my opening day

The storm we had Friday night didn't really amount to much - 9 inches up the canyon, a couple inches at our house - but it was enough to get me up and out and skiing on November 19th.  I'd been hemming and hawing over whether to go the night before and so Saturday morning was scurrying all over the house, trying to find my  helmet and mittens and base layers and socks and ski pants and ski pass and all of it.  I didn't have any hand warmers (had to buy some up at Alta to the 300% inflated price tag) and I had thrown my boot covers away at the end of last season because they were pretty much shredded, so I knew my toes would be cold.  But still, everything came together and we headed up the canyon by 8:30 a.m.

Bright enough to make me squint

There were more people waiting for the lifts to open than there were on the actual opening day, but once the initial crowd got up the mountain, it was clear there weren't many people there at all.  Only three lifts were open (Collins, Wildcat and Sunnyside) but we never ended up waiting in line and we did ride more than one chair with the same people.  The snow was much better than I expected it to be.  I stayed on the groomers off Collins but plenty of other skiers were whooping it up in the meager powder, tramping out traverses and claiming first tracks.  Of course, you could hear the rocks and stumps scraping across the bottom of their skis as they swooped down the hillsides - gotta bring your rock skis to early season skiing.  We stayed out for about three hours, enough for everything to get tracked out.  My legs are a little tired but I'm counting it as a good start to the 2011-2012 season.