Jason215

Steamboat for CO standards has a pretty low base altitude. I’m a bit more surprised to hear Big Sky Resort can rain being that it’s about 300 miles further north and a little higher base. Lake Tahoe area can have such wild swings in weather. Either prodigious snows or rain or severe drought. I guess no ski area is totally immune to rain then in the lower 48. You must have had some epic days since you’ve lived in ski country for years. I did ski Grand Targhee once (while on a Jackson Hole trip) and the snow was amazing. Like floating on a cloud!

Well how about that!!! Now we just need a good foot plus of natural to cover up the ice. Not too much to ask for in VT in February.

Okemo seems to be on top of their game re: grooming and snowmaking. They have quite a bit of water capacity to make snow. Killington for example- though they claim 75% of trails have snowmaking- if you follow their snow reports- they are only able to blow snow on 5-8 trails per night. It would take them well over a week to cover most of the mountain assuming they had an artic blast and it was sub 20 the entire time. A guy told me once they just don’t have the water pressure to blast large chucks of the mountain simultaneously (like Okemo does). Also, re:your experience at Okemo- you went on a Wednesday- the snow does not get skied off as quickly as a weekend day- (much less skier traffic) so the tilled snow is able to last most of..if not the entire day. Not too many mountains around here have south facing slopes, but I agree that would change my guidelines somewhat. Especially for March/April spring skiing. 37 on a sunny March day with a southern exposure would be enough to melt the ice into spring conditions. Okemo is a really good mountain, they make the best of whatever the weather throws at them. My gripe with them is they can get really crowded on weekends. Killington is so big, there are plenty of mid/upper mountain lifts where you can escape the crowds. They need to get that South Ridge lift moving already, that’s probably my favorite part of the mountain.

I’ve skied Powder Mountain and Snowbasin, but would like to hit the Cottenwooods. Leaning towards Canada at the moment- with the favorable exchange rate- The thing that I like about Fernie and Big White is the accommodations and slope side village. But I’ve always wanted to ski Lake Louise/Sunshine. I love the Spectacular Scenery. When I skied Breckinridge and lodged there for a week, I got altitude sickness- I had to go to the oxygen bar twice. I didn’t have issues at Vail or Beaver Creek. For Telluride- staying at Mountain Village would give me issues, so yeah in town would be better. My favorite mountain thus far is Big Sky, beautiful place, no crowds- just friendly folk.

You have a valid point! If I wasn’t so snow starved this year plus being traumatized by the rain we got at Whistler up to the 6,000ft level, (temp then dropped and 3/4 of mountain was ice) I would not be as paranoid about rain. I know some of those places in interior BC got rain at the their at the same time.. I think Fernie was one of them and for sure Revelstoke. Usually Whistler does not rain above 4500 ft. Funny thing is, I have never ever heard of any rain at like a Vail, Telluride or Big Sky during the winter months. I wonder if they ever get rain. I know Lake Tahoe resorts can get rain up to 8,000ft via the “Pineapple Express”

Yellowstone Club is for the high rollers! LOL. Big sky was my favorite mountain out west. Got a group of friends together and rented a ski in/out Moonlight Mountain House. From the house, we had the option of skiing Big Sky or Moonlight Basin. Both were amazing. No lift lines or crowds whatsoever. Pristine place. I couldn’t get enough of just staring at Lone Peak. Such a jagged and sharp summit. The view from the summit was spectacular.

In my opinion, assuming there is no freeze/thaw issues, I think the conditions are close to ideal when the temps are between 25-30 (for nice powder/packed powder). Colder than that is perfectly fine, but you just might not be as comfortable. After a rainstorm and then a hard freeze, you want to ski in temps about 40-45 or so to make sure the icey hardpack melts. This would provide soft spring-like conditions- which in my opinion is the second best scenario. You don’t want to go skiing after a thaw or rainstorm and then a hard freeze and temps remain sub freezing- the whole mountain would be all ice and terrible conditions.

My group ( except for myself) has either never gone out West or only once. So anything out there compared to east coast would be amazing. Revelstoke sounds amazing, but since their base is very very low, I worry about getting Rained on like what happened to me at Whistler. I’ve dealt with enough rain this winter, here on the LI rainforest. I think Kicking Horse is prolly too intense. Mostly double blacks from Summit. (My sweet spot is single and some double blacks, but that is east coast standards. West coast would be more like blues and single blacks. I’ve skied a handful of out west double blacks (Whistler, Big Sky, Jackson Hole) but that was to say I did it, rather than enjoying myself while doing it. We’re east coasters who want an out West experience, doesn’t have to be untracked- hellisking-like. A few tourists won’t scare us off. Heck, I’ve skied Vail, but don’t remember any lift lines (must have been a weekday). What are your thoughts on LL, SV, Banff Vs Telluride vs Snowbird UT, vs Vail. also, have you ever hit Big white, Fernie, etc? It would be great to take advantage of the favorable exchange rate we got going in Canada. Sorry for the long ramble!

Good question. Group is a mix of skier and snowboarders. None of us are that hard core. ( I’m only hard core by LI standards). I get humbled real quick out West. The only side- country terrain I’ve skied was “The Dip” at Jay Peak. Never did any backcountry. And I’d be a bit intimidated to ski the Face Chutes at Jay, but I’m sure I could do it. Can prolly do all double diamonds on east coast. Out West, I would need to be careful because I don’t do cliffs and mandatory air! We are all about the same ability. Night life would be great (a big plus for Telluride) but we’re not going to get hammered every night drooling over ourselves, LOL! We would probably want at least some night life. I’ve skied Jackson Hole, Big Sky, Whistler. I don’t think lack of expert terrain out West would be an issue no matter where we go. My main concern is good snowpack and great conditions and No rain issues like what happened to me at Whistler back in 2011 or was it 2010.

I’m Jealous!! I love the little secret place. It’s the Anti-Resort. The snow there holds up very well compared to other mountains. Not enough skier traffic to ski/scrape the snow off. Plus they aren’t open on weekdays. Glad you took advantage of the great conditions. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it up there this past weekend..

Hey Guys, I’m looking for some advice. Trying to plan a group trip out West with some friends. Between end of Feb to end of March. I’m thinking either Telluride Big Sky, Jackson Hole, Banff, Lake Louise/Sunshine Village. other possible options are Snowbird/ Vail. I haven’t really been keeping track of snow tallies out West, except I know the Lake Tahoe got absolutely buried. But I’ve already skied there and want to hit something new and I prefer cold smoke. Bucket list for me is Canadian Rockies or Telluride, but any of above lisT would work to. Anyone know how these resorts are doing? Thanks! -Jason

Glad you’re back at it! I agree you gotta strike when the iron is hot! Especially this season with all the cutters, freeze/thaw cycles. Last Feb/March spoiled me with all those back to back Nor’Easters.

I never would have thought 6-8” of upslope would be sufficient to cover boilerplate. Amazing! Perhaps this was a fairly dense snow?

I think they will be bad. I went to Killington several weeks ago after a cutter and it was pretty bad. I mapped out all of the snowmaking trails and skied only those trails where they blew or were blowing snow on, it was still bad. Perhaps Okemo has better snowmaking capacity and would produce a better product . Or ski the Northern Greens Upslope Machine. Jason

Skied Belleayre on Saturday. The conditions were pretty good. The last natural snow was about 6 inches 8/9 days ago. But temps were cold and they must have blown snow everywhere for 8/9 days straight. Anyone know how far north the freezing rain got? I know Belleayre, Hunter and I believe Plattekill had ZR... wondering if the ZR made it into Mount Snow or Stratton?

Agree. I’ve seen that a lot in the corporate world. However, I’ve also seen managers with less than desirable people skills get laid off. I think the recent trend (at least in my company) has been to have managers who motivate people instead of being condescending and abusive. I believe it’s slowly getting better.

Nice! Mine were considered mid-fats when I bought them 9 years ago. Only 78mm under foot. The trend has been to go fatter lately.

I skied BigSky/Moonlight back in 2009. It was my favorite western resort. Didn’t have 2 feet of powder though. Buying slightly used skiis is the way to go. I bought my current pair at Stowe’s Demo Center. They were $1200 skiis, got them for $550.. they were only used a few times that season. I was at Timberline lodge this past July (I didn’t ski). They were still able to ski just about to the lodge from the Palmer snowfield. Are you going to bring both your regular skiis and powder skiis out west? I wonder if it’s problematic to ski on fatties if there’s not much powder? (Although the PAC NW should have tons of snow by Feb.)

Going skiing on Saturday at Belleayre and prolly hit Plattekill on Sunday. Never skied in Fatties before. Sunday should be great for that! I don’t do that well in 2 feet of powder, LOL! I need to demo a pair one of these days.

I believe all options are still on the table at this juncture, but I think that the Catskills will be spared the ice. Can’t rule out some sleet mixing in. But with 15-20 inches of snow, you’d hardly notice!

Thanks! That’s exactly what I’m working on!

Hoping the mountains get a good dump. If only the big one would come in a day earlier! This looks like the kind of storm to bring all of the caktskiils and Berks up to par. VT is already prime.

Great pics, looking good one t there Skiing Belleayre next Saturday. Anyone know how are the Catskills are looking regarding that storm brewing for the weekend?

So sorry to hear you got injured. I hope and pray you have a speedy recovery bro.

Good to know Magic now has the old Snowbowl lift. Yes I agree Stratton is the first decent mountain coming up from the south, though some would argue Mount Snow is a tad closer, but I definitely prefer Stratton over Mount Snow. Stratton has deep roots in snowboard boots for sure! My buddy bought one of his boards at the shoppe in the village. The slope side village is another plus Stratton has which is unique to New England. Living in Long Island is not a convenient place when trying to get to Mtns. Skiing/snowboarding is a very expensive sport, so you’ll run into the high end folks most resorts anyway. They don’t bother me at all. Speaking of riff raff- you get that at Mountain Creek and some of the Poconos. Went to Blue Moutain last year and one of my buddies snowboards was stolen. We prayed and asked God to find it and within a couple hours, mountain security overheard the guy bragging about stealing a snowboard. We got the snowboard back!! Unfortunately that’s the type of clientele you have at the resorts with proximity to NYC. You need to lock up all your gear. No cubbies! Glad you’re enjoying it out there today!