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Fun skiing in the woods of northern Vermont

Posted Sunday, March 5, 2023
— Backcountry skiing
Telemark skier makes a tele turn in some fresh snow
Skier makes a turn in some fresh snow
Spiky rime ice on small branch looks like barbed wire
Skier tries to move through a bunch of hobblebush

Sometimes you've just gotta bushwhack! But some of these bushes had been nibbled on by a moose!

Hallelujah, we have some snow! A look at the graph of the snow at the stake atop Mt. Mansfield has some good news: At that elevation, we are nearly catching up to the average snowfall for this time of winter!

The Skimeister and I got out and enjoyed the new snow in the woods here in northern Vermont. We earned our turns on Saturday and Sunday. Now we're pretty darn tired — and isn't that a great feeling!?!

One of the fun things about going off-piste is that you often come across evidence of wildlife. We again found signs that a moose had been in the area that we explored.

While bushwacking our way through some hobblebush that we couldn't avoid, I noticed the tips of the branches had been nibbled off. I thought, "Maybe this is the day we'll see a moose while skiing." Alas, it was not.

We also found gorgeous rime ice on the braches of hardwood trees at about 1,800 feet in elevation. It looked like barbed wire. When I went to nibble on some, it was rather prickly!

The new snow was not very fluffy at these mid-elevations. However, our fat skis made it fun to surf our way down. Yippee!

Hope you are getting out on the snow while it's here! Carpe ski ’em!

 

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