Sunday River 22-23

[machski]

Boyne should open Loon early season using the Gondola for up and downloading and open the east basin double trail pod along with North Peak and the Camp 3 lodge. They did this years ago. Loon and Sunday River have low base elevations which hamper early season snowmaking.

They have done the Gondi up, Easy basin chair to download in the distant past. Problem is, Camp III is super low elevation too. They tried to get down to it and haven't had much luck this year. Temps have been brutal, especially below about 1800' elevation.

 

[deadheadskier]

They did do that for a year or 2. With the Fans on mid/lower Amex and DD into Amex now, this would be possible. Probably have to beef up the hydrant spacing on Upper AmEx to give it a real chance. Overdraft should be fine as is to get back to Chondi. Of course, this setup means 2 lifts turning to serve 1, which I'm sure they'd hate. The alternative is replace Locke with a HSQ (only build an uphill mid to limit the grip cycles and download from the top). But for a month a season at the current asking $$ for detaches, pipe dream here.

My thought on using two lifts is whatever extra cost is associated is with running two for a week or two, they can make up for by reducing hours on redundant lifts mid season. This would be true whether they adopted a Jordan / Oz early season strategy or a Chondi / Spruce. There's probably plenty of days mid season, mid week that they could skip on the Tempest chair or run only the Chondola instead of both it and South Ridge.

 

[Newpylong]

You can't kill South Ridge mid-week that's the core beginner lift. Nor can you kill Tempest how would you get beginners out of White Cap? Two rides to get out less than ideal also.

 

[deadheadskier]

You can access all of the same terrain off the Chondola as South Ridge. There is no appreciable difference in difficulty going further up. The never evers are down on the carpet anyway.

Yes, use Little White Cap and Heat quads. You don't need to run all 3 White Cap lifts mid week.

My larger overall point though is that having to run a second lift for downloading isn't some huge cost that can't be relieved elsewhere throughout the season.

 

[machski]

You can access all of the same terrain off the Chondola as South Ridge. There is no appreciable difference in difficulty going further up. The never evers are down on the carpet anyway.

Yes, use Little White Cap and Heat quads. You don't need to run all 3 White Cap lifts mid week.

My larger overall point though is that having to run a second lift for downloading isn't some huge cost that can't be relieved elsewhere throughout the season.

There absolutely is a difference in difficulty of terrain South Ridge only vs off Chondi. Dreamaker0 may be a Green circle, but it has a lot more pitch than anything within South Ridge and is not learning terrain step up from Sundance Carpets.

As I said, AmEx is possible but the mid and upper would need denser hydrant/gun spacing than itp
has now. To do Oz, that would need a completely revamped snowmaking setup. Princess has towers but too widely spaced for early quick opens. And we won't even start discussing Eureka which hasn't seen a machine made flake in almost a decade.

 

[kbroderick]

You can access all of the same terrain off the Chondola as South Ridge. There is no appreciable difference in difficulty going further up. The never verse are down on the carpet anyway.

Yes, use Little White Cap and Heat quads. You don't need to run all 3 White Cap lifts mid week.

My larger overall point though is that having to run a second lift for downloading isn't some huge cost that can't be relieved elsewhere throughout the season.

My four-year-old would disagree that there's no appreciable difference in difficulty between Dreammaker from the chondi and skiing from the top of 2. Prior to having kids, I might have been tempted to agree with you, but it really is a big step up, especially if you consider the terrain below that top pitch under 2 versus Dreammaker, which has sustained pitch comparable to that top of 2 pitch.

 

[deadheadskier]

Maybe I'm misremembering the terrain, but I didn't recall the little bit above South Ridge to North Peak being all that much steeper. I was more thinking lower Downdraft than Dreamweaver. Lower DD is essentially a connector trail down to South Ridge and skis like a wide green to my recollection.

Again, my point though is that the notion that a resort gets bent out of shape by running a second chair for downloading for a week or two is pretty silly when you consider all of the other opportunities to save cost throughout a long season at a massive resort like Sunday River. It should be a non-issue.

 

[kbroderick]

Maybe I'm misremembering the terrain, but I didn't recall the little bit above South Ridge to North Peak being all that much steeper. I was more thinking lower Downdraft than Dreamweaver. Lower DD is essentially a connector trail down to South Ridge and skis like a wide green to my recollection.

Again, my point though is that the notion that a resort gets bent out of shape by running a second chair for downloading for a week or two is pretty silly when you consider all of the other opportunities to save cost throughout a long season at a massive resort like Sunday River. It should be a non-issue.

The combination of traffic and pitch on the last bit of Amex usually results in fairly interesting surface conditions, and if you go left at the split, you the up on Grand Rapids, which is both steeper and narrower. Plus both come through the major junction just above the bottom of 8.

But I get what you're saying. I think this year the even better question would be whether or not it's feasible to improve water storage so they have enough in the pond to cover opening both early season trail pods. Hopefully it's a while before we see another fall this dry, but if we do, more water on hand would mitigate that impact.

 

[Newpylong]

There is always enough water as it comes up from the River to the tune of 10,000 GPM.

As Machski mentioned there is no the hydrant density anywhere else but T2 for early season.

 

[machski]

There is always enough water as it comes up from the River to the tune of 10,000 GPM.

As Machski mentioned there is no the hydrant density anywhere else but T2 for early season.

Yeah, I am unsure where this rumor of lack of water is what slowed everything down this year came from. It's absolutely nonsense. SR has access to a ton of water, their rights and watershed are far more than they have ever attempted to push in any season. This year was no different. I know I heard someone mention a snowmaker or 2 said they were on water restrictions, but I haven't heard that. Had they been on restrictions this year, I seriously doubt they would have attempted both Locke and Jordan back in October like they did. Funny how that rumor surfaced AFTER the weather had demonstrated temp-wise SR despite all their efforts wouldn't be able to pull off a dual opening. SR does great things with their snowmaking, but they still can't control the weather when it just won't cooperate.

 

[deadheadskier]

If I were to believe a snowmaking problem rumor with Boyne it would be that maybe something is off with Loon's system? So bizarre that Cannon opened before Loon this year. I always considered Loon the gold standard for snowmaking in New Hampshire.

 

[Smellytele]

If I were to believe a snowmaking problem rumor with Boyne it would be that maybe something is off with Loon's system? So bizarre that Cannon opened before Loon this year. I always considered Loon the gold standard for snowmaking in New Hampshire.

elevation/temps at said elevations was the issue I am guessing. Drove through lincoln and it didn't get any where near the snow Cannon got in the notch.

 

[machski]

elevation/temps at said elevations was the issue I am guessing. Drove through lincoln and it didn't get any where near the snow Cannon got in the notch.

This. Cannon's 2000' base elevation made a huge difference this year from Loon's 900'. They just couldn't get enough run time below about 1600' or so, even Camp III couldn't get covered at its level.