My friends and I decided to go hit the slopes after a dismal 2004/05 winter season, even though historically for us, opening days/weekends have sucked (in the past, we've had lots of injuries and damaged snowboards and skis from hitting rocks and trees).The only place open in Washington this past weekend was Crystal Mountain. I always thought of it as a skiers mountain, maybe because I went there mostly when I skied a lot, but mainly because they never really got into making decent halfpipes and terrain parks.
Nevertheless, the terrain there is always fun whether I'm on ski or board.
The drive up there only took 1 and a half hours from Bellevue. I was shocked when we pulled into one front row parking spots around 7:30 AM. There was a helicopter above and you could hear a lot of avalanche control being done. I was excited, expecting no crowds and lot of snowboarding.
We paid $45 for our lift tickets, which was a discount from the $50 regular price, so our first instinct was that there were "preseason" conditions. But thankfully we were wrong. The conditions were amazing. Not a single rock or tree branch showed through the groomed terrain, and there was powder to be had in a lot of places.
On the downside however, I don't think Crystal has a full staff yet. They only had 4 or 5 lifts operating all day, the average wait time was 45 minutes to get on a lift (until about 2:30 PM when things really died down), and they had no shuttle service running all day. There was even a long line that ran alongside the entire lodge to get lunch.
I think Mt Baker opens on Tuesday. I might go up there midweek to avoid the crowds, and then next weekend I might take the dogs up to Snoqualmie so they can play in the snow.
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