Another good day
One thing about Scottish skiing is that it's never monotonous !
Winter gear was back on today after only needing a light fleece on Thursday and the heavy wet snowpack had hardened and was covered with snow of icing sugar texture.
Coronation wall was being groomed as we headed down after the lifts had shut. Photos here [www.winterhighland.info]


Helen

Slightly off topic but had a great 22km tour today starting and finishing in the ski area. Skinned to the summit and headed off down Coire Raibert to Loch Avon, over to Beinn Mheadhoin and a fantastic descent down the W facing Coire Buidhe. Continued on to Carn Etchachan and had a couple of laps of an E facing gully in perfect spring snow conditions. Finished the day with a run down the Cas Headwall as the Piste Basher was heading up Coronation Wall.Plenty of sunshine throughout the day and even a May blizzard on the plateau to remind us that winter is still here



^ Dave A heading off the summit of Beinn Mheadhoin into Coire Buidhe


^Enjoying the second lap of a great little gully on Carn Etchachan

A casual observation yesterday was that there seemed to be a very high proportion of people with day tickets on the mountain, compared to the often stated claim that only season ticket holders ski this late in the season.

Just had a look at the stats for WH and the previous 2 weeks up to and including Saturday 5th May, 90% more pages were served to 67% more absolute unique visitors than the same two week period in the 2010 season.

Just for the record (a bit more 'archivable' than Facebook) ... CML have just posted this dramatic image of the first-ever pisting of the Coronation Wall ...

In their words ...

"Need a new piste map, to include the "Coronation Black Run"
Winch was pulling 3.7 tonne.
Good Job"

well if it is pisted it is included in the uplift ticket, therefore expect a ride to top on a skidoo or pistie

The pisted line on Coronation Wall is accessible with a traverse across the Summit Path from the Ptarmigan Tow.

I like the look of it, but having not skied it yet Im wondering if its like the pisted section of the Ptarmigan traverse; looks great in pictures but is actually incredibly short and takes an age to get back to the top.

But then again thats probably me just being me

Did anyone ski it today? How quick did it soften up, did it soften quicker than the white lady side, or later in day? I presume Cas is still 1st area to soften up?

Off Topic

TUPP 99. YER EMAIL IS NOT WORKING

George

May skiing in Scotland just went up a level today....fresh snow overnight and blue skies made for fresh tracks over the back of Cairngorm, All slopes were good but S and SW facing slopes were in fantastic shape. A couple of cheeky gully descents down to Loch Avon added to the fun


^ Dave A heading for Loch Avon

Aye I skied it this morning. The rest of Coronation had set up very hard over night but the area between the poles was soft from the outset. It would be totally worthwhile to make a permanent feature - I'm sure it will have encouraged a lot of people who otherwise wouldn't have ventured down that way to do so.

The area groomed was very much the 'first right turn' towards the traverse once round the corner so skiers on that section didn't interact with those taking higher traverse routes or runs from the summit.

Difficulty wise it was probably equivalent to a steep-ish European red because it was about 4 groomed widths wide and rock free.

Wow ! another stunning photo Craig.

Regarding Coronation wall I skied it about 11am Glenogle and it had lovely pisted and new snow on a firm base.

Cammyammy,the traverse round from the Ptarmigan tow to reach it is quite long but the run is also longer than the Parmigan traverse and today you were able to cross the traverse and continue straight into the area between the traverse and 105.

Off piste today was fantastic with the overnight snow. Enjoyed it all but a definite top run within the ski area was way out to the east lady in the M2 direction and down to the lady

Three shots of coronation wall as I went down it in a snow flurry at 11 am attached

Helen

Attachments: Traversing round to Coronation Wall.JPG (48kB)   Top of the run.JPG (114kB)   Lower down.JPG (90kB)  

Thanks George!
HighRustler those are great pics.

Coronation wall was great - soft from first thing. All the offpiste was pretty good from early due to the layer of fresh on top. Spent most of yesterday lapping the ciste and ptarmigan tows to ski mutliple lines down the eastern side of the Ciste bowl. Best was probably to continue past the pisted run back to the ptarmigan tow and ski down in the general area where the posts for blocking of the start of the Ciste Gulley are. There was one narrow snow bridge across the stream to get back to the Ciste Tow. I was finding nice lines of fresh snow on a hard base all day.

Compared to last Sunday the resort was remarkably quiet - no long queues at all, so I'm knackered today as I got in a lot of runs. Carpark was full though and Colin said they'd sold about 700 day tickets. I did see a lot more people with day tickets and fewer season ticket holders than I usually see late season.

Looks like a good Holiday Monday with a light layer of fresh.






Edited 1 times. Last edit at 08.54hrs Mon 7 May 12 by alan.

Attachments: pt-2012-05-07.jpeg (46kB)