Fun snow, epic springtime weather, and great vibes made St. Patty’s day at Palisades a blast today.
This blog was written by Ryan Williams.
It was a fun day of following the sun to find the stashes of good snow. From laps on KT22’s Saddle and Rock Garden to Broken Arrow’s South facing slopes. Today’s conditions were an absolute blast ripping the corn, groomers, and side stashes.
We started the afternoon by taking a few laps on KT. The ride up is pretty fun these days with the awesome views of the filled-in terrain and the 3 spots where the lift almost touches the slope. Big thanks to mountain ops and patrol for digging these areas out to keep the lift rolling. At the top, we headed out to the Saddle, following the afternoon sun.
The snow on the Saddle ridge had warmed up by noon and was fun spring-like. Looking up at Headwall, it’s amazing to see how massively filled in the terrain is after this past storm cycle. Dropping into the groomers on the Saddle, the snow was a bit icy on the roll-in, then super edgeable, fast, and smooth all the way down. The terrain they groomed is amazing this season, with so many new zones to cruise. The snow was getting better with each lap in the afternoon sun. The Rock Garden zone opened after it softened up a bit, at around 2:30pm – the snow was smooth in the sun.
Broken Arrow
After yesterday’s scoring session in Broken Arrow, we had to head back there today to check out the great corn snow. The sun was baking the south-facing slopes well and the conditions and terrain were looking awesome. We jammed over from Big Blue to the Broken Arrow hike. It was mellow today, with fewer people than yesterday which was a nice treat. At the top, the pano view was incredible today.
The conditions all across the bowl were awesome, smooth, and soft with just a few tracks. We headed out the traverse to score one of our favorite chute zones. At the drop-in, it was wild to see how filled in this zone has become. The south-facing snow was silky smooth corn – dreamy spring conditions. From mid-way down, we had a blast riding the filled-in gullies, with north-facing chalk turns and the southside with corn spring turns. Broken Arrow was riding the best of all zones today with its awesome conditions and amazing terrain. Hyped to get there for more tomorrow.
Closing Bell on KT22
With the longer days and sunshine, we headed back to KT22 for the closing bell lap in the sun. The Saddle and Rock Garden were riding even better than earlier in the afternoon. It was so great to see so many friends out in the sun, smiling and celebrating St. Patty’s day shredding on the slopes.
