Mount Snow 2/28 & 3/1

[drjeff]

Dates: 2/28/09 and 3/1/09

Resort: Mount Snow

Conditions: Hard pack with frozen and loose granular trending towards loose granular/machine groomed as the weekend went on. Seasonable winter temps

Report: Yup, it got warm and wet Friday and then a few hours before the lifts spun on Saturday EVERYTHING white froze up like a rock. Limited terrain at 1st chair Saturday with ropes dropping as the the cats could groom things out throughout Saturday. Decent immediate post freeze up snow, death cookies while present weren't too numerous and generally under 3" in size. All in all I didn't have too tought a time quitting early Saturday.

Sunday, much better than Saturday thanks to the extra passes from the cats to get the primary surface over to loose granular. Fast skiing, generally very edgeable surface. Anything ungroomed(read as the bumps) you just didn't want to bother with. The afternoon was VERY nice as it was ski on to the lifts and the sun came out for the last couple of hours which combined with basically no wind helped soften up the lower mountain.

Fingers crossed for the high end of the 6-10" that the NWS forcast is calling for tommorrow to get everything back into play again!

 

[gladerider]

long john was the best trail of the day today. afternoon sun did the magic. stayed there all day. hats off to the groomers

 

[tree_skier]

I was amazed that mtn ops decided they had to convert all of the smooth frozen surface to death cookies before they opened it on saturday. By far the best skiing was anywhere that was ungroomed.

 

[tekweezle]

took the emilios ski shop bus from NYC to Mt Snow on sunday. the drive up was quick and uneventful. got to the slopes at about 8:45 am and by the time we got our tickets and got sorted out, it was about 9:00.

the slopes were frozen in the morning and the temps were crisp. ah....classic new england conditions. good thing my skis were recently tuned. groomers did a good job of chopping up the ice and laying out some semblance of corduroy. it seemed colder on the main face. headed to the sunbrook side and it was a little warmer in that area. the trails overall were fast and slick. great conditions for carving out GS style turns. the Northface was mowed flat as well. by the end of the day, the sun came out and softened the trails up noticably. ended the day by the canyon express.

overall, a good, classic new england day.

 

[Glenn]

Yesterday turned into a really nice day once the sun came out. There was virtually no wind which made things really nice.

As said, snow was hardpack, but fast and edgeable. Uncles was great after lunch. No crowds either after lunch. I think the snow storm scared people home early. Which was fine because it was sunny and nice at the mountain.

 

[carbonXshell]

death cookies while present weren't too numerous and generally under 3" in size.

Free Fall was littered almost top to bottom with death cookies, some the size of baseballs. Then there were other trails like Cloud Nine and Thanks Walt that were smooth as butter.

 

[vcunning]

It was a great weekend for sharp edges. My 9-year old could easily make the run-off from Mine Shaft to The Gulch with speed to spare.

 

[tekweezle]

funny thing for me is that I had been getting spoiled having not had the pleasure of skiing "classic NE conditions" in a while. Lately, I've been hunting for powder and soft moguls where I can find them in decidedly non northeast conditions.

took me a couple of runs to get my groove back. it felt good to lay some high speed arcs in the bulletproof hard pack. it put the "controlled descent" techniques on hold for the day.

 

[MommaBear]

All in all I didn't have too tought a time quitting early Saturday.

Sunday, much better than Saturday thanks to the extra passes from the cats to get the primary surface over to loose granular. Fast skiing, generally very edgeable surface. Anything ungroomed(read as the bumps) you just didn't want to bother with. The afternoon was VERY nice as it was ski on to the lifts and the sun came out for the last couple of hours which combined with basically no wind helped soften up the lower mountain.

Fingers crossed for the high end of the 6-10" that the NWS forcast is calling for tommorrow to get everything back into play again!

I'm glad to hear Sunday was better than Saturday. Was getting LOTS of grief from family about not heading up Friday night (commitments in CT Saturday morning). They weren't thrilled with Sundays conditions so Saturday would have been REAL miserable (we've gotten spoiled, I know). I, personally, couldn't get into skiing Sunday with no bumps or trees (thou the groomers WERE in good condition) and the brisk temperature. Headed back to the condo for a nice hot cup of tea to warm up and enjoy the silence (left everyone else at the mountain). When I saw the sun shining I decided to go back and ski. Glad I did, snow had definitely softened up a bit and the cold didn't feel so bad anymore. Skied to last chair and had a blast just ripping down trails off the Canyon chair with my 8 year old.

Thanks to a text message from a friend in CT letting us know 8 to 14" were expected and very high probabilty of no school Monday, we opted to stay over another night and enjoy the expected 6 to 9" predicted for Dover. Was disappoined to see only a couple of inches on the ground this morning, but it WAS still snowing. Unfortunately, by the time we called it quits at 12:30, the snow hadn't amounted to too much more. What had fallen definitely improved the conditions from Sunday but no bumped up trails were open (per the trail report...I never made it over to North Face or Bear Trap to confirm it). The wind was brutal today and I heard several other people saying how much colder it was today vs Sunday. Temps were about the same but no sun and way more wind today. Hopefully the snow continued in VT - it was still snowing here in CT when we returned at 5pm - 14 inches rec'd at the shoreline, guessing about 12" at our place mid state. Website said they are opening more terrain for Tuesday so I'm guessing it did continue (or they are hoping it will thru the night).

 

[drjeff]

I'm glad to hear Sunday was better than Saturday. Was getting LOTS of grief from family about not heading up Friday night (commitments in CT Saturday morning). They weren't thrilled with Sundays conditions so Saturday would have been REAL miserable (we've gotten spoiled, I know). I, personally, couldn't get into skiing Sunday with no bumps or trees (thou the groomers WERE in good condition) and the brisk temperature. Headed back to the condo for a nice hot cup of tea to warm up and enjoy the silence (left everyone else at the mountain). When I saw the sun shining I decided to go back and ski. Glad I did, snow had definitely softened up a bit and the cold didn't feel so bad anymore. Skied to last chair and had a blast just ripping down trails off the Canyon chair with my 8 year old.

Thanks to a text message from a friend in CT letting us know 8 to 14" were expected and very high probabilty of no school Monday, we opted to stay over another night and enjoy the expected 6 to 9" predicted for Dover. Was disappoined to see only a couple of inches on the ground this morning, but it WAS still snowing. Unfortunately, by the time we called it quits at 12:30, the snow hadn't amounted to too much more. What had fallen definitely improved the conditions from Sunday but no bumped up trails were open (per the trail report...I never made it over to North Face or Bear Trap to confirm it). The wind was brutal today and I heard several other people saying how much colder it was today vs Sunday. Temps were about the same but no sun and way more wind today. Hopefully the snow continued in VT - it was still snowing here in CT when we returned at 5pm - 14 inches rec'd at the shoreline, guessing about 12" at our place mid state. Website said they are opening more terrain for Tuesday so I'm guessing it did continue (or they are hoping it will thru the night).

About 1:30/2PM, the snow started falling again, much lighter and fluffier than that HUGE inch or so this AM. Wind still blowing pretty good up here right now. I'll be searching for drifts tommorrow and may very well atleast attempt a trip back into the trees to see if any decent amounts of fluff blew in there(fingers crossed)

 

[Glenn]

Let us know what the final total is up there. Looks like this was a more southerly storm.

 

[Glenn]

Pics from Sunday, 3/2009:

Mountain Ops on a quad

The sun came out in the afternoon...and the snow down south scared everyone away.

 

[Dr Skimeister]

Uncles or the only-opened-mid-morning One More Time were the runs of the day Sunday.

Nice pictures.

 

[drjeff]

Let us know what the final total is up there. Looks like this was a more southerly storm.

Probably 4-5" total and then the standard wind redistribution that had exposed areas mainly near the summit wind scourred down to the hardpack , and then some wind deposited drifts that were closing in on boot top deep . Trails that they didn't groom last night and that didn't get a wind buff had a couple of inches of fluff on them. - I'll elaborate more in the TR (with pics) I'm about to post

 

[carbonXshell]

Pics from Sunday, 3/2009:

Here are some from Saturday,

 

[carbonXshell]

 

[Glenn]

Nice pics! Amazing cookies out there Saturday. Eek!