• 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!

Help me choose between Jiminy, Butternut, & Catamount.

Ballistic

New member
Joined
Feb 6, 2009
Messages
53
Points
0
Location
Manchester, CT
My wife and I are fortunate enough to be having a weekend at a Bed & Breakfast in Lee, Ma (Western Mass). We'll be skiing for two days, and I've never been to Jiminy Peak, Butternut, or Catamount. Which 2 of the 3 should I plan on going to have the best time?
 

MR. evil

New member
Joined
Nov 29, 2007
Messages
3,547
Points
0
My wife and I are fortunate enough to be having a weekend at a Bed & Breakfast in Lee, Ma (Western Mass). We'll be skiing for two days, and I've never been to Jiminy Peak, Butternut, or Catamount. Which 2 of the 3 should I plan on going to have the best time?

I like JP and have never been to Catamount but have heard good things. Everytime I have been to Butternut is has been over crowed and not much fun. But I hear the place is dead on week days.
 

marcski

Active member
Joined
Jan 10, 2005
Messages
4,576
Points
36
Location
Westchester County, NY and a Mountain near you!
It would help a little if you would have told us a bit about your skiing ability. I think the conditions at all three should be pretty good this weekend. I think Catamount is less crowded than the others...and IMHO, has the most interesting terrain. Jiminy is overall the steepest, but perhaps the least interesting IMO, since the trails don't have much character as they are flat and go straight down the fall-line. Butternut is probably the gentlest of the three...although I admit, its bee quite some time since I've been there.
 

zinger3000

New member
Joined
Apr 14, 2009
Messages
136
Points
0
Location
Latham, NY
Butternut is great midweek and overcrowded weekends. I think lift tickets are only $20 midweek. If you like black diamonds, though, you may get bored quickly as there is very little challenging terrain at Butternut.
 

Ballistic

New member
Joined
Feb 6, 2009
Messages
53
Points
0
Location
Manchester, CT
It would help a little if you would have told us a bit about your skiing ability.

You're right, I should've included that info. My wife is a beginner level skier (probably for life!), and I'm an intermediate level snowboarder (I've done the blacks at Snow and Killington, maybe a little slow, but completed nonetheless.)
 

ERJ-145CA

Well-known member
Joined
May 6, 2007
Messages
2,027
Points
48
Location
Northwestern, NJ
I haven't been to Jiminy or Butternut but I went to Catamount for the first time a couple of weeks ago and I really had fun. It had some interesting trails and because I was there on a weekday it was a pretty mellow place, don't know how it is on the weekends. I would recommend it and it seemed to have plenty of trails for beginners and intermediates too.
 

JD

New member
Joined
Dec 5, 2004
Messages
2,461
Points
0
Location
Northfield
Website
hotmail.com
I think butternut still does milk runs (free skiing for the first hour). You could show up early and do a couple runs and see what you think....could easily still get a full day a catamount if you decided it was too mellow. It is nice and close to Lee though.
 

crank

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 3, 2005
Messages
1,442
Points
63
Location
CT
Butternut is flat as a pancake and your wife would probably love it for that.

Catamount is a bit steeper, a bit more old school, older lifts, lodge, etc...

Jiminy is by far the steepest of the 3 and has plenty of easy stuff too. It has the most modern lifts and lodge.
 

MR. evil

New member
Joined
Nov 29, 2007
Messages
3,547
Points
0
Butternut is flat as a pancake and your wife would probably love it for that.

Catamount is a bit steeper, a bit more old school, older lifts, lodge, etc...

Jiminy is by far the steepest of the 3 and has plenty of easy stuff too. It has the most modern lifts and lodge.

butternut is flat, but a total cluster F&@* on the weekends becuase it's Very cheap and easy to get to. If your wife is a beginner she may
not like how crowed the trails get there.
 

Ballistic

New member
Joined
Feb 6, 2009
Messages
53
Points
0
Location
Manchester, CT
^I would go to Berkshire East, but we can go there anytime really, we live off of 91 in CT, and we've been there before, so I'm looking to try a couple new places. I think I'm going to go with Catamount and Jiminy Peak, as crowded trails make her more nervous than steepness does (I've heard Butternut gets crowded, and you guys are confirming it!), also, they definitely look bigger and more interesting for me! It's for the last weekend of February.
 

crank

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 3, 2005
Messages
1,442
Points
63
Location
CT
Berkshire East is by far the best Western MA area.
 

billski

Active member
Joined
Feb 22, 2005
Messages
16,207
Points
38
Location
North Reading, Mass.
Website
ski.iabsi.com
Berkshire East is by far the best Western MA area.

We have to qualify "best" again, please.

When I took my rank beginner daughter there when she was 9-10, she (with instruction) found the terrain to be very limited for greens. There was basically one trail she could ski on all day, and even then she thought it to be a bit much.
 

Jiminy

New member
Joined
Jan 17, 2010
Messages
1
Points
0
come to jiminy!

hi
we have about 30% of our terrain for beginners- for your wife, and our steeps are pretty steep, so if you did blacks at Killington you can do blacks at our resort. we've just modifed some of our green and blue/green trails for night skiing as well.

If you purchase multi day tickets at Jiminy, you get free night skiing included... fun to ski/ride under the lights and we're an easy drive from Lee.

Hope to see you here.
Jiminy Peak
 

Greg

Moderator
Staff member
Moderator
Joined
Jul 1, 2001
Messages
31,154
Points
0
hi
we have about 30% of our terrain for beginners- for your wife, and our steeps are pretty steep, so if you did blacks at Killington you can do blacks at our resort. we've just modifed some of our green and blue/green trails for night skiing as well.

If you purchase multi day tickets at Jiminy, you get free night skiing included... fun to ski/ride under the lights and we're an easy drive from Lee.

Hope to see you here.
Jiminy Peak

Welcome! Request:

Please, please, please: Seed some top to bottom moguls on Whitetail. Half groom it if you must. The lack of bumps is my only complaint about Jiminy, and 1K vert of good relatively steep bumps would get me and a lot of other AZers up there quite a bit. Could you imagine lapping a bumped up Whitetail off the Six pack? I would last probably 2 hours.
 

Greg

Moderator
Staff member
Moderator
Joined
Jul 1, 2001
Messages
31,154
Points
0
This, with top to bottom seeded bumps, would rule:

aaa.jpg


Sorry for the hijack.
 

ts01

New member
Joined
Jun 2, 2004
Messages
179
Points
0
Location
NY burbs
Welcome! Request:

Please, please, please: Seed some top to bottom moguls on Whitetail. Half groom it if you must. The lack of bumps is my only complaint about Jiminy, and 1K vert of good relatively steep bumps would get me and a lot of other AZers up there quite a bit. Could you imagine lapping a bumped up Whitetail off the Six pack? I would last probably 2 hours.

+1, x100.

Seed them or just let them build up from normal skiing. You have enough identical groomed terrain that you could lose one trail or one half of a trail or god forbid two trails or two halves of trails for people that want to ski bumps, and no one would ever know the difference. Heck, let Jericho bump up -- it's a "double diamond," right?
 
Top