Photo: Jason Abraham
Check out this letter sent to Unofficial via email last night. The people have spoked. Send us your opinions to this and anything else that’s on your brain.
On Monday January 31st Squaw experienced one of only 2 powder days that we’ll have in over 6 weeks time. I’d be bold enough to call these 2 powder days precious. Precious powder means a lot to us Squaw skiers who’ve impatiently waited a month for snow. These 2 powder days become even more precious when you consider that we aren’t forecasted to get any more new snow for at least 2 more weeks.
So, yeah, these 2 powder days were precious. Period.
I drove up from the Bay Area on friday in anticipation of the storm and even took monday off work hoping that Squaw would keep Granite and Silverado closed on Sunday then open them Monday and give us another shot at the precious powder. Things worked out as I planned. Granite and Silverado remained closed the entirety of Sunday. Then on Monday Granite opened and had the highest quality, deepest, most fun snow on the mountain. Because of the nature of the storm, the best skiing was on low angle rolling slopes. Where are the best low angle rolling slopes on the mountain with the best snow? They are on the skier’s left side of Granite Chief off the long traverse that heads out there.
On Monday morning the Granite chair opened right away but they kept that skier’s left side completely closed. Why? Because Squaw thought it would be a good idea to allow a film crew to video patrollers unnecessarily throwing bombs on Granite Chief Peak! All simply to get film of it. Not because the peak needed avalanche control (it had been done the previous day). Unbelievable!
Besides this act being wasteful, un-environmental, and dangerous to both patrollers and public – it was a huge downer for the skiers on the mountain who paid $90 to ski that day and who’d banked on Granite for our only good powder turns in a month. Squaw kept the skier’s left of Granite closed until 11am for no other reason than getting a video of guys throwing bombs that clearly could have been performed before the public was allowed on the hill at 9am. Many of Squaw skier’s I spoke with on Monday were very frustrated with this act.
All I have to say is – not cool Squaw, not cool.
