Do you ever have a moment when you are so grateful for a good fortune that you question what you could have possibly done to deserve it?

I had one of those today as I swooshed to a stop at the bottom of Mexico. I had just floated almost effortlessly down a perfectly spaced tree line through powder so soft and deep I wasn’t really skiing it, so much as just aiming my toes during a weightless fall. At the bottom: three smiling faces of good friends who’d just had the same epiphany. Could we all be so lucky? The answer is simply, YES. Four inches of fresh FLUFFY powder fell overnight, to my surprise. We’ve had fresh snow all week and a killer powder day Tuesday, but in the 24 hours in between, the storm howled with a vengeance.

Evidence of yesterday afternoon/evening’s high winds was easy to spot this morning.

Check out that rime ice! But aside from the evidence of some serious storminess, there’s also a positive signal here:

The howling winds came in from the West, which means for the most part, they blew straight UP the front side.

The upper slopes were ultra smooth this morning, and with that fresh down-comforter coating…

Smooth, easy turns. Even better – the sun broke through for a while this morning, illuminating the powder paradise with a warm backlight.

As smooth and forgiving as those open slopes were, they didn’t really compare to the places where the snow had drifted and settled.

Add a dash of steepness…and the right amount of gravity…

…and you get nothing but pure, unadulterated, powder love.

– April

Oh yeah, the forecast looks bomber, too: check out this link and clear your schedule.