After a few days of overcast skies and snow the weather has finally improved. With sunny skies and light winds, Friday was a good day to do some back country skiing. Our original destination was near Forest Road 794 at about 8000 feet elevation. We were disappointed to find that even at these elevations much of the snow pack was lost a few weeks ago during the warm winter storm that brought rain to the area. So we went with our backup plan and drove up Snowbowl Road to the base of the ski area. We skied across the lower slopes to the Humphreys Peak Trail and began our climb — eventually leaving the trail and traveling through the trees to some great ski terrain.

Our first stop was the area known as “Flying Dutchman.” Enough snow had fallen in the past few weeks to finally cover most (but not all) of the rocks. We followed an uphill track and eventually caught up to some acquaintances that we had not seen in a few years. After a few minutes of chatting, they headed downhill while we continued up to the site of the WWII bomber wreck — located just below tree line. The snow was very good — but still a few rocks were poking up through the snow (or lurking just below!) to catch and damage ski bases.

We skied down across the bomber site and then into the trees returning to the top of Flying Dutchman. This is always a lot of fun as it is moderately-pitched, wide-open terrain with plenty of vertical descent from top to bottom. And, yes, we hit a few more rocks.

Finally, back into the trees and down the narrow Humphreys Trail — which can feel a bit like a bobsled run when it gets hard and icy. But today the snow was good.