closing day 2022/2023

Sunday, the closing day of Alta's 2022/2023 season, was nearly opposite from Saturday in every way.  It was bright and clear and sunny, and if it was a little cool ambient temperature-wise, the strong sun made it very pleasant.  And it was crazy-crowded!  As we drove up, traffic was diverted along the bypass road in Snowbird since the main road was still covered in avalanche debris.  What surprised us, however, was that the line of Alta-bound traffic was at a standstill even before we got to the bypass road.  They were checking everyone's parking reservations upon arrival at Alta and since most people wanted to park at Wildcat base - where the big parties are - it was very slow going.  Although H would have preferred to have parked at Wildcat, once we got to the Peruvian Lodge, we were able to get out of that line and drive up to the Albion lot instead, where there were hardly vehicles yet.  The parking attendant checked our license plate and waved us on.  

Yay sunshine!

That wasn't the only long line.  The lift lines weren't bad until 10:15 but after that, the corrals were just swarming with people.  The singles lines weren't too bad, however, since everyone wanted to stand in line with their friends.  With the revellers out in force, there was lots of good people-watching - we reckoned 80% of the people there were wearing costumes - so the lines at least weren't boring.  We even went through the Wildcat double chair once (that was enough): there was a small, half-hearted Frank competition going on but honestly, I think the Alta employees were just too tired to want to build jumps after all the shoveling they've been doing all winter.

That'll take a minute to melt

The skiing was really good too.  Since it had been cloudy and snowing the day before, the snow never melted, so it also didn't set up overnight.  It was soft and fairly quick and didn't get the slightest bit sticky until well after noon.  We skied all over - although we declined to stand in line for the Devil's Castle rope drop - and it was all good, by far the best closing day snow conditions we can remember.

We'd even experienced enough of the party while in the lift lines, so we weren't that upset for a mellow tailgate back at the truck when we were done.  The Albion lot was full and there were lots of folks camped out in lawn chairs, soaking in the sunshine and talking about the record breaking season.  They didn't technically hit 900 inches until after closing day but it was just a few days later when they announced the season snowfall total: 903".  I'm guessing we never see the likes of that again.