Spring has sprung in the Salt Lake Valley where we are being treated with an incredibly spectacular bluebird day. The high temperature at the Salt Lake City airport may eclipse 60. I wasn't in the mountains today, but suspect the skier grins are a mile wide, although the sun and high temperatures may be spoiling the snow a bit on some aspects. Unlike spring, when the snowpack is sometimes dirty and dusty, it is currently bright white, providing spectacular contrast with the blue skies.
With the warm weather, high snow levels, and valley rain we have had the past couple of weeks, I feel like this cool season we've had two falls and a spring rather than a fall, winter, and spring. Yeah, it was cold, snowy, and polluted in the valley in December and January, but the mountain snowpack was fall-like until only recently.
Mild weather looks to continue through the coming work week, with a warm storm late in the week. If everyone gets their bikes out, maybe Mother Nature will bring back winter.
I was at Canyons yesterday (Sunday) and it was a gorgeous day. The sun exposed slopes had nice corn. Up high, off the ninety-nine-ninety lift, the snow that was not in direct sun light was maintaining nice dry consistency. There was quite a bit of wind loading on Friday off the Park City Ridge that made for really nice turns (in-bounds) off of Ninety-nine-ninety. Saturday, was very cool - did "Backcountry 101" with the Utah Avalanche Center outside Brighton in Twin Lakes. It was awesome. There was fresh un-tracked powder and it was very wintery that day. I finally got to use my new equipment and finally got to do a tour. Now, I want to be in Utah all the time so I can do more. Alas, I'm back to my cubical in California on Monday. :(
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