day 44. skiing. sunday river. 1/25.

rain and lots of it. i was tired from snowboarding the last two days so i skied. the heavier rains were supposed to come in later. it had been raining and freezing all night. i did south ridge and spruce first and headed down american express planning on cutting over to the top of the chondola. the top of american express had a coating of ice over the surface but by the time i reached downdraft to cut over it was a little softer and i could actually get a bit of edge in. i was getting wet but not out of control wet. the mountain was clearly going to take a beating before it was all said and done. after the chondola i cut around behind the north peak lodge to polaris and sensations to get to aurora. i was supposed to cover richard's break at the aurora side of #13 since jordan was broken down and he was over there. #13 is a rare two-way lift but they weren't loading toward jordan so richard was actually in the shack not loading chairs. because of the rain he wasn't going anywhere and that shack isn't big enough for two people. so i headed up aurora to get the other richard's break. then i flew down kansas, light's out, downdraft and grand rapids to get to barker. sergio actually rode down so i tried to dry my out layers off in the shack. from there i went to the top of #9 where the shack was leaking so bad drying anything wasn't much of an option. then over to #11 which while leaky as well had enough bungies to hang most of my stuff up. i wasn't looking forward to heading up white cap and was pleasantly surprised to find they had shut it down before i got there. by now i pretty much was the only person left skiing anywhere. since #10 was closed i took #9 to head back. i cut over to lower monday mourning which was actually pretty good. the barker basin was practically a lake by now. a straight shot to easy street was out of the question. i went to the left of the lift and around then flew down easy street and across south ridge and in. i survived. it was great to be in. i actually did avoid the worst of the rain. the mountain did take a beating, as did the bethel winterfest set-up. thank god sunday river has such kick-ass grooming and snow-making capacity.