Killington Opening Day - 11/9/2004

[jimme]

Hmmm. The snow guns were brutal, absolutely brutal! Kinda like a firehose spraying ice crystals at your face. Unavoidable, totally blinding google icing at serverl points on the decent.

Aside from the man-made ice blizzard, the surface conditions were great! Because Kmart was blowing snow all day the coverage was excellent. By 3:00 there was some scraped off spots, but only a few. Rhime had some pretty good bumps on it. The sun was popping in and out, giving me enough time for a quick lunch trailside. ASC got my $39. and that was it. Got on the K1 by 11:40AM with a full cabin, but by 2:00 I was typically riding alone as the crowd had thinned out. (Probably got sick of the snow guns.) There were no lines for me all day.

If the snow guns had not been on it would have been a stellar opening day. Maybe I'm whimping out on the sg issue, but they were the most intense I've ever experienced. It wasn't so much the burning and stinging as it was the icing up of goggles. Within seconds you literally couldn't see. You'd scrape, and then a minute later start scraping all over again. By the day's end I was completely iced up from head to toe.

Bottom line- I was skiing. . .

Jimme

[JimG.]

Originally Posted by jimme

Bottom line- I was skiing. . .

Jimme

And that's all that really matters. Wish I had been there.

[bvibert]

Thanks for the report. Sounds like a good time, despite the snow making!

[tirolerpeter]

Isn't it ironic, that we want a lot of snow, we want sun, we want moderate temps, yet, we hate skiing under the guns!

[Yooper]

Trust me.... The Guns were something else. I have been to OD for years (the old Truck routine) but these first two days were extreme. (I am aware that they were trying to take advantage of the cool temps during the day to blow as much snow as possible) It 10 degrees at the summit in the morning and 13 degrees at 1:30, no wind, visibility fantastic. The guns were pointed directly accross the trails as opposed to an angle, iced up every couple of hundred feet. But so much for that. The lift lines were non existant yesterday (10th). On Tues OD there were approximately 225 people in the K1 at 9:00, yesterday we counted roughly 75 at 9:00. By noon there was no more than two a gondy, and by 2:30 I was alone in the gondy for several runs. No grooming..... Bumps.....Big Bumps.... few ice spots by late afternoon, not crowded...kinda what you'd exspect for the first few days, still worth doing guns or no guns.

Do it.......Just do it.......

[Greg]

Originally Posted by jimme

KOD

jimme - I edited your title so that when folks search for members' trip reports from the ski area profiles, this one will come up. It's important to use the ski area's name in the topic title. Please see the How to post to a Skiing Trip Report. Thanks!