I am literally not in the same league as you telemarkers. :o
Anyway, I’ve hit the slopes every weekend since Christmas here in New England: Wachusett, Okemo, and Mount Snow so far. I’ll be going back to Wachusett this weekend with my son and some other friends. We’re all intermediate skiers. I’m planning to work on my technique: more carving and less skidding.
Next week I head out to Park City!
Also have overnight trips booked for Sunday River in Maine, Stowe in Vermont, and Pats Peak/Mount Sunapee in New Hampshire over the course of the next six weeks.
Headed to Bolton Valley backcountry on Saturday. Not sure yet about Sunday, maybe MRG if the snow reports are good. Looks like VTah got some good dumping today and maybe some more tomorrow.
Last weekend plans were cancelled, by wife was too sick to head out and the cold temps would have set back her recovery for weeks.
This weekend looks like snow in the forecast, especially for Sunday. I floated the idea of skiing Sunday/Monday at Jay Peak since that would give us the most skiing in the best snow, but I just glanced at the forecast high temp for Monday, -7. Ouch.
Kirkwood on Sunday - gorgeous weather, excellent coverage, busy but not horrible lift lines. Legs screaming after each lap by the end of the day. It’s dumping hard in the Sierras all this week - expected 2-4+ feet by Friday, with the main storm hitting this evening thru tomorrow (packing 80-100 MPH winds along the ridges and peaks). Winter has arrived! Powder Alert for Friday!
Park City was great…spent most of our time on the Canyons side. They are having a great year for snow this season, and we hit it just right. They got 34 inches of snow while we were there, including 21 inches on Friday (1/19). I had a little difficulty getting used to skiing in actual snow (as opposed to the typical hard pack of New England), but was getting more used to it by the time I left. I hit the hot tub each night, and got 3-4 inches of snow in my flip-flops one night!
Last weekend I went to Sunday River in Maine, and it was also great, but completely different conditions. Back to cold, icy, rock hard slopes. Temps were mostly in the single digits, with highs in the teens. Pretty fast conditions, but had to take frequent breaks avoid frostbite on toes and fingers. Also hit the hot tub each night…it was so cold out that my beer got colder the longer it sat, and my glass of ice water froze completely solid.
This weekend my son and I are taking a day trip to Killington in Vermont. It’s also supposed to be very cold.
Heavenly got about 36" overnite and looks like they didn’t even bother to try to some upper lifts dug out.
I’m watching the web-cams, and they are just now (1:30pm) starting to think about beginning to dig out Comet Chair. Didn’t get Dipper running till around Noon-ish. On a Sunday. :rolleyes:
I stayed home. Didn’t want to fight for parking, and the wife took the AWD Little Red Shit Car.
What happens when the recent unpleasantness of repeated winter storms results in very firm but ice free skiing on the best GS pitch between the Rockies and the Laurentians? 48,750 vertical feet of hard charging tele turns today. Wheeeeeee!
Yeah, over the past 2 weekends; the highways closed, the resorts closed, due to weather. I was able to get up to Heavenly on Thursday and enjoyed one of those perfect days. If these storms woulda hit during the week it may have been better for the resorts, but the weekend closures are probably not helping their bottom line. As long as it stays cold, the snow should last a while tho.
I like the snow-stake video in the above link - watch it for the last week. It’s interesting how the snow melts/compresses between storms. The one for Northstar nearly broke (starts leaning).
Just got back from Stowe in Vermont. First time I’ve ever skied there.
Conditions on Saturday weren’t great due to high winds, and most of the lifts (including the gondola) were shut down. The wind made the below-zero temps feel even colder, and the line got pretty long at the one lift still running. It worked out OK, though – after I took a break to warm up, the crowd had cleared out.
The winds died down overnight, and Sunday was fantastic. I skied over 25K vertical feet in 4-1/2 hours. Conditions were “firm and fast.” According to my ski tracking app, I had a sustained speed of 41.5 mph on one run, and a top speed of 47.3 mph, which are both personal records for me.
The town was nice, too. We had dinner Saturday night at the Trapp Family Lodge.
Holiday weekend, been shut down entirely or mostly for a few days due to wind and dumpage. They get opened up today (Sunday), still a little windy and snowy, but reasonable.
Power Outage! Shuts down the Nevada side around 1pm. :smack: Oh, The Humanity!
Maybe tomorrow? Not for me. I’m Blacked Out, I think.
Thanks! At my wife’s suggestion, we’re actually going back to Stowe in two weeks, so maybe we’ll be able to try out your suggestion.
Planning to head to Okemo tomorrow for a day trip. Hopefully the drive isn’t too bad – snow is supposed to start around midnight, but only 1-3 inches are predicted. The drive is around 2-1/2 to 3 hours each way.
We deep-sixed our plans for a Canada ski trip - expect 4 niece/nephew weddings this summer to eat up a chunk of our travel/vacation budget. But we were feeling restless, so we decided to book 5 days at Deer Valley. Enjoyed it so much last year when we went w/ 2 of our kids and their SOs - wife and I decided to do it again, just the 2 of us - last week in March. Going whole hog - staying at the Goldener Hirsch. So looking forward to it!
Had a great day at Okemo in Vermont yesterday. It was a long drive for a day trip, but road conditions were pretty good at least.
It was a light wintry mix as I left Connecticut yesterday morning, but it had turned to light snow by the time I hit Vermont. It snowed throughout the day, until the sun came out by mid-afternoon. A guy I talked to who had been there the whole holiday weekend said that Monday was the best day – best snow conditions of the weekend, and the crowds were pretty low, too.
Due to the fresh snow, it was getting pretty chopped up by the end of the day, but I was pleased that I handled it just fine. (I had a lot of trouble with this in the past.)
On the last run of the day, I ran into a big crowd of people heading back to the main lodge. The trail widened out with a mix of chopped-up crud and large patches of skied-off ice. There were bodies* everywhere. Still made it down with no issues – took the fall line straight down off to one side.
I sure hope you got on the slopes yesterday - the blackout was only Sat and Sun (at least with my pass).
We planned to go to Kirkwood yesterday but the road was still closed at Carson Spur, so we just headed up toward Lake Tahoe thinking Heavenly. Amazing, massive amounts of snow along the roads. As we passed Echo Summit we contemplated just going to Heavenly as it would have been epic to see the Lake from the upper mountain with that much snow around, but decided to venture around to Kirkwood, thinking with the Spur closed the holiday crowd would be less.
We were treated to an almost dream-like day! The drive over Luther Pass and Carson Pass was spectacular - every needle, every branch, in every stand of trees totally coated. The meadows were pristine. At Carson Pass the visitor center literally buried. At Kirkwood it was like a weekday - while there were people around - plenty of open space on the slopes. In the AM the air still frosty and the east wind blowing and re-organizing the powder for us, along with keeping snow crystals aloft with the sun shining thru them. Never got above 20F.
Altho we rolled the dice on the Spur being open for our return trip to the west in the afternoon, it was still closed - but we got to drive back thru that incredible landscape again as the sun was lowering. An incredible day!
Stayed home Monday. But today was beyond belief. 99.599% perfect conditions (for me).
Nice packed powder moguls, sunny, not too cold, no wind, no crowd, perfect parking, good drive up, good drive back. Just under 30k vertical feet, found a wad of cash (who loses cash skiing? ), rescued some idiot’s snowboard that got loose down the face, brought it back to the top for them…
All fun and games! Home in time to takes the dogs out in the Jeep. Had a few beers.
Why bother at this point?
If these storms woulda hit during the week it may have been better for the resorts, but the weekend closures are probably not helping their bottom line. As long as it stays cold, the snow should last a while tho.
Guy in the black jacket.