tseeb wrote:I have not experienced typical May weather for my trips to Mammoth this year and Fri/Sat of Memorial Day weekend 2011 when there were strong winds due to approaching storm.

As in 2011 tseeb left before the weather turned cooperative. In this case Saturday had ideal weather for spring skiing: some overnight freeze, not a cloud in the sky and steady breeze to retard the onset of slushy conditions.

I started on Chair 2 about 8:15. The lower half of Stump Alley was in corn mode already but it was firm elsewhere. So I ran a few laps there plus Mambo and one run on Powder Bowl, which has a similar NE aspect. About 9:15 I took the gondola up, thinking similarly exposed Cornice would be ready, but I never made it to Cornice. Observing a few skiers ripping on Climax, I knew I had to check that out.

The gondola had been closed midweek so the wide expanse here was smooth corn cruising top to bottom.

Skier’s right Climax from 9:30 to 11:30 was as good or better than the Paranoids Friday, and thus worth repeating 4 more times. The last two of those runs I continued down to chair 5, once via Dry Creek and once via East Bowl and Coyote.

Despite its unappetizing appearance I decided to check out Dave's Run.

This is the only major run up top that has been degraded by the sustained drought since New Year's. Historically Dave's is one of the best preserved runs, so I have no idea what caused this. Fortunately there was the one nice line where the 2 skiers are.

After a couple of runs on 5 I took one more gondola to Climax, this time cutting left to Saddle Bowl and reaching chair 23 about 11:30. This was close to the time 23 had opened Friday, so I headed out to Paranoid 2 and found it still in smooth corn mode. The racers were finally done, so next run I skied Drop Out 3 and then the untracked corn on World Cup back to 23. Then I headed out to Paranoid 1. The traverse through this notch was a bit rockier than Friday.


As I started down I met "powderpig" of Mammoth Forum, skiing P1 here from a slightly lower entry.


I showed him the high traverse to Paranoid 2, and then he took his last top run on Wipe Out 2.


Wipe Out 1&2 and the top of Drop Out 1 softened the last hour. Here's Drop Out.

Note there's a bump zipper line up here this year. Not for me when I'm already well past 30K for the day.

My final run up top was Wipe Out 1. I then took 1 to 3 and skied its face. As I suspected the grooming and salting was more intensive on the weekend. Lower St. Anton was salted around noon. A line down Stump had been salted not too long before I skied to the car.

I skied 8:15 to the 2:30 close, 35,750 vertical. The latter was highest of this season and highest lifetime day in any month of May. 14 runs off the top of Mammoth was probably a record too.