Tomorrow is another day. And with it, the promise or more snow, and, by default, increased SWE. The glass is half full.
I’m of the school that, as a backcountry tourist, we must embrace what some might call the dark side—mid-winter high pressure. In this high-pressure, sunshiny darkness, there is light. First, since, at least out West, not much recent powder has fallen (I hear you in the Tetons saying, “That’s not true. Winter is here”), a few things are making the backcountry kinda sweet.
Recently, on weekends, after a certain time, the local backcountry has seemed desolate. Thank you, NFL and NCAA football. Timing tours around playoff football is a great strategy. On Monday, the timing was perfect—I hit my line on the local volcanic crater around 3 pm, just in time for some solitude and peak soft snow. I saw a splitboarder and a skier slide toward some old-growth firs—other than that, the aforementioned solitude. The setting was the reward; the excellent corn snow on the south-facing slope I skied was the bonus for clinging to hope.
In the PNW, any old weather app has been displaying the same: back-to-back-to-back sun icons denoting clear views ahead and unlimited visibility. Which also means high pressure and no new snow. But that doesn’t mean bad touring. (See above.)
So, let’s check out the SWE maps and see where things stand. (We’ll look at the median SWE to eliminate low-snow and high-snow outliers and provide a visual of more typical winters.)
Starting off with the 50,000 foot view. Thank you NRCS.
Let’s take a look at AK. Truth be told, in and around the main population centers, like where Alex Lee resides, the trend is one of SWE emerging toward normal SWE—but not quite there yet.
Lots to see here in the southern portion of Canada’s excellent ski terrain, Washington, northen Idaho, and western Montana.
Oregon, despite the high pressure, looks good, while looking south to the Sierra, it looks like they might be playing some SWE catch up.
Let’s zoom in on the Sierra. Indeed, orange is not the color we’d like to see from a drought perspective or a fun-hog perspective.
Eyeing portions of Montana, Wyoming, and into Utah, it’s a mixed bag of SWE.
Green in the Rado and improving conditions in Utah having us believing that the tide is always rising.
