711 Inches of Snowfall!!
Snowbird breaks its
all time record
By Chris Weiss
711. It’s a three-digit string that’s significant
to anyone familiar with skiing and snowboarding the Cottonwood
Canyons. Prior to this season, it simply represented the convenience
store perched awkwardly on the corner of Fort Union and Wasatch
boulevards. Few other convenience stores hold a greater place
in ski legend than the Big Cottonwood 7-11. It’s been
called the busiest 7-11 in the world. It’s not. What it
is is the quintessential last-stop when visiting Alta, Snowbird,
Brighton or Solitude, the place to caff, carb and drain the
early-morning coffee and OJ before heading up-canyon to your
destination. If you’ve been to any of those resorts, you’ve
probably been to the 7-11. In fact, you probably know it well.
But on April 30, 711 gained a new
place in Cottonwood lore. The Bird awakened early that Saturday
morning to a fresh 15 inches, pushing the snowfall total for
the year to 711. It was officially the first 700-inch season
in Snowbird’s history, making 2011 the king of some of
the snowiest seasons in the ski world. Those 15 inches on the
final day of the month put the cherry on top of an April that
had already witnessed more than 150.
In fact, just four days earlier, Snowbird
celebrated its all-time season record with 690 inches, surpassing
the 688-inch mark set way back in 1983/84. Everything beyond
that just built upon legend. A momentous week, to be sure.
Local pro Ben Wheeler put it into perspective in Snowbird’s
celebratory press release: “Having skied at Snowbird for
16 years, I can honestly say this is by far the best year of
powder skiing I’ve ever experienced. The mountain is incredibly
filled in, with areas that used to be 30-foot cliffs completely
buried under all this snow.”
Josh Matta, a one-time local who found himself in the midst
of nature’s fury on a late-season return, echoed those
sentiments: “The past 3 weeks have been some of the most
consistent skiing I have ever experienced at Snowbird. The coverage
from the best year in history combined with snowfall nearly
every day made some of the best skiing ever, not just April
and May.”
I hadn’t been there to witness it first-hand like Matta
and Wheeler, but news of the record was enough to awaken me
from my mud-season stupor and send me out on a late-season stash
hunt.
It wasn’t until around 12:30
p.m. that I rolled up to Snowbird on that 700-breaking Saturday
afternoon, and I fully expected less-than-epic conditions when
I plopped down for my first ride up Peruvian. 15 inches, sure,
but warming, late-April temperatures were certain to turn that
foot of snow  into
a gloppy mess. And the mass of people wrapping around the building
from the Tram—seemingly every skier and rider in the Salt
Lake Valley—certainly took care of any powdery scraps
that the sun didn’t boil.
Recon on the ground
proved much different, though. The minute I strapped my back
binding and pointed my tip, all the negatives evaporated into
the background, overshadowed by a simple thought: “This
is good.”
Soft, knee-deep powder; fresh lines within
spitting distance of the lift; and late-April face shots were
enough to keep a smile tattooed on my face run after run. Peruvian,
Cirque, Mineral Basin, Little Cloud— it didn’t matter;
they were all soft and supple for the first hour+ of my day.
It might as well have been mid-February.
And the day slowly wound to one of the most memorable runs
of my life. With all base-area lifts skier’s-left of the
Tram shut down, Gad Valley held some of the best turns of the
day, possibly the year. I climbed aboard the Tram at just before
3:30 and realized it was entirely unlikely that I’d make
it back for last call at 3:45. Gad was my final destination.
From the top of the tram, I skated just below the Cirque and
dropped in at the top of Gad Chutes. It might as well have been
morning again—a little side-slipping, and fresh lines
and face shots were bountiful. As the chutes flushed out into
the flat, mellow traverse near Mid-Gad restaurant, I cut to
the left through the open gate, rolled over some pre-cut woods’
tracks and took a short, sharp plunge down a fresh tree line
that spit me out into Carbonate, winding past the lifeless Gad
2 lift.
 I
lost momentum just beyond Gad 2 and had to unbuckle momentarily
to skate up to the tip of the slight ridge just beyond. As I
sat down to strap back in, the silence gripped me. Not a single
soul in sight. The only sound was the soft, gentle white-noise
of thick flakes falling around me. It felt more like deep-backcountry
solitude than Bird powder-day mayhem. It was if I had those
711 inches all to myself.
And it rode that way too—the rest of the run was fresh,
open cruiser lines interspersed with quick bursts of tree stashes.
The snow was heavy by this point in the afternoon, but untracked,
fast and stable. As I came to the twin Gad lifts, I exhausted
every iota of momentum until friction finally dragged me to
a stop. Immediately, I was overtaken by ambivalence: the
ringing disappointment at the end of such a quality day went
battling against the enlivenment of living it. 711 inches was
much more than a pretty number.
Want to experience it for yourself? It’s not too late
to get a piece of the record-breaking season. Though temperatures
have risen sharply over the course of a week, Snowbird President
Bob Bonar said last week that the Bird will be open through
Memorial Day. Given the record-breaking snowfall, I’d
be surprised if they don’t make it until Father’s
Day (they did last year) or even Fourth of July (2005). Ski-and-stay
packages start as low as $65 per person/day. Get your fill before
the most epic season in history really is over.
Last Minute Packages: www.snowbird.com/lodging/hotdeals.php
The skiers pictured above are Colleen
Pruss and Erik Suvanto. Photos by Josh Matta.
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After working the 9
to 5 grind for about five years, Chris Weiss escaped to
the Rockies where he could snowboard, mountain bike and
hike without so much interference from life. A couple
of years of working in the tourist industry was enough
to inform Weiss that it was time for something more rewarding.
He combined his love of the outdoors with his love of
the written word and now freelances wherever he can. Weiss
has written for Bomb Snow, Trails.com and a variety of
other print and Web magazines dedicate to all forms of
outdoor foolishness. |
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