• Welcome to AlpineZone, the largest online community of skiers and snowboarders in the Northeast!

    You may have to REGISTER before you can post. Registering is FREE, gets rid of the majority of advertisements, and lets you participate in giveaways and other AlpineZone events!

The "Sugarbush Thread"

cdskier

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 26, 2015
Messages
6,409
Points
113
Location
NJ
I think most people are clueless about the terrain and what they should or should not be skiing. In their defense, there is no uniformity to the trail ratings. I mean, there are blacks at other mountains that would be blues at SB. I took a family from stratton down paradise some years ago, and the Mom hiked back out.

Agree most people are clueless about what they should or should not be skiing. I don't know how much the lack of uniformity to trail ratings can be used as an excuse though. Anytime you are at a new resort that you're not familiar with you should try to feel out the terrain a bit and work yourself up.

Of course even within a single resort I think there's a lot of variability. The diamonds on Gate House seem to be rated relative to that pod and not the resort as a whole for example. Someone new to the resort that doesn't know better could easily think "well I did Sleeper Chutes and Waterfall no problem so let me go tackle The Mall or Middle Earth since they're all rated the same" when in reality that isn't even close to accurate.

Another thing with people being clueless is that I think a lot of people don't even bother to look at trail reports at all to see what was groomed. If you want to avoid bumps or surprises, that's kind of important if you're not familiar with an area. Back in December at one point North Lynx was open on all natural snow and ungroomed. I had just come down Birch and a father with his young son getting off Gate House stopped me to ask how the trails were. When I mentioned there was no groomed option from the top of North Lynx and everything was bumped up he was a bit surprised and questioned me a bit saying "You mean there's moguls? But I thought there were blue options up there". "Yes, but they haven't made any snow yet up there and at the moment nothing is groomed. They're skiing well as long as you realize you'll be skiing bumps." I think at that point the only groomed option on Gatehouse was the Pushover route so I directed him to trails like Lower Jester off Bravo instead to get some other groomed options.
 

WinS

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 25, 2017
Messages
671
Points
63
Just remember that we were all new to Sugarbush once. We have seen a nice increase in new visitors this year. Some of it is due to the Ikon and MC passes but not entirely. It seems about 6% total visits are Ikon. Still close to 60% of out visits are passholders and the frequency of the days skied this season so far is up over the past couple of years due to the conditions I believe.
 

jaybird

Active member
Joined
Sep 26, 2012
Messages
277
Points
28
Good to see you out there today.
Conditions on Cotillion ridge were PrimoSuperUltra !!
Streambeds are getting audibly active.
Thanks for a very nice light groom on the secondary 'roads'.
8)
 

prsboogie

Active member
Joined
Aug 13, 2014
Messages
1,764
Points
38
Location
Swansea
Just remember that we were all new to Sugarbush once. We have seen a nice increase in new visitors this year. Some of it is due to the Ikon and MC passes but not entirely. It seems about 6% total visits are Ikon. Still close to 60% of out visits are passholders and the frequency of the days skied this season so far is up over the past couple of years due to the conditions I believe.
We had our first ever visit this past Friday and it was awesome. We will be back for sure.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk
 

STREETSKIER

Active member
Joined
Feb 16, 2009
Messages
306
Points
28
Location
warren, vt
The "Sugarbush Thread"

Tuesday was the day no crowds 4-8” fresh no wind ,sun broke out . longest day so far 8-3 non stop .started at mt ellen fresh-tracks down everything then started hitting woods did shots I hadn’t done in 20 years like tumbler woods (I went in at the third pine on the right) basically went in every patch of woods gravity took me and more ended up at south twice due to bus timing which was good liftline in slide brook we couldn’t pass up !!also some raw north facing deep silky if you know what I mean yesterday was ok but had to dig deep for clean lines snowed again last night but warm up is for real looks too be spring skiing next
5512c638492e5453270c0a361e6656b8.jpg
6bca6c5bc44180726ef9346655e668dc.jpg
7b7544276f9c65dd8aa7be8164b19ad8.jpg
b73a001c64df143836440d888e28d2d5.jpg
7a6180a97ed3d57671290191e86cd8e6.jpg
https://


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

MorningWoods

New member
Joined
Mar 5, 2018
Messages
59
Points
0
some day, they are going expand/replace the valley house and make it a legit lunch option. so much potential there. Giant hot tub facing spring fling would be super cool. just sayin'

Cool, I think it’s legit now. I’d rather see something happen at north or top of gatehouse. Although I really like the green mountain lounge.

In the interim can they get some freaking chairs in there? Plastic cheapos will be just fine. They only need 10-20 more. I had to stand at the garbage to eat my lunch because it was the only place to rest my tray. Eventually dug a table out of the corner buried under 55 ski bags but no chairs so had to kneel at it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

djd66

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 6, 2015
Messages
836
Points
63
Cool, I think it’s legit now. I’d rather see something happen at north or top of gatehouse. Although I really like the green mountain lounge.

In the interim can they get some freaking chairs in there? Plastic cheapos will be just fine. They only need 10-20 more. I had to stand at the garbage to eat my lunch because it was the only place to rest my tray. Eventually dug a table out of the corner buried under 55 ski bags but no chairs so had to kneel at it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

+1
 

ThinkSnow

Member
Joined
Oct 25, 2005
Messages
735
Points
16
Location
Bad Liver Valley
Cool, I think it’s legit now. I’d rather see something happen at north or top of gatehouse. Although I really like the green mountain lounge.
Rumor has it Vermont Adaptive Ski & Sports will be breaking ground on a new building aside of the Mt. Ellen base-lodge, which will closely resemble the existing lodge in its architecture. The new building will have an elevator to make the second floor of both buildings accessible for all & supposed to have restrooms on the second floor as well. Current deck on Mt. Ellen base-lodge also supposed to be expanded, or so I've heard....
 
Joined
Jan 18, 2010
Messages
662
Points
0
Location
spring mount, pa
Rumor has it Vermont Adaptive Ski & Sports will be breaking ground on a new building aside of the Mt. Ellen base-lodge, which will closely resemble the existing lodge in its architecture. The new building will have an elevator to make the second floor of both buildings accessible for all & supposed to have restrooms on the second floor as well. Current deck on Mt. Ellen base-lodge also supposed to be expanded, or so I've heard....

IT'S NOT A RUMAH!!! /arnold voice

https://www.vermontadaptive.org/
 

Julius

New member
Joined
Dec 17, 2018
Messages
31
Points
0
Location
Northeast
Tuesday was the day...

Tuesday was No joke, I had to take a dog out early at 2:30am that morn and was pukin so knew it'd be one fun pow day. And that's on top of it snowing Sunday and all day Monday. We hit and stayed on CR mostly. Yesterday (wed) was still a few alternate/untracked lines to take in woods depending where you were. Nice pics..
 

WinS

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 25, 2017
Messages
671
Points
63

flakeydog

Active member
Joined
Feb 7, 2014
Messages
216
Points
28
Location
Vermont
This is awesome. Having known some that participate in the program to and some volunteer activity in the past, they deserve every sq ft of this and more. Time to get out the checkbook and make sure this happens.
 

ThinkSnow

Member
Joined
Oct 25, 2005
Messages
735
Points
16
Location
Bad Liver Valley

WinS

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 25, 2017
Messages
671
Points
63
We have had a nice run but that is likely ending for a day tomorrow. Soft turns today and only very light showers. Unfortunately, it is not cooling off until very late, so that means we will not have a first shift of grooming and letting the snow set up. As a result, the grooming plan will be lighter than normal. We will groom the Gatehouse side at LP first and open that lift at 8am and North Lynx at 9am. Bravo will open as close to 9am as grooming allows, and we will rope off the trails off of the Valley House lift until groomers are finished over there. The temps near the base are not going below 32 until the morning, so lower trails will start off soft. Others are likely to be firm and fast. ME will schedule to open at 8am as normal on GMX. Saturday night we will have a heavy grooming plan and will hope for some overnight snow. Winter is back after today through most of next week. The pick of the day might be Castlerock -----------Pub.
 

HowieT2

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 22, 2009
Messages
1,624
Points
63
We have had a nice run but that is likely ending for a day tomorrow. Soft turns today and only very light showers. Unfortunately, it is not cooling off until very late, so that means we will not have a first shift of grooming and letting the snow set up. As a result, the grooming plan will be lighter than normal. We will groom the Gatehouse side at LP first and open that lift at 8am and North Lynx at 9am. Bravo will open as close to 9am as grooming allows, and we will rope off the trails off of the Valley House lift until groomers are finished over there. The temps near the base are not going below 32 until the morning, so lower trails will start off soft. Others are likely to be firm and fast. ME will schedule to open at 8am as normal on GMX. Saturday night we will have a heavy grooming plan and will hope for some overnight snow. Winter is back after today through most of next week. The pick of the day might be Castlerock -----------Pub.

That's about as honest a snow report as I've ever seen. Thanks.
I got two powder days last week and am emotionally ready for a corn harvest.
 

cdskier

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 26, 2015
Messages
6,409
Points
113
Location
NJ
Perfect timing by Mother Nature for us weekend skiers! Lol.


Sent from my iPhone using AlpineZone
 

teleo

Active member
Joined
Oct 6, 2008
Messages
203
Points
28
Win, I laughed. I cried. But gotta give you big bonus points for honesty!

Careful on the mud out there everyone. Skipped rox gap due to rox gap stat. But was behind a 2wd sedan with no clearance that stopped dead on west hill by the golf course. Fortunately I squeeked by him. In Subie I trust.

Win, Why is that section not paved? There must be a reason.
 
Top