01/08/2014 Here is a report from our day-tour on Sec 2 on Jan 4:
The forecast was for -19F overnight, but it was above zero by 11am
when twelve of us set off from Harriman Dam, so the planned late
departure paid off. We had about 8" of fluff on top of a minimal base.
There were a number of new blowdowns since our work last month, oh well.
One big mess was across the VAST 9 trail, looked like it had pretty
completely blocked the trail for snowmobiles, but one machine managed to
get past it. We followed someone else's tracks on the 'no smowmobiles'
part of the trail. The drop and climb at Graves Brook had enough cover
that everyone managed it with skis on. We had a short lunch break at
Wilder Brook. The right turn N of Wilder Brook (with prominent arrow, the
leaders were following the tracks of others and not watching for blazes, I
guess) was missed by everyone except the sweep, but they ended up back on
the trail shortly.
We had snowmobile tracks to Medburyville, a nice
gradual descent. At Medburyville we almost had one skier use the bailout
car, but she (and five others) opted for the roadwalk on the next section,
since we didn't know if the beaver dam would be crossable. The short
steep descent from Medburyville was best done by sidestepping due to thin
base. The dam was crossable, although not trivial, and earlier group had
obviously gotten wet skis. We regrouped at the short road walk, then all
sidestepped down to the river again, and enjoyed Steve and Rita's
(father-daughter who were with us) mowing of the this section in November.
One wide wet section caused the scrapers to come out for about half the
group. I think Stephen and Lynne were the first ones to ever ski the
short reroute that they helped cut in November, it was almost nice enough
for a yo-yo, but I had my long straight skis and passed on the temptation.
Getting around Searsburg Station was also skied by everyone, despite the
thin cover. The water crossings were not a problem. We had to look out
for flying slush on the short Rt 9 road walk. I saved my faceplant for
the last few yards getting down to the cars, about 3:30pm.
02/13/2014 SNOW! There is some warming coming late next week, but I think we are not going to have to worry about conditions for this trip. We have about 12 folks signed up, please check the Participants page to see if you are signed up, paid up, waivered up.
02/17/2014 SNOW! A friend and I skied from Kelley Stand Rd (start of Sec 5) into the GMNF looking for a place referred to as "Tad River Glen - ski it if you can find it" (sic). We started out with freshly groomed snowmobile 'highway', ventured onto lightly-fluffed secondary sno-mo trail, then started skinning and trail breaking. This was the first time Peter had experienced 'whoomphing', when the "ground" drops and the saplings wiggle as the crust under the snow settles. The trail-breaking was easy, about 8" of fluff on a solid but not icy base. We (after some thrashing about and looking at maps) found the second seconday sno-mo trail that we needed that took us to the bottom of TRG. There was enough snow to get us off the rocks, but it needs about two more feet to get above the hobble bush. TRG has a fairly mellow slope, so the light fluff worked well for two laps, about 300' of vertical each. On my second descent a grouse exploded out of the snow just about under my skis! We skinned up to the top of the peak we were skiing on and skied back down a different aspect to the sno-mo trail, also good skiing, somewhat more varied terrain. On the summit we found three moose beds and Peter saw the moose through the trees. The trip back was easier than the trip up, although the skiing down where we had skinned up between the sno-mo trail sections was pretty brushy and face-slappy. We skied about 13 miles in 8 hours, with about 2500' of climbing all told. Alot of work for two short laps, but it was a beautiful day.
02/18/2014 RAIN! Guess I jinxed it. The current Wilmington forecast has 3" of new snow today, then rain and snow, then warming, then rain, then likely rain for Friday.
So while we will not have to worry about whether or not there is enough snow, we may have some crust issues on some days as the temperature crosses the freezing line. And it could be wet above the snow on Friday.
You are, of course, not obligated to ski in the rain if you don't want to, but please! let me know if you decide not to come: "If you decide to skip a day that you are signed up for, please try to call me before 8:00am at 413-624-0192 or 413-624-3953. After that, try my cell at 413 834 0274 (doesn't work when I'm home!)."
The remaining days look nice, but we may have to contend with frozen snow, not the nice fluff we have now.
Regarding carpooling, I know a bunch of you are coming from Brattleboro, and a bunch are staying at Thurber's and bunch at Binnick's.
Please note that if you arrive with a full car, you are of no help in the shuttle, and everyone must help in the shuttle.
Ideally you will have as many seats empty as full when you arrive, at worst you need to have one free seat to help shuttle another driver. I have plenty of room in my roof box for skis for one half of the day,
and I'm hoping someone else will have a pickup or large roof box for the other half of the day. The Brattleboro folks could consider leaving a car in Wilmington overnight on the first day, and using it for shuttles for Day 2 and 3.
Regarding dinner, we are a small enough group that I think we can wing it, at the end of the day we'll choose a place to meet for dinner.
Since some folks are coming from not-so-nearby homes and others are staying nearby, we may have a group that wants to meet, eat and go home, and another group that wants to go to their
lodging, change, relax and meet later for dinner, so we may be two groups.
We have about 18 folks signed up, please check the Participants page to see if you are signed up, paid up, waivered up, and that I have your dates right.
Please be sure you have read the relevant pages on this site regarding equipment, planning, etc.
02/21/2014 Day 1 Section 1 - Today was, for me, affirmation of my 'never cancel' policy. Despite the forecast for thunder, freezing rain and rain, four skiers joined me for today's ski, down from about twelve originally signed up. We had rain hats, pack covers and smiles. It misted, but never froze or rained or thundered. We had soft, easy skiing in two inches of wet, sleety snow on top of an old and collapsing crust. First we skied south to the Mass/VT border where we took the requisite pictures. The trip north, retracing our tracks for the first 1.5 miles, was even easier skiing, as we had pounded out the collapsing under-crust. The rest of the way was easy trail-breaking (at least for me, I was in the rear), there were tracks from a storm or two back. We had a quick stand-up lunch at the Tobey Brook bridge, no one wanted to tempt fate by dawdling. The Deerfield River valley was beautiful as always, if a bit misty. It never rained or thundered, temps just above freezing. We reached Harriman Dam before 2pm, for a quick 4 hour, 8 mile ski.
02/22/2014 Day 2 Section 2 - Today was, for me, affirmation of my 'always ski when it is sunny' policy. We were sixteen skiers heading north from Harriman Dam, in bright sunlight and above freezing temps. The most dangerous part of the trip was getting out of the cars at the un-sanded parking lot. We had a nicely set track with a few inches of corn snow for most of the morning ski, through a hardwood forest along the shores of Harriman Reservoir. We stopped for a sunny leisurely lunch at Wilder Brook, accompanied by the occasional 'whoomphing' of the crust collapsing under the weight of sixteen skiers. The rolling, then downhill glide to Medburyville was payback for the morning's steady but gradual climb. I got a few tele-turns in the uncertain crust and corn in my favorite Section 2 glade. We stopped for a muffin break at Medburyville, where some folks opted for a road walk ("The better part of valor is discretion") but no one opted for the bail-out car. The skiers variously thrashed their way down and up the next tricky section, I got in my daily face-plant. The new short Medburyville North reroute was good for a few tele-turns, we cut it wide last fall since it is a bit steep. A few folks were dragging by the time we got to the short Rt 9 road walk and back to our cars, but everyone seemed to be glad to have been out skiing in the soft snow and warm sun.
02/23/2014 Day 3 Section 3 - It seems no one paid attention yesterday afternoon when I told them how today's ski could be very crusty, icy, fast and scary. Luckily, they all came because we had a great ski! Trail Chief Tim was our day leader, it quickly got above freezing, we skied up hill, everyone got to do some light-weight trail-breaking and experience the 'whoomphing' of the settling crust. Seven eager skiers got to spot the return cars and chase the eleven leisurely skiers, who packed out a great trail for the eager skiers, who caught them just at lunch time. It was nice to see that everyone had figured out how to handle the dipsy-dos and to watch out for the group as a whole. A well-oiled-machine! One 'machine' did get a bit low on fluids but was quickly back on her feet. 7.5 miles, five hours for the first group, four hours for the chasers.
Jim Goodine's pictures
If anyone else wants to share pictures, send me the link and I'll post them.
02/24/2014 Day 4 Section 4 - So Friday we had rain, pack covers and rain hats, Saturday and Sunday we had warmth and sun, ball caps, barehands and t-shirts. So naturally we needed a blizzard for Monday. This was actually fortunate as the new 4" of powder were welcome on top of the rather crunchy result of the freeze and thaw. But the twenty degree drop in temperature and snow-filled wind was a bit of a shock as we headed south from Grout Pond. The wind reduced the temptation to get right out on Somerset Reservoir and skip the tricky trail skiing along the reservoir shore. Sometimes skiing along the edge of the reservoir felt like skiing on the edge of the world, to our right was just a white howling emptiness. We managed the missing bridge near the north end of the reservoir, and the dreaded drifts were not significant. Trail-breaking was minimal, although once we reached the reservoir there were no signs of previous skiers. This tour often features a leisurely, sunny lunch on the 'beach' halfway down the reservoir, but today we opted for a quick stand-up lunch in the shelter of the spruces. We managed to overcome our only (I think) equipment failure of the tour when a 20-year-old three-pin boot toe split. Section 4 involves (I think) the longest CT shuttle, usually we solve this with a key swap, but with only ten skiers we decided to keep the group together. Via some complicated pre-planning we had already left two cars at the base of the dam yesterday, and were able to get everyone out and back to their cars without incident. More snow was falling as we returned to Grout Pond for the morning's cars.
02/25/2014 Day 5 Section 5 - Cancelled.
The 2014 Southern Four Day Tour by the numbers:
5 - Days scheduled in the Four Day Tour 1 - Days cancelled 5 - Fewest skiers per day 2 - skiers skiing all four days 18- Most skiers per day 1 - Days of skiing in the rain 2 - Days of skiing in the sun 1 - Days of skiing in blizzard conditions 4 - Inches of new snow 1 - Trail-side blister treatments 1 - Skier getting an EKG (she's fine) 3 - Pre-tour group breakfasts 3 - Post ski gatherings 5 - Trail Chiefs responsible for Sec 1-4 49 - skier-days 35 - trail-miles covered 10 - approximate height, in feet, of drop-off that 'someone' skied off of into a stream bed 17 - bridges crossed 1 - bridges skied under 6 - couples on the tour 3 - skiers on the tour who have already skied the CT end-to-end 8 - skiers who hadn't joined a CT tour before this year 18 - years since one skier's last ski tour 186 - or more, emails to set this trip up These things are all zero (as they should be): * lost skiers * people who couldn't find the trail-head * skiers who told me (they might have kept it to themselves) that they weren't having fun * evacuations These cannot be (and should not be) counted: * Falls. * Laughs. * New Friends. * Times someone said "This is so beautiful!" * Pounds of gear carried. * Pounds of delicious goodies shared on the trail. * Hours spent drying wet gear. * Hours spent coordinating this tour. * Appreciative comments.
More pictures:
Mark Hyer's pictures
Marie Bartlett's pictures
Thanks to all of you for your company, your indulgence in my desire for breakfasts in diners, your support of the Catamount Trail, your good humor and your enthusiasm for this sport.
