they're coming

Sunday at Alta: warmer, cloudier and beginning to get busier as the Ikon pass people start to arrive for the Christmas holiday.  Sigh.  We knew they would get here eventually. 

After an uneventful bus ride up to Wildcat base, we learned that there was a half hour delay on opening the Collins chair; apparently it had been very windy Saturday night and some of the sensors had gotten knocked askew.  People were bailing out of the lift line for the Wildcat chair but we took a different route and did a reverse Around the World: taking the rope tow to the Sunnyside chair (which now features a singles line), skiing down to the Sugarloaf chair, and going around the EBT back to Collins, which was by then open.  Basically we took three lifts before skiing a single run. 

We then stayed at Collins for a while.  The snow was firmer and more skied off than it had been teh day before and I thought taking Spring Valley to Strawberry was the best snow.  When we returned to Sugarloaf, Sugarbowl was holding up (surprisingly), Razorback was still skiing pretty well and Rollercoaster was pretty good, as were the trees between it and Extrovert. 

Same outfit, different day

We did an early and quick lunch at Alf's and then were at Supreme for the next couple of hours, just doing laps over there.  As it started to get busier, it was like dodgeball getting around the cat track and down Upper Big Dipper - the new quad lift brings so many more beginners and lessons to Supreme.  Sigh.

I took the 2:36 bus back down to the valley (I just missed the 2:04 so I got a beer at th Goldminer's Daughter lodge while waiting and got carded!).  H skied all day and got home tired and hopeful for some new snow soon.