Whether you experienced a late start to winter in the home range or bopped from place to place, chasing good snow, a solid winter eventually arrived. Throughout our first season publishing The High Route, we’ve kept an eye on SWE (snow water equivalent). The more SWE, as the season evolves, the better the turn-making and the longer the ski/ride season extends. We hurled past the spring solstice last month. And now, almost mid-April, we are at peak SWE for some parts of North America. Meaning the snowpack may be diminishing. Of course, the vagaries of daily, weekly weather, albedo, and melting rate can bump max-SWE early or later. We prefer later.
The very general trend in the northern portions of the Lower 48 and portions of Canada are the colors we associate with the color wheel’s more alarmist and cautionary aspects: yellows and oranges. The northern swath of Washington, Idaho, Montana, and portions of Wyoming, southern BC, and Alberta are below (and maybe even way below) the percent median 1991-2020. The truth is, in some subbasins, the % below normal is significant enough that the snow sliding season may come to an earlier end than desired.
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