Redemption Day
The past 2 days have seen PG and his great cobber - the equally legendary PGM, heading to the promised land at Whakapapa. A place where it is said good snow is as rare as lips on a chicken, and the numerous fossils in beanies drink too much of their own Kool-Aid….
PG tries not tot buy into the bias that exists between loyalists to both sides of this magnificent Maunga - after all it’s just one big as hill with snow on it. But with PGs DNA firmly in the Turoa domain he is a rarely seen rock hopping on these northern slopes, and yet there he was - the eternal ski optimist (or just a sucker for punishment ??).
Spring is a cruel mistress on Ruapehu as the warming temps can often quickly turn the slopes into a giant Mr Whippy zone, but if you’re lucky at Whakapapa you’ll get the early sun enabling the famous ‘spring release’ and although this phenomena can be as reliable as a pair of chocolate oven gloves on Xmas day, it is to be cherished whenever it presents itself. And today, my AJ blog homies, was THAT DAY.
Yes indeedy it almost pains me to admit it, but the glorious sunshine and warm temps today (14deg at the base) meant that Whakapapa was forgiven - at least temporarily, for all its past sins (of which there are many) and gave PG several of the best runs he’s ever had on Ruapehu. There, I said it.
This was largely made possible by the presence of local expert PGM leading the charge into numerous rarely skied stashes and knowing exactly which slopes would release first and which would turn to slush. It was a case of simple point & go skiing more or less wherever you wanted to because there was nothing white that didn’t give way as soon as you hit it. Nothing, nada, SFA. It was a day for the ages.
Today also saw PG clock up the significant milestone of his 46th day on his soon to be worthless lifepass so has now effectively skied one day free. He’s such a total bargain hunter - just ask PGW.
With rain forecast this weekend the fragile lower slopes on both sides are likely to get hammered and require downloading fairly soon but thankfully all the upper areas are still holding enough coverage to last a few weeks yet so hopefully we haven’t seen the end of ‘23 just yet.
Keep the faith homies.
What could possibly go wrong ?
Run of the day ‘expert’ level Front Page. Dicy traverse in but well worth it once established in the turns.
And there it is. Rain groomed, untracked spring release all to ourselves. Magnificent skiing. Yes really.
The curse of Whakapapa : thigh burning drag lifts. Protecting your place in the chaotic queueing system for these T-bars can be a bit like being the 3rd monkey on the plank to Noahs Ark and it just started raining…..