Despite the warm weather, conditions at Ski Liberty are the best they’ve been in years - literally. Ski Liberty has 100% of its terrain open (yes - even the half-pipe!) All the trails have a good strong base of snow.

On Saturday, Adventure Alley was open with machine groomed bumps on the upper portion. These bumps are perfectly spaced and just right for practicing technique. After hitting these for a few practice runs, I hit the bigger, less regular bumps on Eastwind. Upper Eastwind has obviously had some expert skiers come through. Rather than the usual long icy slide to the first bump, there was actually a line cut through from nearly the top. Taking that line down skier’s right put you in some nicely shaped large moguls.

With the temperatures in the low 40’s, the bumps gave enough to give even some of the more timid bump skiers confidence through the steeps. The lower half of Eastwind was even better with lots of lines cut through from edge to near edge. One note of caution, the lines through lower Eastwind tend to flow to the right requiring you to switch left halfway through.

Upper and lower Strata were quite occupied. Seems I wasn’t the only one that missed skiing that trail! But there was still plenty of room to carve huge S turns. The good news is that skiers and boarders were more spread out over the rest of the resort with none of the usual traffic nightmare at Heavenly. In fact, Heavenly was just that - lots of powder, manageable skier traffic and plenty of room to carve! Upper and lower Ultra were also in great condition with real powder on skier’s right.

For beginners and those less adventurous, Ski Liberty has set up two “Family Ski Zones” on Whitney’s Way (formerly Be Happy) and Don’t Worry. The family ski zone signs at the beginning of these trails are huge so you can’t complain you didn’t know if you get nabbed by Ski Patrol for skiing too fast. Lots of snow on both trails.

On a side note, Ski Liberty did have a race course set up on Whitney’s Way on Saturday. Doesn’t make much sense to me - putting a RACE course on a Family Ski Zone slope where you need to go SLOW. Family zone skiers will want to note that on those race days, a good half of Whitney’s Way is closed off. Beginners and lower intermediates will also enjoy Dipsy with full coverage beyond edge to edge (remember not to ski behind the snowmaking equipment!) and Sneaky Pete open. There’s also the First Class Skier area with the widest trail and the most gradual slope at the area. This is perfect for first time skiers. In fact, a friend of mine who tried skiing for the first time had a blast up there - he’ll definitely be back. (Hi Mike!)

As for the rest of the Front side, Blue Streak and White Lighting are both open. Blue Streak is, by far, my favorite with plenty of snow edge to edge and the best snow on the skier’s left. White Lighting still has the lip where you can catch some air on the way down. Unfortunately, there wasn’t as much of the softer white stuff on this trail.

With temperatures expected to cool off later this week, skiing should remain fun for a long time yet!