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Loon vs. Waterville valley for season tix next year- help me decide

Dickc

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Dec 5, 2013
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567
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Location
Northeast Mass
Loon's East Basin double had some upgrade work done in the last few years. Looks like they had Skytrak come in and rework , at least the towers, as there are now SkyTrak lifting frames on them. My impression by looking at it a few weeks ago is they plan on keeping it for a while. Hall doubles are just about bulletproof.
 

machski

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Sep 5, 2014
Messages
3,702
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Location
Northwood, NH (Sunday River, ME)
Ok

Wasn't sure if they were considering a trail off Sunset to run parallel and skiers left of Flume. Seems like a fair amount of acreage in there.
Shhhh, plenty of good lines in that area already. Unfortunately the upper ones Loon has cordoned off the entrance and marked it as OB and roped it off. One entrance off Haulback to the lower lines is roped similar, but several others there. Putting am actual trail in there would be difficult. From sunset, you have a LOONG traverse around the peak to get to the front (the lift terminates below the actual peak by a fair amount and the peak pulls quite a distance out towards Sunset). You could cut it in from Flume possibly, but it is steep to skier's left of the lift. And it is a bit cliffy in there too above Haulback.
 

machski

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Sep 5, 2014
Messages
3,702
Points
113
Location
Northwood, NH (Sunday River, ME)
Seems to me there is a massive amount of acreage in between some of the trails on South Peak if Loon is looking for places to increase downhill capacity.
I doubt we ever see anything more on South proper outside of the approved learning complex which is basically from where Escape Route breaks off from Cruiser and below. The original South Peak expansion plans from I think the 80's called for something like 28 trails over there. They even got forrest service approval and began cutting trails around 1990 or so before that got hauled by lawsuits. The eventual compromise is what we have today. Upper South is pretty much fully built out, I think they may be able to swing one additional trail off the top above Cruiser to make for a more novice way off the very top, but that is all. I don't even think they can add any more glades over there.
 
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