Skiers make the best of a winter bust. And there’s always next season.

Just days before 70-degree temperatures hit Eugene last Saturday, March 14, Willamette Pass waved the white flag on what has been a bummer of a snow season.

“Due to unseasonably warm temperatures and deteriorating conditions, Willamette Pass is suspending operations until further notice,” the resort said in a release. “While the lifts won’t be spinning for the moment, we are keeping the mountain set up and our team on standby in case of a spring miracle.”

It would be some miracle.

It was an undeniably rough winter for those who spend their time on the slopes. The three-month stretch between December and February tied 1934 for the warmest on record in Oregon. Snowpack has hovered around 30% of normal, meaning even the good days brought limited runs and little powder.

“I feel like the morale is getting bad,” Willamette Pass ski patrolman Ian Doremus told Lookout in February. “We patrol because we want to be needed. We want to be useful. The whole team of us coming up for one or two chairlifts operating — it just didn’t feel like we were being used to our potential.”

So they adjusted. Shifts were reduced. And on the days the mountain did open, extra planning was required — fewer runs meant fewer options to safely transport injured skiers down the mountain.

They made do with what they had, said Doremus, a 17-year veteran of the patrol, and the rest of the Oregon ski community did what they could to adjust.

Despite it all, South Eugene High School Nordic ski coach Erin Moore described her team’s season as “great.” In her second year leading the program, Moore guided her team through a winter that ended with a trip to the state meet at Mount Bachelor.

She won’t sugarcoat it: It’s been a bad snow year. But Nordic skiing relies heavily on dry-land training, and her team adapted by traveling farther to find snow — Moore said two of their meets this year moved from the closer Hoodoo Ski Area to Bachelor Nordic.

 They also just enjoyed the time they had being outdoors.

“For the ski team, we are teaching flexibility and skills for being comfortable outside in all kinds of weather,” Moore said. “We can make the best of what we do have, and are truly grateful to just be outside in these forests in the wintertime.

“Every year is a little different — even within the year. Within any season, we have a lot of different conditions. So yes, it’s extreme, but it’s still within the range of variability.”

That variability is what gives Doremus some optimism, even after a difficult winter.

A Colorado native, Doremus went 16 years without skiing while living in the Midwest before moving to Oregon and returning to the mountains.

“It gave me the opportunity to pursue this dream I’ve always had,” he said.

Yes, this year was a bust. But that’s skiing — a sport defined by its ups and downs.

“Looking at the positive side of things, we had an exceptional year last year. We were open more days than we’d been open in recorded history for the resort,” Doremus said. “I’m optimistic to get back into it next year and sort of have a reset and start fresh.”