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Mt Sunape?

abc

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One of the Peak mountain that’s now part of Vail and accessible to Epic pass holders.

I’ve never been there. Would love to check it out.

But is it horribly crowded on weekends?
 

chuckstah

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I haven't been since 2007 I think, when I last had a pass. An hour or so from home. But the answer is yes, weekends are packed. It's one of the closest biggish places from Boston. I can only imagine the crowd's now with Epic. If you want to check it out, wait til later in March. Fun place if Vail hasn't dumbed it down more than it already was. There's nothing extreme or steep, but there are some fun glades when snow is sufficient, which is unreliable. Worth a day or 2 if you can avoid the crowds I'd say.

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skicub

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Great place for some laps on a weekday with a beautiful view of the lake. Nothing challenging, but some nice pitches in the sunbowl. Good place for intermediates and beginners. IMG_1662.jpg


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Edd

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Sunapee skis really well, IMO. Definitely a good weekday hit. I’m psyched it’s on the Epic pass because it’s only 90 minutes from my place.


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Smellytele

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Right where I want to be
Not sure if they still groom the fuck out of it like before vail and after the state ran it but on powder days they would have trails closed until they could groom them.


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Bumpsis

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I had a couple of powder days there in the past few years and that was before Vail took over so I'm not all that sure they did that in 100% of powder days. The mountain hasn't change much since Vail took over, at least from my perspective, which is that of an occasional midweek visitor.
It just got much more expensive although it looks like they still have a two-fer or reduced rate lift pass on Wednesdays. I'd avoid it on weekends.
It's a cruiser mountain and the trails are laid out well so it's fun and varied. They used to have two slopes on which moguls grew. One was seeded, they other was "naturally" grown and that added to the appeal of the place.
The main quad chair gets you to the top of the mountain and thus, lets you ski their full 1500 feet of vertical drop in one swoop, so it felt like skiing a bigger mountain.
The Sunbowl area is bit shorter, but still fun. With good cover and fresh snow, what they have for glades adds to the variety. Overall, for me, a day trip out of Boston, this place is an easy drive.
But it did get expensive. I used to be able to get some work done in the morning and then catch 1/2 day of skiing. Their afternoon walk up ticket was affordable for me. Vail ownership changed that. I may catch a couple of Wednesdays there later on this season.
 

pauldotcom

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Get there early and you can park right up close to the lifts. As far as crowds, normal like everywhere else. There is a lift on the backside that is usually pretty quick to get on. Not my favorite mountain at all, but not a bad place to get laps in. You can avoid the crowds if you know the mountain.
 

medfordmike

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My weekend house is near Sunapee and I have Epic and a Pico pass. I am usually at Pico on weekends but hit Sunapee a few times a year. I find it less crowded than Okemo and Stratton. The views are great and if you are the type that gets there early you can get a decent amount of runs in before it gets busy. As others have said nothing too challenging but it is a good family mountain and the glades are very cleared out and fun. I will say once you get into March weekends are pretty relaxed and not bad crowd wise despite being so close to Boston.
 

xlr8r

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Been to Sunapee many times on weekends the last few years. The main parking lot fills up fast, and the other parking lots are a bit of a pain to park in and then ride the bus back to the lodge. But even on days when all the parking lots are filled the lift lines remian manageable. North peak never gets a line longer than a couple minutes, a lot of the time even on weekends it is ski on. The two main quads get lines but they are shorter than places like Okemo, Stratton, Mount Snow etc. The only true black diamonds are off of North Peak and those go pretty much straight down the fall line. All the trails off the summit are blue, but they all are filled with twists and turns, my favorite being Blastoff. So if all you want is black diamonds you will get bored quickly, but if you like to cruise you will enjoy it a lot.
 

thetrailboss

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I haven't been since 2007 I think, when I last had a pass. An hour or so from home. But the answer is yes, weekends are packed. It's one of the closest biggish places from Boston. I can only imagine the crowd's now with Epic. If you want to check it out, wait til later in March. Fun place if Vail hasn't dumbed it down more than it already was. There's nothing extreme or steep, but there are some fun glades when snow is sufficient, which is unreliable. Worth a day or 2 if you can avoid the crowds I'd say.

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Agreed. My personal experience is also now about the same vintage (2005-2006 when it was my home mountain). I will say that in those days the first two hours each weekend day (8-10am IIRC) were really awesome with relatively few folks. After that it got pretty busy. Midweek was pretty quiet.

It is a fun place for intermediate cruisers and has some great views. Great grooming and snowmaking. I would not count on it at all for glades or natural snow.
 

Los

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Conditions were absolutely horrendous today - worse than I had imagined. On top of that the slopes were dangerously crowded, including a very high percentage of guests on rentals. It was scary until about 2:30-3:00 when the masses finally called it quits for the day.
 

JimG.

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Conditions were absolutely horrendous today - worse than I had imagined. On top of that the slopes were dangerously crowded, including a very high percentage of guests on rentals. It was scary until about 2:30-3:00 when the masses finally called it quits for the day.

Sounds EPIC
 

The Sneak

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Conditions were absolutely horrendous today - worse than I had imagined. On top of that the slopes were dangerously crowded, including a very high percentage of guests on rentals. It was scary until about 2:30-3:00 when the masses finally called it quits for the day.

Good to know. Thinking about heading there Tuesday if the storm comes through.


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Los

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Sounds EPIC

Yep... And then we tried Okemo yesterday. The conditions were slightly better but the overall experience at Okemo was even worse than Sunapee. Significantly worse, in fact. For all the reasons that you can imagine.

Thank God we also have season passes to Sugarbush and Whaleback (which includes the Freedom Pass). The Epic pass is for suckers (like me, I guess). #neveragain #vailsucks
 

deadheadskier

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To be fair, the crowding at Sunapee and Okemo has always been awful over the holidays. Same goes for My Snow and Stowe as well. Attitash and Wildcat less so.

But while you have the pass, if you truly want to escape the madness on holidays, consider giving Crotched a shot. It's not the most exciting skiing (though it does have some really nice glades when snow permits), but after weather like we had recently where the snow is basically awful every where, it scratches the itch just fine for me. 900 or so vertical of decent cruising terrain.

This picture was taken in the base lodge yesterday at 9:45 AM. I was parked less than 200 feet from the lodge.

IMG_20191229_094145461.jpg

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Los

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To be fair, the crowding at Sunapee and Okemo has always been awful over the holidays. Same goes for My Snow and Stowe as well. Attitash and Wildcat less so.

But while you have the pass, if you truly want to escape the madness on holidays, consider giving Crotched a shot. It's not the most exciting skiing (though it does have some really nice glades when snow permits), but after weather like we had recently where the snow is basically awful every where, it scratches the itch just fine for me. 900 or so vertical of decent cruising terrain.

This picture was taken in the base lodge yesterday at 9:45 AM. I was parked less than 200 feet from the lodge.

View attachment 25865

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Thanks deadhead. We've skied Crotched at night several times and have enjoyed it. But I assumed (I know, I know...) that it too would be swamped given it's proximity to Mass, so we didn't bother trying. Glad to know I was wrong!
 

deadheadskier

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I've never seen it truly packed. Busiest day is probably the big Telemark race they host. When. it does get busy, it's not typically until afternoon.

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