1/2/12 Tremblant Conditions

[T360]

Late Night Apres Ski attached below in "Reply"

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Noon Hour Update: We were inaccurate on our traffic estimates,
we thought it would be fairly light, with a lot of folks traveling home
after the Holiday Weekend. You will still be able to find quiet zones
here and there, but it's actually a fairly busy day at some of the
Lift Loading Zones on the Mountain.

There's a fair line on the Gondola...

Web Cam Snap Shots Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

1.2.12.South.Base.Line.jpg (30.19 KiB) Viewed 3329 times

Almost No line on Flying Mile...

Web Cam Snap Shots Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

1.2.12.South.Base.Line.a.jpg (20.58 KiB) Viewed 3329 times

There does not seem to be more than about a 2-3 minute wait at the max
on the North Side.

Web Cam Snap Shots Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

1.2.12.North.Base.Composite.pic.jpg (325.01 KiB) Viewed 3328 times

Moral of this story... If you unexpectedly find yourself in a long
line at the Gondola, divert and go to the Flying Mile Quad, jump
onto the TGV and you'll be at the Summit before you'd be through
the Gondola line. Then descend on the North and Ski/Board there.
This brings up another time saver option which is eating at the North
Base to avoid the Summit Crowds.

By adapting and shifting, you can keep on moving with minimum delays
even when things are busy.

----------------- 7:39 A.M. Orig. Post --------------------

63(*) Open Trails on the Beautifully Snowy
4 sides of Tremblant!

The Summit Web Cam shows us exactly what we like
to see any Tremblant Winter morning... Fresh Snow!

All You Need To Know
About This Morning .

Web Cam Snap Shots Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

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Tremblant Mountain Operations and the Ski Patrol work together
to put the finishing touches on todays Open terrain right before
"First Tracks" gets under way. We love Sunny days, but we really
love Snowy days and looking at this view before setting off to the
slopes in the morning is all we need to see in anticipation of a
gorgeous, snowy, winter day.

This is going to start out being a phenomenal day of Skiing/Boarding
quality. The traffic should be relatively light and it may seem like it's
your very own private club as you cruise around, lap after lap on
exceptionally fine surfaces.

Due to the fact that the Base Level overnight temp's did see about an
8 hour thermal heat burp that was slightly above freezing, there may
be overtones of spring-like characteristics possible in some base level
sectors. We believe the Summit has not had that exposure, but we
feel there may be transitional and potentially slick zones mid-mountain.
Part of the confidence we have in projecting the very high overall quality
for this morning is due to the Web Cam evidence of the 'round the clock
work by Mountain Crews who we know will be doing their best to blend
in the best surfaces possible.

Tremblant Geophysical Theory du Jour:

Tremblant's Alpine surfaces do not always get effected by these
short overnight thermal events. It has been our observation over
years and decades that despite a few hours of nighttime "warm",
you get out on the Mountain and it seems like it never happened,
at least surface quality wise. We think the answer is "convection".
"Hot air rises", but equally important to us is that "cold air sinks",
so what that means is that when the base is at zero, but the Summit
is typically 3 to 5 degrees Celsius colder, the cold air from the Summit
levels, literally sinks and falls over the trail surfaces washing them with
a protective coating of cold air. It's the only reason we can think of
that could explain this phenomenon, and we've seen it happen on many
days similar to today.

Morning Ride Up The TGV

www.tremblant360.com Photo. All rights reserved.

1.2.12.PB.Morning.Ride.TGV.jpg (254.73 KiB) Viewed 3305 times

Safety Caveat:

At this early hour of 6:30 am, the base temps are right at Zero, but
during the course of the day, temp's should start to drop and by mid
afternoon, they could get down to -11C. Logically then, if there are
any moisture related elements to this mornings conditions, that could
and probably will see some "firming up" of surfaces. You will need to
stay alert and sensitive to these changes for safety.

One mitigating factor in this situation is "traffic". If there is sufficient
flow of Mountain User Traffic during the "firming" process, then to some
degree, that constant abrasion may help alleviate some hardness in
the top surface layers. Time will tell.

The rest of the weather story is the big, impending 1 or 2 day
deep freeze expected. Believe it or not, the Weather Network
is projecting an overnight low temp of -30C for tonight!!! Wow,
that's cool, actually, that's Cold! A bit of a kicker with that is the
possibility of a moderately brisk North-West wind coming up the
Mountain over the Nansen Sector. It's going to be interesting to
see how that develops.




63(*) Open Trails on the Official, Downloadable PDF,
Trail and Grooming status report,
Courtesy of http://www.tremblant.ca

Screenshot of Official, Downloadable PDF, Trail and Grooming status report, Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

Screen Shot 2012-01-02 at 8.16.07 AM.png (229.71 KiB) Viewed 3370 times

An Excellent Start To The New Year!
One more look at the Summit Web Cam
from early this morning. Such a pretty
little picture!

Web Cam Snap Shots Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

1.2.12.Summit.Snow.b.jpg (13.47 KiB) Viewed 3370 times

Links:

http://www.tremblant.ca

http://www.tremblant.ca/mountain/winter ... port-e.htm

(*) Understanding Trail Counts - http://alturl.com/n54py

http://www.tremblant.ca/mountain/trailmap-e.htm

http://www.tremblant.ca/galleries/webcams/index-e.htm

http://translate.google.com/translate_t ... =fr&tl=en#

http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weather/CAQC0360

Forum Index: http://alturl.com/r4cco

Bring Back The Memories... Research Future Visits...
If you would like to look up dates you visited Tremblant, or you
want to research days/weeks/months to visit, you can sample what
they look like historically, month by month, year by year.

GoTo: Archive, Search Reports by Date: Index: http://tinyurl.com/yktelmu

When reviewing dates from any of the past, numbered, archived pages,
you can use the "Previous Topic" or "Next Topic" buttons, located
screen far right, in upper date/message bar to scroll through sequential
dates, or use your browsers "back" button to stay on the selected index
page for non-sequential date reviews in either forward or reverse order.

There are approximately 6, 25 day Index pages per season.

( If You "Bookmark" the link above, it will always take you to the
First index page with the latest posts. That gives you an immediate,
current to 25 day past, review scroll of Winter Alpine Conditions by
consecutive date.)

.

[T360]

T360 Apres Midnight, Apres Ski...

Web Cam Snap Shot Courtesy of www.tremblant.ca

1.2.12.Summit.Sunset.jpg (19.24 KiB) Viewed 3142 times

Purple Sunset At The Lowell Thomas Summit

It's going to be....
Colder, but not exactly sure as the forecasts have been
changing as far as the precise number it will get down to.

Minus 23, Minus 27??? ...at those levels it won't seem much
different, compared to today, really freakin' cold!

...the temps have been slower to go down than the weather
models suggested they would back this morning. It was supposed
to be a lot colder at 11:00 P.M., but it looks like we may not be
falling quite as far as originally thought.

This quick little "Cold Snap" shouldn't last much more than 48 hours
and if they're right, the coldest part will actually be what we see
tonight, from which point it will take the balance of the 48 hours
to work itself back up to about -8 for a daytime high by Thursday.

There's a bit of natural snow in the mix, maybe as much as another
10Cm or about 4 inches, between now and the weekend.

With all the Mountain Ski/Board traffic, plus natural snow, plus
grooming, plus blown snow, we think the Alpine Trail Surfaces
should remain in very good condition.

We'll be putting a "Sharp Edges" caveat in tomorrows post because
of the rapid drop in temps that could cause the formation of icy sectors.

We get Banzai, MCA (North) back on-line and Fripp (South) added
to the list as well.

If you're at Tremblant tomorrow, dig out the layers tonight 'cause
yer gunna need 'em!

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