xlr8r
Active member
- Joined
- Feb 7, 2009
- Messages
- 947
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- 43
I guess you can only wait for fresh snow for so long, we are almost halfway through the season and its time to get out there and make the best of it. I only had 4 days on the season so far with the most recent of those on New Years Weekend in Maine, so 3 weeks was too long of a break. I still don't think the conditions warrant money on lodging for a full weekend trip to Vermont or back to Maine, so I took a day trip to Loon on my MAX pass for day 5 of the season.
Any time I go to Loon I make sure I get there early before the usual Loonatics show up, so I started off just after 8am at South Peak. South Peak is definitely the best place to start the day as it remains quiet over there until 10:30 or so and by then you can rack up 10 or so laps on the Lincoln Express. Lower Ripsaw, Twitcher, and Jobber were all nice but the upper sections were pretty icy. Cruiser was skiing superior to Boom Run so I did that several times. Next up was North Peak where upper Flume was the trail of the day ungroomed with lots of loose fresh snowmaking with a fun double fall-line aspect to it. After In the afternoon I went over to the West Basin where Rampasture and Lower Picked Rock were skiing nicely still when pretty much everywhere else was getting icy.
The place was crowded as you would expect but did not have much trouble with the using singles line except for the one time I tried using the Gondola at the end of the day and was rewarded with a 25 min wait. The day was mostly cloudy for most of the day, but the sun came out towards the end which made for some great views of the Whites. Finished with 24 runs and over 31k vertical ft skied, which is significantly more than my other 4 days so far this season. Best day of the year yet, and good things are to come as I also booked a 5 day trip out to Steamboat in February this week, something to look forward to.
Any time I go to Loon I make sure I get there early before the usual Loonatics show up, so I started off just after 8am at South Peak. South Peak is definitely the best place to start the day as it remains quiet over there until 10:30 or so and by then you can rack up 10 or so laps on the Lincoln Express. Lower Ripsaw, Twitcher, and Jobber were all nice but the upper sections were pretty icy. Cruiser was skiing superior to Boom Run so I did that several times. Next up was North Peak where upper Flume was the trail of the day ungroomed with lots of loose fresh snowmaking with a fun double fall-line aspect to it. After In the afternoon I went over to the West Basin where Rampasture and Lower Picked Rock were skiing nicely still when pretty much everywhere else was getting icy.
The place was crowded as you would expect but did not have much trouble with the using singles line except for the one time I tried using the Gondola at the end of the day and was rewarded with a 25 min wait. The day was mostly cloudy for most of the day, but the sun came out towards the end which made for some great views of the Whites. Finished with 24 runs and over 31k vertical ft skied, which is significantly more than my other 4 days so far this season. Best day of the year yet, and good things are to come as I also booked a 5 day trip out to Steamboat in February this week, something to look forward to.
