As Karl mentioned, still lots of skiable snow in the park – at least for another few days. With temperatures predicted in the double digits… maybe even 20C early next week – the snow will start to fade pretty fast – but for now it’s manageable.
I started pretty early (maybe a bit too early) and was faced with icy rutted snow but at least it was continuous all the way to the Brule lookout. From time to time I could find some smooth patches to crust cruise over but the whole trail should soften as the day progresses making for nice skate skiing. Jumped onto Ridge road at Brule lookout and got a better idea of how hard the crews have been working to clear brush off the trail. Lots of debris and sawdust to try and skirt around/over. I did manage to crust cruise a few of the bogs off Ridge road but opted not to tempt fate and ski over the deeper water – it is April 21st after all.
Ended up at Gossip North (trails 1 and 2) and that’s where the trail further north stopped with some yellow closure tape. The tree clearing crews were working on 1B as I skied 1 and hadn’t gone further north yet so I opted to turn back here.
On my return I skied on the parkway out towards Black lake and got some of the nicer skiing of the morning. Quite a few more smooth open stretches without any ruts and the surface was starting to soften as the temperature climbed. Finally returned down to P10 and the descent of the hill was about as (intentionally) slow as I’ve ever gone. The icy ruts were still a bit choppy so I took my time. The lot was approaching half full on my return so a few people out enjoying a nice spring ski. If you time it right the skiing is quite nice. Still lots of snow but it will be interesting to see how quickly that changes.