I headed out to Timberline around 630 Sunday morning with two friends to get at least one day of skiing in before I depart for Senegal (where there is NO snow or mts.) in early January for study abroad for the spring semester. We arrived at the mountain a little after 10, purchased our $17 lift tickets and headed down to the lift. Unfortunately, I had not been able to find my snowpants, gloves, hat or goggles before I left so I was a tad cold on my hands. Salamander and that whole side of the mountain were dark and fairly cold for most of the morning. We ended up spending most of our time on Dew Drop which had some great jumps on the right side where you could also meander through the woods. The snow was in great shape, good cover and not too sticky or loose in any one spot. No lift lines and a bright sunny day made it all in all a great day. Off the Wall was somewhat icy on the humps, but manageable (only fell once). Snowmaking was going on on Twister which was still closed. I snuck past the closed signs to take a peek, but the piles of snow made it hard to see. I would say it is narrower than Dew Drop though, but will really make the mountain feel bigger (kind of opens up that whole side). Pictures are available here .

Thanks for the report. Your photo link didn't work for me. Good luck in Senegal. My daughter will leave in a few weeks to study abroad for the semester in Madrid.

Thanks for letting me know-try this:

http://community.webshots.com/user/kahuna613

Its the last album.

I was at tline yesterday also and can say it was some good skiing . It was good enough coverage to ski "everywhere" with rock skis. The drop looked awesome. Kudos to tline for puttin up the wands to blow snow there and get it open this year. They still had a little more work to go on Twister and the Drop, so it will probably be the end of the week. It didn't seem that crowded either. Maybe had to wait at most 2 chairs to hop on the lift. Also not quite sure what was going on with the bear claw terrain park under the lift. They had 3 big mounds of snow blown, but hadn't done anything with them yet. Funny thing seen so the lift ridin up : Somebody came and launched one of the mounds and way cleared the other side, landed on the flat and ate it good. He got up and recovered his skis and went on but everyone on the lift was giving him a hard time.

Dave