PhineasC Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 Hit Bretton Woods today. No issues, but I wish more terrain was open. I thought things were very relaxed, was pleasantly surprised by the lack of COVID-related paranoia and meltdowns. Most people seemed to be following the rules. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HoarfrostHubb Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 9 hours ago, Lava Rock said: Was just thinking about Jay. Talk about north south flip flop in terms of snow depth. Does WaWa have more base then Jay? . If they do not for much longer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STILL N OF PIKE Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 What a disaster conditions will be on Saturday . Mountains will be reporting “frozen granular” and some folks won’t realize that means “don’t ski - icy AF” half the time . Mountains don’t seem to want to say “it’s Xmas weekend, don’t give us your money today , it’s dangerous” Folks who work in the medical center on the slopes must just be waiting for some narly accidents those mornings. I recall being at Stowe after a relatively rare freezing rain storm on the mountain a day and a half before ( about 2 Full years ago ) and I was checking into the lodge and I saw 3 people in basically body casts checking out And 2 talking about the conditions the afternoon before And now they were heading to Boston Hospitals . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhineasC Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 19 minutes ago, STILL N OF PIKE said: What a disaster conditions will be on Saturday . Mountains will be reporting “frozen granular” and some folks won’t realize that means “don’t ski - icy AF” half the time . Mountains don’t seem to want to say “it’s Xmas weekend, don’t give us your money today , it’s dangerous” Folks who work in the medical center on the slopes must just be waiting for some narly accidents those mornings. I recall being at Stowe after a relatively rare freezing rain storm on the mountain a day and a half before ( about 2 Full years ago ) and I was checking into the lodge and I saw 3 people in basically body casts checking out And 2 talking about the conditions the afternoon before And now they were heading to Boston Hospitals . We are skiing all this week because we figure this weekend and early next week will be pretty rough. This grinch storm is a real doozy. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PowderBeard Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 11 hours ago, Lava Rock said: Was just thinking about Jay. Talk about north south flip flop in terms of snow depth. Does WaWa have more base then Jay? . Right? They haven't even opened the Flyer or any woods this year. MRG has only had the Practice Slope open. No Castlerock at Sugarbush or Madonna at Smuggs. When is the last time that happened in a December? Wildcat is essentially one way down from the summit. They all typically get close to 100% open for a weekend or two before a melt-down at the end of the month. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bwt3650 Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 Visiting the kingdom of @powderfreak...starting to snow pretty decent here. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 Open 'em up today. Shut 'em down Thursday. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bwt3650 Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 53 minutes ago, CoastalWx said: Open 'em up today. Shut 'em down Thursday. Tnrw could be good, but thurs is a disaster. Maybe better by New Years? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoastalWx Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 45 minutes ago, bwt3650 said: Tnrw could be good, but thurs is a disaster. Maybe better by New Years? Maybe if the 29th trends better. But you wouldn't catch me up there anytime soon paying all that money to ski on an ice luge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 The snow is just so “tired” up here without getting that big storm. Just gets groomed and skied into oblivion each day... snow eventually breaks down to dust or ice granular with repetitive crushing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subdude Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 1 hour ago, powderfreak said: The snow is just so “tired” up here without getting that big storm. Just gets groomed and skied into oblivion each day... snow eventually breaks down to dust or ice granular with repetitive crushing. My son works at Park City as shift supervisor of snow making. They're having a dismal year as well. 20" base, 26/44 lifts running, 12% of terrain, 43/347 trails open. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PWMan Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 2 hours ago, CoastalWx said: Maybe if the 29th trends better. But you wouldn't catch me up there anytime soon paying all that money to ski on an ice luge. That's my mindset. The kids and I have new gear and are itching to go, but there's no way I'm dropping that type of money to ski limited terrain that'll be loose granular and boilerplate. I feel bad for my DC-area friends who booked a week of skiing in VT and are doing the whole self-quarantine thing. Just an all-out disaster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NW_of_GYX Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 River skied well today all things considered. I have more snow on my front lawn in Bridgton than in the woods on Barker and South Ridge. Crowds weren't as bad as I expected. Tomorrow looks good and then see ya later till after the New Years in all likelihood. RFID rollout continues to be problematic, it's going to undoubtedly be a sh** show there this weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 7 hours ago, STILL N OF PIKE said: What a disaster conditions will be on Saturday . Mountains will be reporting “frozen granular” and some folks won’t realize that means “don’t ski - icy AF” half the time . Mountains don’t seem to want to say “it’s Xmas weekend, don’t give us your money today , it’s dangerous” Folks who work in the medical center on the slopes must just be waiting for some narly accidents those mornings. I recall being at Stowe after a relatively rare freezing rain storm on the mountain a day and a half before ( about 2 Full years ago ) and I was checking into the lodge and I saw 3 people in basically body casts checking out And 2 talking about the conditions the afternoon before And now they were heading to Boston Hospitals . Nobody buys day tickets anymore anyway, it’s all pass holders who go anyway regardless of condition lol. Epic Pass and IKON Pass have essentially replaced day tickets. Leads to busier crowds on crap days because they figure they’ve already paid for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PWMan Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 41 minutes ago, powderfreak said: Nobody buys day tickets anymore anyway, it’s all pass holders who go anyway regardless of condition lol. Epic Pass and IKON Pass have essentially replaced day tickets. Leads to busier crowds on crap days because they figure they’ve already paid for it. That's interesting to hear. The people I know who have passes actually tend to be more selective about conditions, but I'm sure it goes both ways. Guess it depends on what the perceived break-even is. I've been wondering how the RFID thing is working, particularly at Sunday River where we go most often. I'm also curious about whether "midweek" is as much of a thing these days, with so many people working remotely and kids not in school every day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bch2014 Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 I’m skiing with my uncle and cousin tomorrow at Sunapee. They are both once per year skiers so I figured it would be better to get out before the rain hits (plus I have vacation days to burn). Using Epic buddy passes for them, it was $69/ticket for the full-day, which I guess isn’t terrible. In the process of planning a late January Crested Butte trip... Colorado snow hasn’t been great early season but figured CB has lower skier density which should help preserve conditions and plus, I like the more “Texas” vibe there compared to the I-70 rat race. That said, MTN isn’t deriving much ancillary revenue from me or my friend that I’m going out with-We’re both epic pass holders and aren’t staying slopeside... AirBnB in town. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bwt3650 Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 4 hours ago, powderfreak said: The snow is just so “tired” up here without getting that big storm. Just gets groomed and skied into oblivion each day... snow eventually breaks down to dust or ice granular with repetitive crushing. Jay was jay this afternoon. So many fewer skiers, the snow was in great shape by afternoon. Tonight looks like it may over perform and they have to be close to being able to open up some glades up top. It def looked skiable. Some of the the upper half of Mansfield looked close to me if we add another 8 or so tonight. Shame about Thursday because today could have made some real progress. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 1 minute ago, bwt3650 said: Jay was jay this afternoon. So many fewer skiers, the snow was in great shape by afternoon. Tonight looks like it may over perform and they have to be close to being able to open up some glades up top. It def looked skiable. Some of the the upper half of Mansfield looked close to me if we add another 8 or so tonight. Shame about Thursday because today could have made some real progress. Tonight is a Jay flow, IMO. Model signature leads me to believe they may perform substantially better than Mansfield. I gotta get up to Jay once we get some snow. No mega-pass affiliation and closed Canadian border. We’ve been saying it all along, special times for Jay skiers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NW_of_GYX Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 1 hour ago, PWMan said: That's interesting to hear. The people I know who have passes actually tend to be more selective about conditions, but I'm sure it goes both ways. Guess it depends on what the perceived break-even is. I've been wondering how the RFID thing is working, particularly at Sunday River where we go most often. I'm also curious about whether "midweek" is as much of a thing these days, with so many people working remotely and kids not in school every day. I can confirm that the RFID rollout at SR has not been great. Maybe one of the industry professionals here can illuminate, and there must be a reason the whole industry is adopting, but from a skiers perspective they are a PIA, rarely work correctly, create pile-ups unless monitored closely by staff, and the direct to lift aspect doesn't matter as most folks were already doing that with season passes. I'm guessing the data harvesting makes it worth it for the resorts, but it has negatively impacted the on mountain experience IMHO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowgeek Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 I can confirm that the RFID rollout at SR has not been great. Maybe one of the industry professionals here can illuminate, and there must be a reason the whole industry is adopting, but from a skiers perspective they are a PIA, rarely work correctly, create pile-ups unless monitored closely by staff, and the direct to lift aspect doesn't matter as most folks were already doing that with season passes. I'm guessing the data harvesting makes it worth it for the resorts, but it has negatively impacted the on mountain experience IMHOHmmmm. I’ve had the opposite experience. It seems to work flawlessly at the ORDA NY mountains (Gore, Whiteface, Bellayre). I have found it to work great at other mountains too. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
powderfreak Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 4 hours ago, NW_of_GYX said: I can confirm that the RFID rollout at SR has not been great. Maybe one of the industry professionals here can illuminate, and there must be a reason the whole industry is adopting, but from a skiers perspective they are a PIA, rarely work correctly, create pile-ups unless monitored closely by staff, and the direct to lift aspect doesn't matter as most folks were already doing that with season passes. I'm guessing the data harvesting makes it worth it for the resorts, but it has negatively impacted the on mountain experience IMHO History has shown about a one to two winter learning curve for resorts and their customers. By the third winter, RIFD is as smooth as it gets. Part of it is consumer education and the other part is operational education. Once it gets dialed, it is the way to go, along with long distance scanners that can hit a ticket anywhere on a persons body, even buried in a wallet. The days of having to take out and show a pass to someone, or take it out to have someone scan it, are over. You get your ticket or pass, you put it in your snowpants pocket and you don't have to fish for it every lap. Just cruise on through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.Spin Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 1 hour ago, powderfreak said: History has shown about a one to two winter learning curve for resorts and their customers. By the third winter, RIFD is as smooth as it gets. Part of it is consumer education and the other part is operational education. Once it gets dialed, it is the way to go, along with long distance scanners that can hit a ticket anywhere on a persons body, even buried in a wallet. The days of having to take out and show a pass to someone, or take it out to have someone scan it, are over. You get your ticket or pass, you put it in your snowpants pocket and you don't have to fish for it every lap. Just cruise on through. Oh man, RFID is just so good from a skier’s perspective. We’ve loved using ours at Stowe over the past several years, and with Bolton converting over to RFID last season, it’s been even better. I just stick my passes in my shoulder pocket, and literally forget about them. Even keeping both my Stowe and Bolton passes right together in the same pocket has been no trouble. Gone are the days of fumbling around in the lift line to show your pass, especially on storm days when it’s just dumping, and the last thing you want to have to do is take off your gloves, search around to pull out your pass, etc., etc. Bolton doesn’t typically have much in the way of lift queues to begin with, but we haven’t experienced any sort of issues, just smooth sailing onto the lifts through the automated gates without even having to trouble any of the lift attendants. I have to think it’s pretty cost effective if even Bolton Valley is willing to invest in it for all their lifts. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bwt3650 Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 On 12/22/2020 at 8:59 AM, PowderBeard said: Right? They haven't even opened the Flyer or any woods this year. MRG has only had the Practice Slope open. No Castlerock at Sugarbush or Madonna at Smuggs. When is the last time that happened in a December? Wildcat is essentially one way down from the summit. They all typically get close to 100% open for a weekend or two before a melt-down at the end of the month. There will be woods to find today, but nothing “open”. The flyer was late last year too, but I think they had it up right about now. There was a bad freeze last year right around now that left the whole mountain bulletproof until the last couple days of December when they got dumped on and dropped almost the whole mountain. Compared to Stowe (love Stowe...but....) jay was skiing ten times better yesterday. Stowe has more terrain open but it’s all blown and beat. I think jay is actually being smart with their snowmaking. They are burying all the connections and sacrificing some early season trails so when they do get it, they should last. In past years they would have blown Haynes and maybe Ullrs or goat already, but with limited snowmaking, why dump 5-7 days into a straight shot ttb run. At least that’s my guess. When jay does get it, it will be THE spot this year. Wildcat surprises me? Don’t they have a fairly robust system and decent elevation? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
radarman Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 On 12/22/2020 at 8:59 AM, PowderBeard said: Right? They haven't even opened the Flyer or any woods this year. MRG has only had the Practice Slope open. No Castlerock at Sugarbush or Madonna at Smuggs. When is the last time that happened in a December? Wildcat is essentially one way down from the summit. They all typically get close to 100% open for a weekend or two before a melt-down at the end of the month. Not sure if it's happened since, but definitely was the case in Dec 06. And really nothing changed until Mid Jan, just got worse in fact. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
radarman Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 December 2011 might have been pretty awful up there, I don't really recall however. Was certainly awful down here. Maybe they scored some upslope or something. edit- Dec 2015 too maybe? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bch2014 Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 Total shit show at Sunapee today Too many people for the lift/trail capacity when chairs are only going up half full... the sun bowl quad is having issues too.. vail=fail Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PowderBeard Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 3 hours ago, bwt3650 said: Wildcat surprises me? Don’t they have a fairly robust system and decent elevation? They have an updated system, tons of water, and a base at 2000'. As I mentioned earlier, there were years they were running top-to-bottom before Sunday River and Killington in October/early November under Peaks. I would bet there will be some condos for sale at both after this year and Cannon will have a big jump in season pass sales. Absolutely shame, aside from DJ's at Cannon, Wildcat has the best lift-served terrain in NH. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PowderBeard Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 Meanwhile. I found some size 15 boots. Can you tell we have a toddler in the house? Just noticed the dog bowls in background. Ordered December 7th, 2nd day air, finally arrived today. She can actually walk in them versus the smallest I could previously find in 16.5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PowderBeard Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 2 hours ago, bch2014 said: Total shit show at Sunapee today Too many people for the lift/trail capacity when chairs are only going up half full... the sun bowl quad is having issues too.. vail=fail Damn, yea it looked it on the webcam. Line for Sunbowl was heading up Wingding. Looks like a lot of folks are out there today before the melt. Heard Huntah is a complete ___show too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Angus Posted December 24, 2020 Share Posted December 24, 2020 Can report that once the lift lines diminished around 130ish, the skiing was enjoyable. The low angle natural trails are all bumped up with some dirt showing in troughs but it is not a rocky mountain so all good. You just pick your way around the steeper stuff which doesn't have much cover left. There is some man-made glacier that is going nowhere until May. The lift situation was a joke. Way to many people for the reduced uphill capacity. The parking lots looked busy for a mid- winter weekend. Also, I think these areas need to be a bit more assertive and start going out into the lines and requesting folks cover up or leave. Clearly folks ignoring - and I think the risk of contracting Covid is low risk outdoors. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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