow they open the top.

game on folks!

[KANUTTEN]

Suddenly I'm hot on Chamonix again. La Flegere, manage to get on the fourth chair up of the Index just after they cranked it up. That's 3x6 = 18 tracks ahead of us, plus a handful from the patrollers on the entire mountain. Knee-deep fluffy goodness on an endless base. For whatever reason, no queues all day on L'Index... first three runs weren't just fresh tracks they were fresh BOWLS to shred up. Last five runs on the high traverse to Lac Blanc, rarely crossing a line all day.

Have anyone told you that you have a very labile personality? You might consider seeing a shrink. Either that or just rip it while its there

[subtle plague]

Hot Damn !

[Lostinthetrees]

.....i feel like an old man!

Glad you said it. Truth hurts, reality bites. Welcome to the "ol' Man's ski club".

[Lostinthetrees]

3 exclnt days skiing boot-high+ pow. My wife is now a comfirmed powder hound and following me everywhere, anywhere.

Saturday - PDS CH "backwoods" ski station. No chairs up high opened all day (viz, hi winds, avi-clearing, etc). Leaving us w\ 400+m pow lines to ski in the alpage. Short hike out and another circuit.
[/img\CH\LITT\outta_focus/blower_rooster_tail/img]
Sunday - Leysin. Almost no snow under Tour d'Ai, all blown away! But under the Berneuse over-boot-high laps 'til we hooked up with TeleAl's gang. Bill is nutz, completely. Cannot follow him. But, he did show Lisa and I the "wrap-around" and she loved it. Big confidence builder 4 her. Lapped it twice. After 3 hours Leysin was destroyed.
[/img:\CH\LITT\outta_focus\birdeye_view_wrap_round/img]
Monday - PDS CH. 10cms new and plenty of wind filled in all the damage. No competition for our lines. Again, 400+m lines boot-deep.
[/img:\CH\LITT\badly_outta_focus\gully_blower_lines/img]
Back home resting my bones.
Will be back out there on Thurs/Fri/Sat. Hopefully storm-chasing. Any takers?

[Ripzalot]

Glad you said it. Truth hurts, reality bites. Welcome to the "ol' Man's ski club".

but in my case it's only temporary.

[Lostinthetrees]

but in my case it's only temporary.

ohhh, that hurtz. ...but you are right, I am an "old powder hound".

EDIT: and proud to have that title.

[bbirtle]

Have anyone told you that you have a very labile personality?

Had to look up "labile" in the dictionary, gotcha.

Today was excellent, a day where it was well worth it - but consider there was a queue of over two hours to get onto the bottom cablecar, and that's after the "Tokyo subway" style bus journey. I nearly collided with other skiers on open bowls on perhaps a dozen occasions - it was really a race on every run to stay ahead of the mob and forget about avalanche safety. By 10:30 AM, the parts of the mountain easily accessible to those without serious local knowledge were completely tracked out and visitors were skiing pistes again. (We know some good pow stashes so we skiied fresh all day but 90% of the people were not that lucky).

Those going to Les Grands Montets today endured another 1-2 hour queue to be surprised that the entire mountain was already completely tracked out from top to bottom, from every nook to every cranny. This because yesterday the resort was in fact all open but the Office of Tourism, all the electronic lift status boards around town, and the website were listing it as "closed". (Again, we have a friend in Argentiere that tipped us off, but for 90% of the people, they were not so lucky)

Good skiing? Yes. But like I said, comes with a lot of baggage and I'm looking forward to trying out some new spots with TeleAl tomorrow and getting the fuck out of Dodge for awhile.

That's my random rant for the evening. Now back to your regularly scheduled stokeathon.