Cannon Mountain, Saturday 12-03-16.
A heavy snow squall greeted my Saturday morning arrival in the wintry Franconia Notch. A lift ticket was purchased with four nonperishable food items combined with $19.50. By the time I got to first chair at 8:30 am about an inch of fresh snow had fallen. There was light snow on and off all day, including another squall late morning and a third squall midafternoon. In all, about two inches of snow fell while I was there. I wouldn’t call it wet snow, just a little sticky. Temps were in the high 20’s to low 30s’. There was little wind so the snow fell evenly over the slopes and stuck where it fell providing a nice early season skiing surface.
Gremlin off the Eagle Cliff triple was the smoothest groomed run and held up well throughout the day. Rocket and Gary’s skied about the same, groomed but bumpy and a little chunky in places with some moguls to be found on the edges. For me, Zoomer was the best of the three open runs on the Front Five. There were bump lines down both edges of the manmade snow pack, a mixed bag of soft snow, crud, firm snow, chucks and some powder too. The moguls were small so they were easy to ski through, around or over; almost as if they were not there. The middle of Zoomer was pretty smooth and firm with an edgeable surface. There were no lift lines, the visibility was good and I only hit debris once that caused a little p-tex damage to one of my skis. I quit skiing at 2:30 pm.
For après ski I had a 16 ounce pounder PBR can for four bucks in the Cannonball Pub. Upon my return back through Franconia Notch there was another snow squall and the roads slicked up. I arrived upon a rollover and three cars off the road. The highway was shut down for an hour. I cranked up the tunes starting with an Allman Brothers song list and sat there in my car. I watched the snow fall and looked up and around to the woods and the mountains. Everything was covered in snow; a winter wonderland so it wasn’t too bad of a place to wait.
Gremlin off the Eagle Cliff triple was the smoothest groomed run and held up well throughout the day. Rocket and Gary’s skied about the same, groomed but bumpy and a little chunky in places with some moguls to be found on the edges. For me, Zoomer was the best of the three open runs on the Front Five. There were bump lines down both edges of the manmade snow pack, a mixed bag of soft snow, crud, firm snow, chucks and some powder too. The moguls were small so they were easy to ski through, around or over; almost as if they were not there. The middle of Zoomer was pretty smooth and firm with an edgeable surface. There were no lift lines, the visibility was good and I only hit debris once that caused a little p-tex damage to one of my skis. I quit skiing at 2:30 pm.
For après ski I had a 16 ounce pounder PBR can for four bucks in the Cannonball Pub. Upon my return back through Franconia Notch there was another snow squall and the roads slicked up. I arrived upon a rollover and three cars off the road. The highway was shut down for an hour. I cranked up the tunes starting with an Allman Brothers song list and sat there in my car. I watched the snow fall and looked up and around to the woods and the mountains. Everything was covered in snow; a winter wonderland so it wasn’t too bad of a place to wait.