Sugarloaf and Saddleback

[uphillklimber]

Resort or Ski Area

Attitash

Date

May 26, 2021

Snow Conditions

1. Powder

x

 

[speden]

Oops. time to leave for work. To be continued!

C'mon man, let's hear the rest of it...

I'm thinking of making a trip like this sometime in the spring. Sugarloaf sounds like a place that would be more fun with warmer spring temps. Saddleback seems to be at its best right after a big powder dump, so maybe it won't be that good in the spring.

 

[tipsdown]

C'mon man, let's hear the rest of it...

I'm thinking of making a trip like this sometime in the spring. Sugarloaf sounds like a place that would be more fun with warmer spring temps. Saddleback seems to be at its best right after a big powder dump, so maybe it won't be that good in the spring.

SL and SB are both great in the spring. Saddleback has the highest base elevation in NE and they get a bit more than the Loaf so both would be great in the spring..

 

[xwhaler]

additionally, SB has NW exposure which will yield less rapid snowpack loss come warmer temps
I hope to be making turns at Saddleback in mid to late April this year

 

[Bumpsis]

hey uphill, can you please throw in some details about the actual surface conditions (ice, hardpacked, soft, man made vs natural, groomers vs bumps, etc), if you can.
I'm getting ready for a 9 day trip to Sugarloaf, so I'm watching the weather and any SL user reported conditions with great interest.

 

[bigbog]

Great pp considering the little natural stuff here & there. Think they're blowing on random basis..(don't take my word on that). Just keep the edges sharp and dress warm... Maybe Saturday ~11-2 will get the normal Saturday crowd, but outside of that...should be great. If you believe it...Farmer's Almanac is talkin decent snow for mid-February...:lol:

 

[Skier75]

Okay, I'm back! Had to put in 8 today so I can do this again!

Still at Sugarloaf. We find the snow to be hard packed and crunchy, pretty fast, but certainly edge-able. The huge rainstorm was only a week and half ago, and Sugarloaf has done a good getting things back in shape. Some trails just are not covered, but really, alot of it is very skiable. I think they were claiming close to 100 trails. My wife says it was fast hard crunchy and death cookies. Teeth rattling.

Well, he was close to what I was referring to as teeth rattling. I thought the part that was teeth rattling was the Tote Road Ext., after that it was pretty crunchy, but edgable. As the day wore on things did soften up a bit, but we never went back up the Timberline Quad, that was waayy too slow for the conditions. Some of my favorite trails has always been off the King Pine Quad, Hual Back, Widow Maker, Choker, and Flume. I thought they softened up a bit as the day wore on. A little scrapey in spots, but not too bad.

I was a little bummed that I couldn't ski some of my other favorites, Upper Narrow Gage and Competition Hill, because of the racing going on. In between races we were able to cut across from Sugarloaf Super Quad across Pick Pole to the get on the other side. As we reached the other side, we stopped to check out the racing, man they were cruising....wouldn't want to be in their way.

Now Saddleback was like day and night. What an awesome day at Saddleback. Nice soft corduory pretty much all day with hardly anyone there...what a blast!

 

[Bumpsis]

Bumpsis, just re-read what you asked. Didn't do too much in the way of bumps. The snow coverage was thin, an inch or so over the ice and boilerplate. I don't think I can honestly say it was ever 2 inches thick. Check that, the learning areas, shallower pitch did have some thicker snow. Get anything steep, and I don't think there was more than 2 inches anywhere.

Probably could have done some bumps, but they didn't have much in the way of green or blue bumps, only on the steeper trails. How is anyone supposed to practice and learn if they have to start right out on steep bumps????? Anyways, with the sparse coverage, I wasn't too hot about even trying the bumps. I did see some on it, and not too much scraping going on, but there were some sticks sticking up thru some of the troughs.

Gotta say, the Loaf has done well getting the trails ski-able after all that rain. It was as good as one could have hoped for. Those groomers spread the snow around and made for some great skiing.

Big thanks for addressing in detail my specific questions. It sounds like your had a great time at Sugarloaf despite less than stellar snow conditions. If they don't hit by a decent snowfall between 2/12 - 2/20, we'll definitely hit Saddleback just to check it out. It's been a long time since I skied over there.

 

[salsgang]

Awesome. Thanks for the report. Getting my Saddleback fix in Saturday.

 

[UVSHTSTRM]

C'mon man, let's hear the rest of it...

I'm thinking of making a trip like this sometime in the spring. Sugarloaf sounds like a place that would be more fun with warmer spring temps. Saddleback seems to be at its best right after a big powder dump, so maybe it won't be that good in the spring.

SB closes down with nearly 100% open and plenty of coverage.

 

[speden]

SB closes down with nearly 100% open and plenty of coverage.

By 100% are you including the glades, or just the groomed trails?

 

[salsgang]

By 100% are you including the glades, or just the groomed trails?

April 15, 2008 I skied the last day they turned lifts and it was 100% wide open glades and everything. It was incredible late season skiing. All depends on getting snow in March and early which is usually a pretty good bet. (with last year being an exception)