Ski Saddleback 12-30-2007

Area skied: Ski Saddleback, Maine.

Date skied: December 30th, 2007 from 8:30am - 1:30pm

Surface conditions: Packed powder, machine groomed, wind blown.

Weather: Cloudy until 12:00pm, then partial sunshine with 25F steady temperature.

Well after 612 miles of driving since friday, Warren and I are home and just in time to great heavy snow. Saddleback was very crowded today and I had to park in the upper parking lot for the first time since my first visit here in December 1989.

The skiing was excellent and we skied onto the Rangeley chair for the first hour of skiing. We quickly flew down a groomed Royal Coachman, followed by more of the same on Green Weaver and Grey Ghost.

Lines became long (10-15 minutes for the Rangeley chair) so we took the Cupsuptic T-bar to Red Devil which was newly opened with snowmaking and somewhat icy with death cookies. We took this again and made our way over to the Kenebago T-bar where we spent most of the day.

Warren is old school at the Kenebago T-bar and it was kind of comical to ski with a 7 year old as adult after adult where claimed by the T-bar falling in the worst possible spots on the T line throught the day.

We skied Muleskinner which was fairly awful with thin cover and tough to turn in wind blown cover. Tightline was nice with some windblown powder over groomed down skiers left and Warren was practicing linked turns and pole planting on a black diamond.

Dazzler:



Muleskinner:



Kennebago T-bar line:



Tri-Color:






Intimidator Glade was nice with packed powder and moguls forming in between the tree's, and we had alot of fun skiing this run. Jane Craig was a blast with deep packed powder and some steep lines. Peachy's Peril was packed powder heaven with mini moguls and hardly any ice, this was my favorite run of the day.

Jane Craig:




We skied Hudson Highway top to bottom as our last run with full sunshine and great packed powder conditions.

Warren was way to tired to post as he fell asleep in the car on the way home, so it's now my job.

Great Trip! Thanks for the report and the pics.

Interesting that the Saddleback crowds are way up. I don't think I waited more than 5 minutes at all last year. I wonder if the $40 Saddleback lift ticket vs $72 Sugarloaf / Sunday River ticket is making a difference... or if the word is just getting out... or both...?

I have to suspect the crowds are due to locals Mainers and school vacation. How would you evaluate the crowds? Hard to believe Saddleback could be packed full of vacationers from out of state but it would be a great sign if that were the case.

I would say we had about 50-60% mainer's and the rest from primarily central and southern New England. You had you'r fair share of the Lexus and BMW crowd in the parking lot which is very uncommon for Saddleback.

Nice report! Great pics! Wow, you guys have been in the car a lot!!!!

severine said:

Nice report! Great pics! Wow, you guys have been in the car a lot!!!!

Click to expand...

Thank you, we live right on I-84 near the MA border, so we can be at Sunday River in 4H 15M and Saddleback is about 5 hours away, and reasonable for a weekend trip.

This is also where most of the snow has been this winter and where we will continue to be if the pattern holds. Saddleback is closing in on 100" for the season thus far.

riverc0il said:

I have to suspect the crowds are due to locals Mainers and school vacation. How would you evaluate the crowds? Hard to believe Saddleback could be packed full of vacationers from out of state but it would be a great sign if that were the case.

Click to expand...

Also the silver Maine Pass was blacked out last weekend. Maybe a lot of people went there instead of the Loaf or SR.