Crowded slopes and crazy people

[Buckeye Skier 1330]

Finally made it out to the slopes Friday and Saturday. Its been a rough year between the warm weather,and a Christmas power outage, but we finallty got to go. Went to Holiday Valley, NY. I've read it has the most skier visits in NY state. I believe it. We've been going there for many years and it gets more popular every year. Saturday we were on a blue run that wasn't real wide. There were close to 50 people on a 100 yard stretch of this run. We just stopped to let everyone go when these 2 guys came barreling down using many of the people as slalom gates. I was also brushed my a teenager later in the day when I was just slowing working my way down another blue. He bit the dust about 50 yards below me. They have one hike to trail, about a 150 yard level hike to a short but powder filled trail. It snowed all day Saturday and I wanted to try some turns in knee deep fluff. I hiked over to it thinking I was by myself and as I stopped to put my skis on there were 3 guys poling up behind me. One shot by me before I could get going, then the other 2 passed 3/4 of the way down. This trail is only 20 feet wide!
Do you folks in New England have problems like these on the weekends? We've only skied midweek when we come up there, with the exception of a Sunday afternoon at Wildcat. I got to believe Killington is bad but with the mountains being bigger than Holiday do the crowds spread out?

 

[ChileMass]

Buckeye - welcome back!

I think we've all seen very crowded slopes one day or another. I recall many years ago being at Killington the day after Thanksgiving when there had been a huge dump of snow, and I've never skied in such crowds before or since. Your day at HV sounds pretty bad. I'd say most days even when there's a ton of people at a hill and the parking lots are overflowing the biggest problems are generally the lodge and the liftlines. For the most part, once you get on the lift, you're basically OK. Certainly there are bad days when it seems like you're skiing on a NYC subway, but for the most part the crowds disperse once you get on the trail.

Hope you can get out again soon! Did you get much snow out there from the weekend storm?

 

[skidbump]

me and my wife ski 1-2 days midweek and both days on weekends.We have gotten it down to a science. On weekends we are just about always first on lifts and usually leave by 1:30 ..During week we dont rush to get there and ski till 2-3 pm.Its to the point where its unbearable on weekends after being spoiled by mid week skiing.

season passes to belleayre

 

[BickMaster]

Crowds @ Mount MegaResort

Avoid Killington, Tremblant and such resorts like plague on weekends.
Many ski centers aren't too bad on holidays: Jay Peak was fine around the 27 of december after 5" snowfall. Stowe was OK 2 Sundays ago after 6" dump.
Sugarbush was not crowded yesterday (8" dump).
These centers are also quite far from big cities.

*<;O)

 

[thetrailboss]

Yep, crowds can be bad, especially when they are from the cities (no offense to anyone in here :wink: ) 'cause they just don't know ski-etiquette.

The Trailboss WORST places for crowds are:

3. Killington. It gets crowded here, even on weekdays!!!
2. Loon. As was confirmed by our Jan '05 visit, some of the trails resembled Storrow Drive or the Zakim Bridge during rush hour. A nice place midweek :wink:
1. Jay Peak. You hear a lot about the incredible snow and glades, but Jay's dirty secret is that most of their clientele come from NORTH of the border and bring their bad manners with them (no offense to you, Bickmaster, since I know many nice Canadians including you). The Quebecois have run me over many times and I am not a bad skier! The women and kids will yell at you if you get within 20' because they fear that you will hit them. It comes with good reason--their husbands/boys will just run all over you and then yell at you if you stop on the side of the trail to let them by. Some of the rudest people I've seen. :angry: They scrape the snow off of the main runs by 11am. Midweek this place is fantastic! It is good to hear that BickMaster had a day when this was not the case. :wink:

I guess my overall advice is to avoid Saturdays and come prepared for a mix of skiers/riders. Lately, I have not had any problems with the latter, thanks to snowboarding maturing as a sport and also in part due to parks.

I've heard that NY skiers have attitudes as well but have yet to ski in NY or find any. I've also heard that Mt Snow and Stratton deal with most of this clientele.

 

[dmc]

I've heard that NY skiers have attitudes as well but have yet to ski in NY or find any.

Yo - You gotta problem wit dat???

I generally find New Yorkers to be very nice...

 

[thetrailboss]

I've heard that NY skiers have attitudes as well but have yet to ski in NY or find any.

Yo - You gotta problem wit dat???

I generally find New Yorkers to be very nice...

Hey DMC.

From my personal experience, the New Yorkers I have met have been friendly as well.

I guess maybe we are all thinking about urbanites on the slopes? :-?

 

[Buckeye Skier 1330]

Hope you can get out again soon! Did you get much snow out there from the weekend storm?

Western Ny and western PA got around 12" from Saturday's storm, a lot of it falling while we skied. We were there early so we beat the crowds for a few hours. It wasn't a bad day, just had a few runs with some negative experiences. Friday we skied from 12:00 to 6:00 and got out of there when the busses started rolling in. So we got our runs in for sure. This weekend we hope to go to Laurel Mtn. PA. It's a nice down home ski area with a big vertical (900 ft), at least for this area. It shouldn't be too crowded at all.
One note on NY skiers, the people we met at Gore last year were some of the friendliest people we've been around while skiing. Then again I can see where Stratton gets the reputation it has.

 

[Masskier]

This is one of the reasons I ski Burke. Even on weekends you have trails all to yourself. At lunch time its easy to find a place to sit and eat. You meet some of the nicest and friendliest people anywhere. Also they have the biggest double chairlift in the country, you can easily fit 4 people on it.

 

[Masskier]

This is one of the reasons I ski Burke. Even on weekends you have trails all to yourself. At lunch time its easy to find a place to sit and eat. You meet some of the nicest and friendliest people anywhere. Also they have the biggest double chairlift in the country, you can easily fit 4 people on it.

 

[Masskier]

whoops! sorry for the double post

 

[riverc0il]

Also they have the biggest double chairlift in the country, you can easily fit 4 people on it.

:lol:

 

[thetrailboss]

Yep, Burke's Willoughby Quad is a retrofitted Hall Double. http://www.chairlift.org/burke.html check out my pics of the lift and the Vermont Life photo I contributed from the late 1970's. Here is the old double: http://www.chairlift.org/pics/burke/bu5.jpg

And here are the pics of the quad: http://www.chairlift.org/pics/burke/bu2.jpg
http://www.chairlift.org/pics/burke/bu4.jpg and http://www.chairlift.org/pics/burke/bu3.jpg

The pylons were reused and there was a rumor amongst us locals that the lift used the same engine as the double, hence the slow speed. Take the last bit with a grain of salt. :-?

Regardless, my home mountain is great and has some excellent terrain. Ms. Trailboss does not like the long lift ride 'cause she gets cold, but I enjoy the views and the occasional good or stupid skier/rider who braves Fox's Folly. She likes the Poma lift though, but I find the upper part a real killer on the legs and thighs. :x

 

[Joshua B]

I've nearly eliminated lift lines and crowded slopes from my ski experience. It takes knowledge of what places are weekend "mob scenes" only to be visited on weekdays. Well that is, if you want to avoid lift lines and crowded trails.

 

[dmc]

I've nearly eliminated lift lines and crowded slopes from my ski experience. It takes knowledge of what places are weekend "mob scenes" only to be visited on weekdays. Well that is, if you want to avoid lift lines and crowded trails.

For us that have to work midweek...
Local knowledge helps manuver around crowds... If you know a mountain - you know where and when things get crowded... You know what chairs become empty at a given time... What days to get out early or stay late...

The only way to truley emiminate people from your alpine experience is to go backcountry.. Which I pray that I will be able to do this weekend...

 

[hammer]

If you know a mountain - you know where and when things get crowded... You know what chairs become empty at a given time... What days to get out early or stay late...

If you don't know a mountain, hopefully there are local AZers out there who will give you the inside secrets (by PM if necessary)...

 

[dmc]

If you know a mountain - you know where and when things get crowded... You know what chairs become empty at a given time... What days to get out early or stay late...

If you don't know a mountain, hopefully there are local AZers out there who will give you the inside secrets (by PM if necessary)...

....word...

 

[Joshua B]

I never said I eliminate people from my skiing. The word I used was crowds. I don't want to sound like a snob, but I'll give some examples of places I never ski on weekends: Loon, Waterville, Killington, Wachusett, Jiminy, Sunday River...just to name a few. Safe bets for no wait weekends: Berkshire East, Magic, Crotched, and Whaleback next season. This is just personal preference.

 

[dmc]

I never said I eliminate people from my skiing. The word I used was crowds. I don't want to sound like a snob, but I'll give some examples of places I never ski on weekends: Loon, Waterville, Killington, Wachusett, Jiminy, Sunday River...just to name a few. Safe bets for no wait weekends: Berkshire East, Magic, Crotched, and Whaleback next season. This is just personal preference.

cool... I like to eliminate all people from my experience... I am a snob I guess

Can't wait to do some skinning this weekend... Going to recon the woods tonight to check to see if the base settled enough...

 

[Joshua B]

I've got approved for a vacation day so I'll be at Magic tomorrow. Weekday at Magic doubles my chances for no waits. 8)