STORY BY KAREN BOSSICK

PHOTOS BY KATE DALY AND JEAN ENERSEN

A pandemic and what is likely record setting snow conspired Saturday to produce unheard-of lift lines at Bald Mountain on Saturday as skiers and boarders swarmed to Sun Valley Resort to play in 65 inches of snow that fell over a three-day period.

Baldy, which is known for its lack of lift lines, has actually had lift lines this year since skiers have not been riding four to a chair in an effort to achieve physical distancing during the pandemic.

Add all that snow and the lift lines reached lengths normally ascribed to other resorts. There were even lines of people at the bottom of Bald Mountain at 11 a.m.

The action was not limited to Bald Mountain.

Scores of cross-country skiers and snowshoers flocked to Quigley Nordic east of Hailey and Sun Valley Nordic, as families from as far away as Salt Lake City frolicked amidst pine trees frocked out in wedding gowns against the royal blue sky.

It was as if everyone had cabin fever after three days of watching non-stop snow.

As Ketchum resident David Hitchin noted: “We’re heading out today after three days as feckless panteufurs--old French guys who are in their slippers 24/7.”

Numerous slides occurred Saturday on Durrance, a popular backcountry ski area just north of Sawtooth National Recreation Area headquarters. The Sawtooth Avalanche Center also reported fresh avalanches in Croy Canyon near the Bullion-Democrat Divide and avalanches on Della Mountain and Patterson Peak overlooking Hailey, as well as a few slides along Highway 75 just north of Greenhorn Gulch.

There was also a slab avalanche in the Lake Creek drainage that ran over ski tracks.

On Baldy a handful of small slides spilled across the cat track between Au Jus and the Frenchman's lift on Saturday. The Sunrise Expansion area on Baldy remains closed until further notice after a slide deemed the longest in 30 years ran there.

Avalanche danger remains high.in upper elevations to considerable in middle and lower elevations as the new snow of the last few days is not sticking well to old snow surfaces, which consisted of crusts, surface hoar and wind-hammered ice.