indiggio

With all the Camelback talk about skiing in May, just had to get my first day of May skiing in too. With the shitty snow year, only Brighton and Snowbird are left standing, with next week being closing for both. Brighton was luring people up with $40 lift tickets. Since I still had IKON passes to use and the wife with only a new IKON, we decided to head up for some fun. Arrived at the lot at 9 since they’re not opening until 10 with temps in the upper 50’s and only a few clouds. Out in the sun it felt far warmer. The wife is still getting used to the terrain out here, so we just lapped the park which is pretty much the entire Mount as they have features everywhere. By 1pm, the place was packed with park skiers and it was getting spicy trying to avoid so many of them bonking off anything available. Hung out in the parking lot for a while for a couple of beers. Overall a fun day skiing in May, which is probably what I’d been doing back in PA.

They had the engineers in the cab with a PA answering questions from the crowd about the locomotive, pretty interesting to hear all about it.

Since the Union Pacific Big Boy 4014 locomotive is making a tour https://www.up.com/about-us/history/steam/big-boy-4014 and is stopping over up in Ogden, just a short ride from here, I couldn’t pass up the chance to see it up close and in person and also spend a day in the town. Stopped at the Hill Aerospace Museum on the way up which was unexpectedly huge. After checking out all the trains and museums that were free this weekend, stopped for a beer and then dinner at the Prairie Schooner Steak House for an interesting dinner setting and a Chikfila balloon cruising the Wasatch.

Can't beat free!

Solitude's attempting to get more people to come up, so they did away with parking reservations for the rest of the year. Nice having the car to shed clothes, lunch, apres, etc. She wasn't really mentally prepared to get out yet, but since I got her an IKON and it was gonna be a nice, warm day, decided to go out.

We’re back from another fun day at Solitude. Got the wife an IKON to force her to ski, so we rolled up to Solitude to pick up her pass and get her first under the gun. They were even giving out free waffles! Arrived at the lot at 9:15 with temps in the upper 40’s. Hit the ticket office to get her pass printed and booted up. The snow was super soft already and many out in shorts and short sleeves. Had the wife lap the Link to get her ski legs back. The snow was buttery cream cheese hero snow. What few clouds there were upon arrival were now gone and temps climbed into the 50’s. Did a few laps on the Moonbeam and her legs were shot, not having skied much this year and the heavy snow didn’t help. Out in the parking lot the temps rose into the 60’s under bright sun. Lots of tailgating and jocularly going on in the parking lot, there was even a graduation party going on. By the time we got back to the house, it was already 80’ out. Just another day in paradise…

Reminds me of Turtleman…

Yes. The canyons' resorts are good due to their altitude and got more snow over the "winter" to help them along. All the others are lower, so ended up with rain and had to deal with the warmth. Just saw this article about the cause of the warmth. https://cah2oresearch.com/2026/03/17/the-diabatic-engine-behind-march-2026s-record-shattering-western-heat-dome/

Welcome to Utah!

I still have one and use it for the time. The thermo/barometer has gone wacky and thinks it's 90 degrees when it's actually in the 20's, thus making the altimeter way wrong and the run counter off. It's still handy to have the time available at a glance.

Will make for some nice spring slush skiing...

F'n summertime here...

It looks even worse now with not a lot of snow...

I want to get one of those trail signs, but they don't seem to have one in the shop.

I hear ya! I've not ventured into a number of areas since I'm typically solo and can't get a view from below to scope them out, so I have no idea what's lurking out there to get me into trouble. However, eventually curiosity gets the best of me and I go snooping...